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    Don Quixote
    Don Quixote
    Don Quixote
    Ebook1,462 pages28 hours

    Don Quixote

    By Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra and David Whitlock

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    According to tradition Cervantes first conceived his comic masterpiece in jail - his avowed intent being to debunk the romances of chivalry. From first publication Don Quixote was a best-seller, initially taken as a knockabout account of a mad Spanish gentleman and his cowardly peasant squire, but later reinterpreted as an enlightenment text, a representation of universal human nature, a myth of a tragic hero defending man's nobler aspirations, a study in alienation, a spiritual autobiography, a metaphor for Spain's imperial decline, an experimental novel that shaped later prose fiction, a tragedy and comedy in one, and a demonstration that ambiguity and uncertainty can lie at the centre of great art and that great art can be comic.


    Smollet's vigorous and lively translation brilliantly catches the feeling and tone of the Spanish original. It is a comic novelist's homage to a comic novelist.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherWordsworth Editions
    Release dateFeb 1, 2013
    ISBN9781848704749
    Author

    Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

    Miguel de Cervantes was born on September 29, 1547, in Alcala de Henares, Spain. At twenty-three he enlisted in the Spanish militia and in 1571 fought against the Turks in the Battle of Lepanto, where a gunshot wound permanently crippled his left hand. He spent four more years at sea and then another five as a slave after being captured by Barbary pirates. Ransomed by his family, he returned to Madrid but his disability hampered him; it was in debtor's prison that he began to write Don Quixote. Cervantes wrote many other works, including poems and plays, but he remains best known as the author of Don Quixote. He died on April 23, 1616.

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    Reviews for Don Quixote

    4/5

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    • 4/5
      I really liked this. And now I feel smarter. But I have nothing smart to say about it.
    • 3/5
      "The truth may be stretched thin, but it never breaks, and it surfaces above lies, as oil on water."Don Quixote is a middle-aged man from the region of La Mancha in Spain obsessed with reading books about chivalrous knights errant. One day he decides to set out, taking with him an honest but simple farm labourer, Sancho Panza, as his squire, armed with a lance and a sword to right wrongs and rescue damsels. On his horse, Rozinante, who like his master is well past his prime, Don Quixote rides the roads of Spain in search of adventure and glory.None of Don Quixote's adventures never really turn out as he would have hoped and his triumphs are more imaginary than real. He abandons a boy tied to a tree and being whipped by a farmer, simply because the farmer swears an oath that he will not harm the boy. He steals a barber’s basin believing it to be a mythical helmet, frees a wicked and devious man who has been sentenced to become a galley slave, absconds from an inn where he has spent the night without paying because he believes that he was a guest in a castle and therefore shouldn't have to pay. However, not everything that Don Quixote does turns out bad. He does manage, if unwittingly, to reunite two couples who had become estranged.Despite often bearing the brunt of the physical punishments that result from Don Quixote’s erratic behaviour, Sancho nonetheless remains loyal to his master as he endeavours to limit Don Quixote's outlandish fantasies. The first part of the novel ends when two of Don Quixote’s friends, tricks him into returning home. Once back in his home all of Don Quixote's books on knights errantry are burnt in an attempt to cure him of his madness but unfortunately it is far too deeply rooted to be cured so simply and it is only a matter of time before he sets out on his travels once again, accompanied by his faithful squire.During the intervening period of time whilst they were back at home a book has been written relating the pair's earlier escapades making them infamous. Don Quixote and Sancho meet a Duke and Duchess who have read the book about their exploits and conspire to play tricks on them for their own amusement. Whilst staying with them Sancho becomes the governor of a fictitious island which he rules for ten days before resigning reasoning that it is better to be a happy farm labourer than a miserable governor.On leaving the Duke and Duchess the pair travel on to Barcelona where Don Quixote is beaten and battered in a joust. They return to their respective homes where Don Quixote comes to recognise his folly whilst suffering from a fever which ultimately kills him.Now I must admit that I was not expecting too much before starting this but was very pleasantly surprised as I found myself on more than one occasion in tears of laughter. Likewise I enjoyed many of the conversations between Don Quixote and Sancho. I ended up almost feeling rather sorry for Don Quixote in his madness as he strived to recreate a world that never really existed. In particular I felt sorry by how he was treated by the Duke and Duchess and was uncertain whether they were merely cruel or as barmy as our two heroes. However, I also found the novel overly long and at times fairly repetitive, equally as one of my fellow reviewers have stated I hated the fact that some of the paragraphs were several pages long. Although I did enjoy it, it was a plod rather than a sprint through it. I am glad that I've read it but it is highly unlikely that I will bother to revisit it.
    • 5/5
      I finally finished Cervantes' DON QUIXOTE. It was a rewarding experience. It is a hilarious book. To travel along with Quixote, the knight errant and his squire, Sancho Panza is quite a voyage full of adventures. I could call this an adventure story if it weren't so ridiculous. Quixote decides to act out the story of the chivalrous knight that was prevalent in the literature of the time. We accompany him on all sorts of adventures which seem preposterous but he seemed to believe them. It is a fun read and i recommend it.
    • 3/5
      The introduction educates the reader of this translation of Don Qixote, that it has been abridged for the modern reader. I enjoyed it, knowing I would never have tried a book like this if were not adapted for readers today. I wanted to have a taste, or feel of this classic just for the experience of it. It is well done for interest, the narrator easy to listen to and edited carefully to give you the meat of the book without unnecessary details that the original writing style included. I would recommend it if you are not a classic purist.
    • 5/5
      The idea of the novel starts here. This is the source of the modern novel for many. While it remains the epitome of story-telling its fame has also led to the coinage of such terms as "quixotic" and others. Influential beyond almost any other single work of fiction, the characters through their charm and uniqueness remain indelible in the memory of readers.Don Quixote is one of those books whose influence is so far-reaching as to be almost ubiquitous, like The Odyssey, or the Bible. And like the Bible or Homer’s epic, it is more often talked about than read. But my conclusion upon reading it is to recommend to all: read it and enjoy the stories.
    • 5/5
      Can innocence only exist in a past long forgotten? What are the dangers of reading books? What is madness? In his renowned book, Miguel de Cervantes deals with these questions and more as he takes us along on the journey of Don Quixote de La Mancha and his faithful squire, Sancho Panza.
    • 1/5
      I tried, I really did. Just could not finish it. There were some funny moments, but after struggling to get 1/3 of the way through, I gave up.
    • 4/5
      I've owned this copy of Don Quixote for about 30 years, and have begun reading it on several occasions, but could never get much beyond the first 100 pages. This summer, bed-ridden from an accident, I decided I would finally, finally read it to the end. This time it was the last 100 pages that had me bogged down, not because they were boring, but because it felt like this book would never end. I had always assumed (based on "The Man of La Mancha" and other references) that Don Quixote's behavior, though delusional, affects those around him positively by making others see themselves in a better light, i.e. Dulcinea when treated as a lady, begins to behave like a lady. But this is not the case at all. In fact, no one changes their behavior because of Quixote. Except for his squire, Sancho Panza, people treat him even more abysmally than if he had been in his right mind. There is a lot of slapstick humor in this book, but most of the tricks played on him are not really very funny, in fact, they are mostly cruel beatings and tortures. I think the real essence of this book is not in its hero, Don Quixote, but in the displaying of the reality of living in 16th century Spain: the random cruelty, the abuse of power (the duke and duchess), the treatment of prisoners, the Moors, the false politesse of the upper classes. There is also the metaliterary aspect of the novel and its parody of romances of knighthood. I'm glad I read it, but it was not at all what I thought it would be.
    • 4/5
      I cried at the end of this one. A lot, actually. Didn't see that one coming.
    • 4/5
      The first true novel, Don Quixote, has impacted not only the literary world but culture and society the globe over for over 500 years. The masterpiece of Miguel de Cervantes blends fantasy, romance, sarcasm, and parody in such an amazing way that it has captured the imagination of generations over and over again no matter where they lived. The adventures, or misadventures, of Don Quixote and his squire Sancho Panza have made them icons for beyond anything Cervantes might have thought possible.The narrative of the events of the knight-errant Don Quixote’s three sallies is widely known, though more so those in Part I than those of Part II. However, while the adventures of the windmills and the battle of the wineskins and Sancho’s blanketing are the best known it the events in Part II that truly show the modern narrative arc that Cervantes was only beginning to display in Part I. While Quixote and Sancho’s hilarious misadventures are just as funny in Part II as in Part I, through the challenges for Bachelor Carrasco to snap Quixote out of his madness and the machinations of the Duke and Duchess for their entertainment at their expense a narrative arc is plainly seen and can be compared to novels of today very easily.Although the central narrative of Don Quixote is without question a wonderful read, the overall book—mainly Part I—does have some issues that way enjoyment. Large sections of Part I contain stories within the story that do no concern either central character but secondary or tertiary characters that only briefly interact with Quixote and Sancho. Throughout Part II, Cervantes’ rage at another author who published a fake sequel is brought up again and again throughout the narrative arc that just lessened the reading experience.The cultural footprint of Don Quixote today is so wide spread that everyone knows particular scenes that occur in the book, mainly the charge towards the windmills. Yet Cervantes’ masterpiece is so much more than one scene as it parodies the literary culture of Spain at the time in various entertaining ways that still hold up half a millennium later. Although reading this novel does take time, it is time well spent follow the famous knight-errant Don Quixote and his squire Sancho Panza.
    • 4/5
      An early masterpiece in the evolution of the Novel in Literature: Very entertaining, if at times somewhat long-winded, with an array of lively characters delving into the psychology, philosophy... the 'humors & humours' of the human existence, and a legendary 'hero' - Don Quixote - who tilts at much more of humanity's foibles than just windmills.
    • 4/5
      Reading Volume I of Don Quixote has been a bit of a challenge. Not because it's hard to understand, but because there are so many stories within the main story that it bogs it down for me. I kept putting it down for days or weeks at a time, and didn't really look forward to picking it back up. It's funny and entertaing, just long. I think I'm going to try to listen to Volume II on audio.
    • 5/5
      One of the 5 greatest (or most important) novels ever written... however, the old "crazy-old-man-attacks-someone-he-thinks-is-someone-else-and-gets-his-butt-kicked-and recovers-for-a-week-then-repeat, got a bit old after 940 pages.Sancho's govenorship was probably my favorite in the whole shebang.This bad boy was read in the following places: home, work, Starbucks, Spain, France, Italy, Newark Airport (twice), my car, and probably a couple other places I'm forgetting.
    • 4/5
      Don Quixote starts out as a man that is obsessed with the knights of the middle ages, and reads all of the stories about them. He snaps, and thinks that he himself is a great knight. Rides out, takes a squire, and has adventures.There were many funny parts, and I did enjoy reading it. However, it does get to be a bit tedious towards the end. I have no fear of reading a 1,000 page book. But those 1,000 pages should hold my interest throughout. The last 150-200 pages had me impatiently waiting to get to the end. I would recommend it, and it is worth reading. But I did struggle a bit at the end, unlike some other long works (e.g. War and Peace) that hold my interest throughout.
    • 5/5
      The number of references to this individual who is really very well described y deadwhiteguys is truly admazing to anyone outside Spain. Yet they must truly love him and admire him and have done so through the centuries. Spain is truly a misunderstood country, far more complex than most of us understand. No, Ihave not finished it yet, but I must. I was reading this on a city bus and a girl came up and told me it was her favorite book. Never had this happen before.The pasts I can best identify with are the comment that Don Quixote would stay up all night reading, and then the chapter when the neighbors throw out his library. My daughter would really like to do this.
    • 5/5
      I've gone back to this book every few years since I first read it in junior high, and there's always something new to discover about it. I think everybody should read it at least three times in different stages of life in order to appreciate it completely.
    • 4/5
      It's been 20 years since I've read Don Quixote, so I was due for a refresher. This was the perfect format. The art wasn't ground-breaking, but it was fun, and the story fits the episodic nature of comics perfectly. This is worth the read if you need a Don Quixote refresher, or if you just don't want to tackle it in large novel form.
    • 5/5
      This is quite the amazing tome, and always a pleasure to read whenever I take the time to do so. The world's true first modern novel, the (mis)adventures of Don Quixote and Sancho Panza will delight, instruct and make you laugh even after 600 years (and yes, you will chuckle at a few of the naughtier bits!) But there is something that is so endearing about our hero and his quest to become a knight that always will resonate with me every time I read. I think it is because Don Quixote is a reader like us, and as all of us wish we could imitate the heroes that we see in literature (as well as other forms of entertainment well after Cervantes' time such as film, drama and television,) we have no choice but to empathize with our wayward knight as he travels across the Spanish countryside in his quest to become like his idols. We readers all too well know how the power of the written word enchants us, and so we can't help but understand when Don Quixote, the fellow reader, wants to live out the stories of his own books...or perhaps, create his own tale!Comedy, adventure, romance, and sadly, a little realism at the end for a dose of tragedy - - Don Quixote really has it all, and is the perfect introduction for those who not only want to read, but to read well. If this book can't receive 5 stars, what will?
    • 3/5
      I have a feeling I would have liked Don Quixote a lot more in some other translation. I've wanted to read it for a while, but this translation (Wordsworth edition, P. A. Motteux) just didn't work for me. I didn't actually finish the whole thing, because I really, really didn't like the translation. One day, I will find a translation I prefer and have another attempt at it.

      I don't really feel like I get to write a proper review about the book now, but I'll jot down the impressions I got. I did get about halfway through, at least. The translation was a problem for me because it was very dry and dated. I feel like when you're translating books, the point is to make them readable to a new audience. Obviously, Cervantes shouldn't read like Stephen King, but to make the book accessible, it shouldn't read like a textbook. I feel like maybe the translation is too literal. It doesn't help that in this edition the writing is tiny and cramped together. I had a look at the Penguin edition at one point, and I seem to remember it being easier to look at, and the translation a little easier -- although of course I only read a couple of pages.

      In terms of the story, I love it. It's become so much a part of cultural background that it's a little ridiculous not to ever try it. I mean... "tilting at windmills", anyone? It is funny how early in the book that most famous part happens. I found the book rather tedious to begin with, but it was actually somewhat easier when I got to the story of Cardenio -- partly because I've read a book just recently that focused on the Cardenio story and Shakespeare, and that had been what prompted me to actually buy Don Quixote. At that point, I feel, the story does get easier, but I really couldn't cope with the translation anymore.

      I love some of the scenes and ideas, and Quixote's delusions, but it's kind of difficult for me because I get so embarrassed for delusional characters. It makes me rather uncomfortable. I also have a bit of difficulty with books that meander about and have so many stories-within-the-story, without much of a driving plot themselves, but my main problem was that I couldn't get into it and reading it felt like an awful drag.

      Please note that my rating is not for the book as a whole, nor the book in general, but for this specific edition.
    • 4/5
      This book can be read and interpreted from so many perspectives, it's almost difficult to categorize. To call it a classic seems accurate, if unimaginative. I found myself torn when it comes to Don Quixote himself, between feeling pity for someone with such a skewed vision of the world, and being envious of that self same vision. Freedom of thought isn't a trait as much as it is a skill. As for Pancho, such unquestioned loyalty is enviable. To have such blind faith in someone, that you will always be ok if you remain with them, to fight for a cause, side by side with a friend, is indeed a noble calling, and requires a selflessness few possess. I think "insanity" is an oversimplification, and the only box these two could possibly fit within, are the covers of a book.
    • 5/5
      I read it in translation, so I don't know what a difference that might make. Many parts of this are still hilarious after centuries, some scenes are moving, some magnificent. Talk about iconic? Tilting at windmills, Sancho Panza, Dulcinea del Toboso, a man made mad by reading too many books of chivalry... Its second part even pokes fun at itself--17th century metafiction! If it doesn't get the full five stars, it's because it does have stretches I found dull and pointless and meandering. Just felt at times the joke was extended far too long, with one incident after another repeating itself: Quixote goes on a rampage due to his delusions of chivalry. Victim of his outrage beats him up. Rinse. Repeat... But this is one of the earliest novels, at least in the Western tradition, and still one of the greatest and influential in the Western canon--and for good reason.
    • 2/5
       -I really tried to like this one -it's too deep or too old (younger than the Oddyesy) or too Spanish (Lorca is Spanish) or just boring -maybe later, maybe I need to take a class
    • 4/5
      Be it the last great Romantic novel, or the first great work of modern Western Literature, Don Quixote blurs the line between these two eras, parodying, satirizing, and waxing philosophic all the way.Don Quixote, arguably the most influential Spanish work of literature, is a tale told in two volumes, published a decade apart. Within this work, the ingenious hidalgo, Don Quixote de La Mancha, goes slightly mad after a little too much reading and not enough eating or sleeping (haven't we all been there...), and takes it upon himself to perform great feats of chivalry in the name of his unwary love, Dulcinea.Joined by his dimwitted sidekick, Sancho Panza, the two embark on quests and adventures, great and small. Quixote's niece wishes to get her uncle back and sane, which she and her accomplices team up to do, all the while thwarting Quixote's attempts at great acts of chivalry.A great work by any means, albeit a thick one. Recommended for anyone who has had to attack windmills, either figuratively or literally.
    • 5/5
      The first novel, and still amazingly fresh. Well worth your time.
    • 5/5
      Often called the most influential work of Spanish literature, Don Quixote is another classic novel that I've always meant to read but never made the time. Nearly two decades ago while living in a Spanish speaking country, I picked up a Spanish copy of Don Quixote with the plan to read the book as a way to reinforce my language studies. At that time I only made it through about 30 pages. Interestingly, I felt like I had read a sizable portion of the overall book. The copy I had purchased was only about 130 pages so I figured I'd read about one-fourth and promised myself that I'd eventually go back and finish. What I didn't know was that the Spanish copy I had purchased had been very significantly abridged and summarized and was not a true representation of the overall heft of this story. I recently picked up an English copy and found it weighing in at just under 1000 pages of text with another 50 or so pages of end notes and about 20 "roman numeral" pages of introduction prior to the story. I was shocked and at that point decided that I'd do better to tackle the book in English rather than returning to the Spanish knowing that it would take me at least double or triple the effort to read that many pages in Spanish given the slightly antiquated language and abundance of unfamiliar terminology.So I dove headlong into reading Don Quixote. I found out that the English volume contained two "Parts." Evidently the first part was published by Cervantes in 1605 and the second part was published as a sequel 10 years later in 1615. Apparently about 8 or 9 years after the successful publication of the book, an unidentified author wrote and released an unapproved sequel to the story. This anonymous author directly insulted Cervantes in the text and blatantly modified the character, behavior and motivations of the central characters of Don Quixote and Sancho Panza. It's unclear exactly when Cervantes started writing his official sequel but he was definitely spurred on by this derogatory piece of literature defaming his own story. In the official "Part 2" of Don Quixote we have some very over-the-top meta fiction in which all of the characters are familiar with the first official book as well as the spurious unauthorized sequel. There are numerous sequences of dialog between characters where they discuss the unauthorized book and condemn it as slanderous drivel. Don Quixote is especially offended and wants to do all he can to make the world know of the false nature of this second book and the true nature of himself and his adventures.As is likely the case of most readers approaching Don Quixote, I didn't know a lot of the details of the overall story. Naturally I'd heard about the "tilting at windmills" scene through countless allusions elsewhere. And I've long been a fan of the musical "Man of La Mancha" and so I knew some general story aspects from that as well. Certainly not enough to know the entire 1000 page story but I knew that Don Quixote was a man who read a lot of fantastic literature about knights and chivalry and somehow got it into his head that not only were all the stories real but that he was called by divine right to be one of these knights and to ride into the world righting wrongs and fighting for justice. He has sworn his heart to the lovely Dulcinea, also a figment of his troubled mind…a conglomeration of a real woman he knows and a fantasy maiden he idealizes. He takes his friend and neighbor Sancho Panza as squire and the two of them set out into the world looking like the most pathetic knight and squire you can imagine.Most of the story in Part One focuses on a wide variety of adventures showcasing just how entrenched Don Quixote is in his own personal fantasy as well as how truly inept he is at being a knight. Still, through a large amount of luck and with a large amount of mocking and derision, he manages to come off victorious in a number of very strange situations. He is convinced that an evil enchanter is working to block his way and thus when things do go wrong for one reason or another or when his eyesight drifts closer to reality than fantasy, Don Quixote is quick to excuse any glimpses of reality as evidence of interference from this vile enchanter. In the meantime, Sancho Panza sees the world clearly but rides along very loyally beside his friend and master in the hope of obtaining some part of the fortune. As the story went on I tried to decide just how far Sancho was drawn into the fantasy of Don Quixote. Sancho could certainly see the world for what it was and he ended up getting some bad scrapes and beatings as a result of his master's behavior. And yet he wandered along through the adventures in the hope of some reward. I think he partly believed Don Quixote's madness as truth but part of him also acknowledged that Don Quixote was likely a little bit crazy. In which case what does that say about why Sancho sticks around? He constantly says it's because he hopes to gain fortune and become governor of an island, but I wonder if there is a part of him who knows Don Quixote is crazy and he sticks around in an effort to help protect him or at least be comfort to him.As Part One goes on, friends and family from Don Quixote's village come up with a variety of plans to try and bring Don Quixote home and to cure him of his madness. These plans end up just as zany and outrageous as some of Don Quixote's "normal" adventures. In the end, they finally do manage to bring him home for some time so he can rest and heal after many tribulations. But he does eventually sally forth again and thus begins Part Two.As I mentioned above, Part Two has a lot of meta-fictional elements in that it seems that the larger part of the world has already read Part One and is already very aware of who Don Quixote is and what he is doing. Even though Part One made it rather clear that Don Quixote didn't have all of his wits about him, some of the reading public treat him as a true knight errant and are overjoyed to meet him and hear about his ongoing adventures. More frequently however, the people who have read his story know and understand that he is a little off-kilter and they decide to take advantage of both he and Sancho. They treat them as though they truly are knight and squire and they set up fantastic adventures for them all for the purpose of entertaining onlookers who are in on the joke. Even though the scenes often get outrageously funny there is a tragic sense to them in that the central players in the scene are being grotesquely taken advantage of for the sake of amusement. That concept in itself seems like an interesting commentary on just what constitutes entertainment. It didn't seem quite as tragic to laugh at Don Quixote in part one when his fantasy and imagination got him in trouble. But in part two when he embarks on similar adventures prodded by people who know as much as the reader, it feels a little wrong somehow.Part Two seems to focus a lot more on developing the characters of Don Quixote and Sancho in terms of a more philosophical ilk rather than the first part which made some various political and social commentary but seemed largely invested in having a rollicking adventure at the expense of a madman. I found that I liked some of the adventures and escapades of Part One more than the second part but overall I found Part Two more thoughtful and interesting. On the whole I felt like they made a wonderful counterpart to one another and should definitely be read together.Overall I really enjoyed reading Don Quixote even though at times I felt very lost and a little bogged down. There are a lot of political, social and literary references throughout the book, some of which had endnotes for me to reference and others did not. There were many very wordy sections filled with commentary on life and virtue and the nature of everything under the sun. These segments usually worked to break the flow of reading for me and left me a little stuck on that section as I tried to digest what was being said and work it into the overall message. There were many great passages that were absolutely brilliant in terms of observation as well as just great turns-of-phrase.Having finished the novel, I feel like I have completed a major achievement. And yet at the same time, I feel like I only barely scratched the surface of this book. There was just so much meat to be found in every chapter that I felt very overwhelmed and often just "plodded through" to make sure I was making progress. I would love to one day take a course devoted to studying this novel and dissecting some of the major themes and passages. I have no doubt that this book could fill an entire course or more and still leave plenty left untouched.To those thinking about reading this book alone, don't be daunted by its length or content. It is definitely something that can be completed. At the same time I would suggest that if you have access to anybody with deeper insight into the text, it would certainly not go amiss to ask them four some suggestions and pointers to help direct your reading. I would have loved some outside insight to help guide me through different passages. For now, the book returns to my bookshelf. The story and characters will run through the back of my mind for years to come and I hope that someday I can take the book off the shelf and dive into deeper study of this remarkable work of art.****4.5 out of 5 stars
    • 5/5
      My wife asked me how this was, and I told her it was really, really great and that I really looked forward to reading it and so on. She said "Well, it's a 'classic,' right?" Well, yes. But there are many, many classics that I've read and have no intention of reading again, or that I couldn't pick up and read a chapter or two in bed. There are very few classics that make me laugh and cry at the same time.

      There are very, very few classics which can stand with both Chaucer and Sterne.

      That fun stuff aside, Quixote must also be one of the great litmus tests in literary history. Once you can answer the question "what do you think about the Don?" you can probably also answer the question "what do you think about literature?" Gabriel Josipovici argued that DQ is a disenchantment of *all* idealism, and thus a founding moment in (his understanding of) modernism. You could easily read the book as an attack on any fictional work at all: it misleads you, it lies to you, it turns you into a lunatic.

      But if, like me, you're a soft touch, you can equally well say that, although the narrator of DQ is always talking about how the one thing s/he wanted to do in this book is to convince you not to read chivalric romances, because the more 'truth' there is in a book the better, the point of the book is in fact that the narrator is wrong. If s/he wasn't wrong, DQ wouldn't have the cry/laugh effect I noted above. And it turns out that the characters have a much better grasp of the way we use fiction than the narrator does. The Don might be a little bit nuts, but even his craziness is preferable to a world in which telling stories is thought to be 'wrong,' the position he ends up taking just before he dies. We readers might be as mad as Quixote, and as mad as the Duke and Duchess who play such tricks on him (p 956). But as Don Antonio says, "Don't you see, sir, that the benefits of Don Quixote's recovery can't be compared with the pleasure that his antics provide?" (930) Or as Don Quixote has it, "to tell jokes and write wittily is the work of geniuses; the most intelligent characters in a play is the fool, because the actor playing the part of the simpleton must not be one." (507)

      Frankly, I'd much rather build or read a good book than explain why all building and reading are for the birds. My pomo professors would be appalled.
    • 4/5
      I had some mixed feelings about Don Quixote. At times, I was very wrapped up in the story and found it excellent. At other times, I found it too ridiculous or slow paced and would then put the book down for months without any urge to go back to it. Cervantes, nonetheless, has moments of pure genius and my overall feeling is positive.
    • 4/5
      This is a monster of a book. It is just shy of 1000 pages and it definitely felt that long.

      Long classics are incredibly intimidating which is probably why I had such troubles actually sitting down and picking this book up because it intimidated me so much. Although the length is scary, the content isn't.

      I found this novel to be fully entertaining and almost always hilarious. Honestly, I caught myself laughing out loud in some bits, it was that ridiculous.

      Don Quixote is a guy, who after reading a heap of novels about knights, decides to become one himself and practically deludes himself into this strange scenario where he is a gallant knight. Everyone in the book thinks he is a madman, but the fact that they acknowledge this and then continue to go along with his nonsense is what makes this book so hilarious.

      (Also the fact that 'Don Quixote' was supposed to ridicule the novels that Don Quixote reads [and what was popular during Cervantes time] but in fact, made them more popular and became one itself. I swear in the second half it was the story of a true knight, if not a very strange one.)

      The relationship between Don Quixote and Sancho Panza is funny in itself and definitely matures throughout the novel. The intelligence of Sancho, even though he is portrayed as simple-minded, is superb and matures with the novel. Sancho really becomes a part of Don Quixote's madness in the second part and it's also quite funny to see him react in all the crazy situations.

      The plot wasn't that of a regular novel; it was simply the string of events that happened to Don Quixote after he decided that he was a knight and as a knight, he should do knightly things.

      The only thing I didn't quite like about this book was the length. I caught myself wishing it was shorter countless times throughout reading this book. In my opinion, it really didn't need to be this long.

      Overall, I would definitely recommend this book as a first (big) classic to anyone who is interested because I feel that the writing and story are quite easy to follow.
    • 4/5
      who knew that this book is so funny. it is pure slapstick comedy. several times i was laughing out loud. brilliant book cinsudering that is thr first novel ever written. lots of insight in the live of the peolpe of the time. this translation is very readable and has a nice flow.
    • 5/5
      Go on, you know you've always said that you mean to read this. And this translation confirms that this is really very brilliant and very funny at the same time.

    Book preview

    Don Quixote - Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

    Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

    The History and Adventures
    of the Renowned

    Don Quixote

    * * *

    Translated by Tobias Smollett

    with an Introduction

    by Keith Whitlock

    WORDSWORTH CLASSICS

    OF WORLD LITERATURE

    Don Quixote first published

    by Wordsworth Editions Limited in 1998

    Published as an ePublication 2013

    ISBN 978 1 84870 474 9

    Introduction © Keith Whitlock 1998

    Wordsworth Editions Limited

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    Wordsworth Editions Limited

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    For my husband

    ANTHONY JOHN RANSON

    with love from your wife, the publisher

    Eternally grateful for your

    unconditional love

    Contents

    The Life of Cervantes

    The Translator’s Note

    Preface to the Reader

    Volume One

    Book One

    1. Of the quality and amusements of the renowned Don Quixote de la Mancha

    2. Of the sage Don Quixote’s first sally from his own habitation

    3. The diverting expedient Don Quixote falls upon, in order to be knighted

    4. Of what befell our knight, when he sallied from the inn

    5. In which the story of our knight’s misfortune is continued

    6. Of the diverting and minute scrutiny performed by the curate and the barber, in the library of our sagacious hero

    7. The second sally of our worthy knight Don Quixote de la Mancha

    8. Of the happy success of the valiant Don Quixote, and the dreadful and inconceivable adventure of the windmills, with other incidents worthy to be recorded by the most able historian

    Book Two

    1. The conclusion and consequence of the stupendous combat between the gallant Biscayan, and the valiant knight of la Mancha

    2. Of what further happened between Don Quixote and the Biscayan

    3. Of what happened to Don Quixote, while he remained with the goatherds

    4. What was related by a goatherd, who chanced to come into the hut

    5. The conclusion of the story of the shepherdess Marcella, and other incidents

    Book Three

    1. Wherein is recounted the unlucky adventure which happened to Don Quixote, in meeting with certain unmerciful Yanguesians

    2. The adventure that happened to this sagacious knight at the inn, which he mistook for a castle

    3. Containing the sequel of those incredible grievances which the valiant Don Quixote, and his trusty squire Sancho Panza, underwent at the inn, which, for their misfortune, the knight mistook for a castle

    4. In which is recounted the discourse that passed between Sancho Panza and his master Don Quixote; with other adventures worthy of record

    5. An account of the sage discourse that passed between Sancho and his master: the succeeding adventure of the corpse, and other remarkable events

    6. Of the unseen and unheard-of adventure achieved by the valiant Don Quixote de la Mancha, with less hazard than ever attended any exploit performed by the most renowned knight on earth

    7. Of the sublime adventure, and shining acquisition of Mambrino’s helmet; with other accidents that happened to our invincible knight

    8. Don Quixote sets at liberty a number of unfortunate people, who, much against their wills, were going a journey that was not at all to their liking

    9. Of what befell the renowned Don Quixote in the brown mountain; being one of the most surprising adventures, which is recounted in this true history

    10. The continuation of the adventure in the Sierra Morena

    11. Of the strange adventures that happened to the valiant knight of la Mancha, in the Sierra Morena, where he did penance, in imitation of Beltenebros

    12. A continuation of the refinements in love, practised by Don Quixote, in the brown mountain

    13. How the curate and barber set out on the execution of their plan; with other events worthy to be recorded in this sublime history

    Book Four

    1. Of the new and agreeable adventure that happened to the curate and barber, in the brown mountain

    2. Of the beautiful Dorothea’s discretion; with other pleasant and entertaining particulars

    3. The pleasant artifice practised to extricate our enamoured knight from the most rigorous penance he had imposed upon himself

    4. The savoury conversation that passed between Don Quixote and his squire Sancho Panza; with many other incidents

    5. Which treats of what happened to Don Quixote and his company at the inn

    6. The novel of the Impertinent Curiosity

    7. The continuation of the novel called the Impertinent Curiosity

    8. The conclusion of the Impertinent Curiosity

    9. An account of other strange adventures that happened at the inn

    10. A continuation of the history of the renowned princess Micomicona; with other pleasant adventures

    11. The sequel of Don Quixote’s curious discourse, on the subjects of learning and war

    12. In which the captive recounts his life and adventures

    13. The continuation of the captive’s history

    14. The continuation of the captive’s adventures

    15. Of what further happened at the inn, with many other particulars worthy to be known

    16. The agreeable story of the young muleteer, with many other strange incidents that happened in the inn

    17. A continuation of the surprising events that happened in the inn

    18. The decision of the doubts concerning Mambrino’s helmet and the panel; with a full and true account of many other adventures

    19. In which is concluded the notable adventure of the troopers; with an account of the surprising ferocity of our worthy knight Don Quixote

    20. An account of the strange manner in which Don Quixote was enchanted; with other remarkable events

    21. In which the canon prosecutes the subject of knight-errantry, and makes other observations worthy of his genius

    22. The sage conversation that passed between Sancho Panza and his master Don Quixote

    23. Of the sage contest between Don Quixote and the canon, with other events

    24. The story which the goatherd recounted to the conductors of Don Quixote

    25. Of the quarrel that happened between Don Quixote and the goatherd, with the curious adventure of the disciplinants, which the knight happily achieved with the sweat of his brow

    Volume Two

    Book One

    Preface to Volume Two

    Approbations to Volume Two

    1. Of the behaviour of the curate and barber, with regard to Don Quixote’s infirmity

    2. The notable fray that happened between Sancho and Don Quixote’s niece and housekeeper; with other diverting incidents

    3. The ludicrous conversation that passed between Don Quixote, Sancho Panza, and the bachelor Sampson Carrasco

    4. In which Sancho Panza satisfies the doubts, and answers the questions of the bachelor Sampson Carrasco; with other incidents worthy to be recited and known

    5. Of the sage and pleasant dialogue between Sancho Panza and his wife Teresa Panza, with other incidents worthy to be most happily recorded

    6. Of what passed between Don Quixote, his niece and housekeeper, being one of the most important chapters of the whole history

    7. Of what passed between Don Quixote and his squire; with other surprising incidents

    8. An account of what happened to Don Quixote in his journey to visit his mistress Dulcinea del Toboso

    9. Which contains what you will see in the perusal of it

    10. Gives an account of the stratagem which Sancho practised, in order to enchant the lady Dulcinea; with other circumstances equally ludicrous and true

    11. Of the strange adventure which befell the valiant Don Quixote, with the cart or waggon containing the parliament of death

    12. Of the strange adventure that happened to the valiant Don Quixote, in his encounter with the knight of the mirrors

    13. In which is continued the adventure of the knight of the wood; with the sage, uncommon and agreeable dialogue that passed between the two squires

    14. Wherein the adventure of the knight of the wood is continued

    15. Which gives an account and information of the knight of the mirrors, and his squire

    16. What happened to Don Quixote, with a grave gentleman of la Mancha

    17. Which sets before the reader that highest and most exalted pinnacle, which the incredible magnanimity of Don Quixote ever did, or ever could arrive at, with the happy issue of the adventure of the lions

    Book Two

    1. Of what befell Don Quixote, at the castle or house of the knight of the green surtout; with other out-of-the-way matters

    2. In which is recounted the adventure of the enamoured shepherd, with other truly diverting incidents

    3. An account of the wedding of Camacho the rich, and what happened to Basilius the poor

    4. Which continues to treat of Camacho’s wedding, and other incidents

    5. In which is recounted the vast adventure of the cave of Montesinos, in the heart of la Mancha, which was happily achieved by the valiant Don Quixote

    6. Of the wonderful incidents recounted by the extravagant Don Quixote, who pretended to have seen them in the profound cave of Montesinos; from the greatness and impossibility of which, this adventure has been deemed apocryphal

    7. In which are recounted a thousand fooleries, equally impertinent and necessary to the true understandingof this sublime history

    8. In which is set forth the braying adventure, and the diverting achievement of the puppets, with the memorable responses of the divining ape

    9. In which is continued the diverting adventure of the puppet-shew; with other matters really entertaining enough

    10. In which the reader will discover who Mr Peter and his ape were; together with Don Quixote’s bad success in the braying adventure, which did not at all turn out according to his wish and expectation

    11. Of things related by Benengeli, which he who reads them attentively, will know

    12. Of the famous adventure of the enchanted bark

    13. Of what passed between Don Quixote and a fair huntress

    14. Which treats of manifold important subjects

    15. Containing Don Quixote’s reply to his reprover; with other serious and diverting incidents

    Book Three

    1. Of the pleasant conversation that passed between the duchess, her women, and Sancho Panza; worthy to be read and remembered

    2. Which gives an account of the information received, touching the means for disenchanting the peerless Dulcinea del Toboso; one of the most renowned adventures of this book

    3. Being a continuation of what was imparted to Don Quixote, touching the means for disenchanting Dulcinea; with an account of other surprising incidents

    4. Which gives an account of the perilous and inconceivable adventure of the afflicted duenna, alias the countess Trifaldi; together with a letter which Sancho Panza wrote to his wife Teresa Panza

    5. In which is continued the famous adventure of the afflicted duenna

    6. In which is recounted the misfortune of the afflicted duenna

    7. In which the lady Trifaldi proceeds with her memorable and stupendous story

    8. Of circumstances appertaining and relating to this adventure and memorable story

    9. Of Clavileno’s arrival, and the conclusion of this protracted adventure

    10. Containing Don Quixote’s instructions to Sancho Panza, before he set out for his government, with other well weighed incidents

    11. Of the second series of instructions which Don Quixote gave to Sancho Panza

    12. Giving an account of the manner in which Sancho was conducted to the government, and of a strange adventure that happened to Don Quixote in the castle

    13. Giving an account of the manner in which Sancho Panza took possession of his island, and began his administration

    14. Of the dreadful consternation, and cattish concert, to which Don Quixote was exposed, in the course of the enamoured Altisidora’s amour

    15. Containing a further account of Sancho’s behaviour in his government

    16. Of Don Quixote’s adventure with Donna Rodriguez, the duchess’s duenna; and other incidents worthy of eternal fame

    17. Of what happened to Sancho Panza, in going the round of his island

    18. Which declares who were the enchanters and executioners that scourged the duenna, and pinched and scratched Don Quixote; together with the expedition of the page, who carried the letter to Teresa Panza, Sancho’s spouse

    19. Of the progress of Sancho Panza’s government, and other such diverting incidents

    20. In which is recorded the adventure of the second afflicted, or sorrowful matron; otherwise called Donna Rodriguez

    Book Four

    1. Of the toilful end and conclusion of Sancho Panza’s government

    2. Which treats of matters belonging to this history, and no other whatsoever

    3. Of certain accidents that befell Sancho upon the road; and other circumstances, which to know you need only look forward

    4. Of the dreadful and unseen battle, fought between Don Quixote de la Mancha and the lacquey Tosilos, in behalf of the daughter of Rodriguez the duenna

    5. Giving an account of the manner in which Don Quixote took leave of the duke; and of what passed between him and the gay and witty Altisidora, one of the duchess’s damsels

    6. Shewing how adventures thronged upon Don Quixote so thick as to entangle one another

    7. In which is recounted the extraordinary incident that happened to Don Quixote, and may well pass for an adventure

    8. Of what befell Don Quixote in his way to Barcelona

    9. Of what happened to Don Quixote on his entrance into Barcelona, with other circumstances that partake more of truth than of discretion

    10. Containing the adventure of the enchanted head, with other trivial incidents which, however, must not be omitted

    11. Of the misfortune which befell Sancho Panza on board of the galleys, and the rare adventure of the beautiful Moor

    12. Giving the detail of an adventure which gave Don Quixote more mortification than he had received from all the misfortunes which had hitherto befallen him

    13. Which discovers who the knight of the white moon was, and gives an account of the deliverance of Don Gregorio, with other incidents

    14. Treating of that which will be seen by him who reads, and known by him who hears it read

    15. Of the resolution which Don Quixote took to become a shepherd and lead a pastoral life, until the term of his confinement should be elapsed, with other incidents truly entertaining

    16. Of the bristly adventure in which Don Quixote was involved

    17. Of the most singular and strangest adventure that happened to Don Quixote in the whole course of this sublime history

    18. Which follows the preceding, and treats of matters that must be disclosed, in order to make the history the more intelligible and distinct

    19. Of what happened to Don Quixote and his squire, in their journey to their own village

    20. Giving an account of Don Quixote’s arrival at his own habitation

    21. Of the omens that occurred to Don Quixote when he entered the village; with other incidents which adorn and authenticate this sublime history

    22. Giving an account of Don Quixote’s last illness and death

    Introduction

    Tobias Smollett’s 1755 translation of Don Quixote introduces the general reader to Cervantes’ masterpiece through an accessible and racy English idiom. It further invites reflection upon the evolution of the English novelin particular and European prose fiction in general.

    Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra was born in Alcalá de Henares, near Madrid, in 1547. He came from an ancient but impoverished family and little is known of his formal education except that he appears to have had a sound secondary education and to have acquired a huge appetite for reading. He did not attend university. He went to Italy in 1569, there became a soldier and fought in the decisive sea battle against the Turks at Lepanto, where he was maimed in the left hand. Subsequently he spent five years as a captive in Algiers (see Volume One, Book IV, Chapters 12–15) until ransomed in 1580. He returned to Madrid and took up writing to earn his living. He was not financially successful and was forced to take employment as a tax collector. He spent thirteen months in a jail in Seville, unjustly suspected of embezzlement. According to tradition, he conceived of Don Quixote in a prison (see his Preface to Volume One). He returned to writing, and the publication of Volume One of Don Quixote in 1605 marked the beginning of the most successful literary period of his life, though he was always dogged by poverty. He published twelve Exemplary Novels in 1613, Eight Comedies and Eight Farces in 1615 and the second volume of Don Quixote in 1615, together with the less well known Voyage to Parnassus in 1614 and Persiles and Sigismunda, which appeared posthumously in 1617. He died in 1616 – according to tradition on the same day as Shakespeare.

    The first volume of Don Quixote was an immediate success and enjoyed rapid European diffusion and translation. There were pirated copies and an apocryphal sequel by Avellaneda in 1614, which may have hastened Cervantes’ completion of the second part. In his Preface Cervantes writes of

    the whole tribe of vain books written on the subject of chivalry;

    and in his concluding lines of the second part, that his design

    was no other than to inspire mankind with an abhorrence of the false and improbable stories recounted in books of chivalry.

    However it has often been pointed out that the vogue for such books was passing anyway. The last published in Spain was in 1602. It may well have been the case that the reading public at that time was all too ready to laugh at the fictional world of castles, tournaments, giants and dwarfs, ladies in distress, magicians and enchantment, unrequited love and trials by ordeal. Cervantes’ two volumes coincided with a change in reading taste which possibly reflected a realisation that a mediaeval aristocratic military caste and its elaborate rites and customs had little further use in the early modern world. Hence a knight-errant who, unlike his literary heroes, is aged about fifty, lean-faced and skinny, an impoverished rural gentleman whose home village and genealogy are both suppressed; and a fat, garrulous, cowardly, lying, illiterate and married squire, completely lacking in the gentle birth and education associated with chivalrous apprenticeship.

    Don Quixote however has not died with the literary taste it parodied but has become a classic text of the western cultural tradition. This status is due in part to the writer’s skill and in part to the novel’s remarkably protean reception in other European countries.

    The examination of Don Quixote’s library, the selective burning of some of its books (Volume One, Book I, Chapter 6) and the discussion of chivalresque prose, public taste and the drama (Volume One, Book IV, Chapter 21) show that Cervantes was a voracious reader of contemporary fiction and a witty literary critic. He was obviously fascinated by the theory and practice of literature and the literary controversies of his time. As a complex and subtle writer, self-consciously experimental, he delighted to tease the conventions of literature and had marvellous power to entertain. To begin with, he denies his authorship of Don Quixote:

    I . . . tho’ seemingly the parent, am no other than the stepfather of Don Quixote . . . (Preface to the Reader)

    The stepfatherhood is explained more fully nine chapters into the novel when, at the moment that Don Quixote, his sword aloft, is about to smite the Basque squire who is shielding himself with a cushion, Cervantes suspends the narrative – and the reader – to explain that at this point his historical source materials had run out until

    While I was walking, one day, on the exchange of Toledo, a boy coming up to a certain mercer, offered to sell him a bundle of old papers he had in his hand: now, as I have always a strong propensity to read even those scraps that sometimes fly about the streets, I was led by this my natural curiosity, to turn over some of the leaves: I found them written in Arabic . . .

    (Volume One, Book II, Chapter 1)

    Cervantes thus burlesques the romance convention whereby the most improbable fictions must be true because their source was an ancient mouldy parchment, written in a strange hand, discovered in a hitherto unknown vault . . . We are to understand that the ‘real’ author is an Arab historian, Cid Hamet Benengeli, Lord Hamet, Son of Eggplant, a favourite food of Spanish Arabs, whose historical text in Arabic already bore a marginal gloss:

    This same Dulcinea . . . is said to have had the best hand at salting pork of any woman in La Mancha . . .

    Don Quixote’s idealised lady love reportedly did domestic chores. Spanish Arabs were popularly judged liars and as Muslims did not eat pork. As the original documents were in Arabic, Cervantes had to find a translator and to edit an already annotated text. Cervantes is then a sort of second author and the reader must unravel a Chinese box of literary inventions. The frame of the novel appears unstable, the traditional authority of the author is subverted, the reader is made an accomplice in a fiction and the narrative is interrupted by metafictional devices which serve to confound fiction and reality, notably in the second volume when Don Quixote and Sancho Panza discover they are literary celebrities, are fêted by the aristocracy, and on learning of Avellaneda’s spurious sequel to the first part, force his readers to acknowledge their authenticity (Volume Two, Book IV, Chapter 7). Cervantes’ text becomes the object of its own narration. Small wonder that, at the end of the twentieth century, the festive, subversive and experimental features of Don Quixote fascinate literary critics.

    Cervantes was, likewise, the master of an enormous repertoire of narrative voices. The extended burlesque did not exclude his incorporating tales whose sentimentality, gentility and courtly language may not meet twentieth-century taste. Perhaps, despite the epic parody of the romances of chivalry, Cervantes responded, emotionally rather than intellectually, to the ideals and assumptions of that chivalric world. He hankered after the emotional security and moral certainties of a courtly Never Never Land.

    It is equally difficult to resist the suspicion that a writer capable of such subversive experimentation with literary conventions might also have expressed radical views under the guise of a madman. Counter-Reformation Spain was not noted for its tolerance. Some have speculated that Cervantes encountered Erasmian humanism during his schooling. The weight of scholarship is opposed to such musings, but such reflections still linger: the remarkably liberal views of human sexuality expressed in the encounter with the galley slaves (Volume One, Book III, Chapter 8) and Don Quixote’s advice to Sancho upon justice and good government (Volume Two, Book III, Chapters 10 and 11) suggest critical dissent from the orthodoxy or practices of the time. Nor is it entirely possible to banish the thought that even if the novel were not conceived as a parodic commentary upon Spanish decline and the disproportion between Spanish European and global aspirations and actual resources, Don Quixote could well have served such a purpose.

    The first part of Don Quixote was acquired for the Bodleian Library Oxford in its first year of publication, 1605, amongst purchases specially commissioned that year in Madrid by Sir Thomas Bodley. The first English translation was that of Thomas Shelton, part I being published in 1612 and part II in 1620. Shelton’s translation is of great scholarly importance since his English is contemporary with the Spanish original and, coincidentally, with the end of Shakespeare’s dramatic career. His translation was the standard for nearly one hundred years and doubtless its vigour influenced the novel’s reception. In 1614 Richard Brathwaite listed Don Quixote amongst

    fruitless inventions, moulded only for delight without profit,

    and his comment may serve to characterise the predominant English reception of the novel in the seventeenth century: it was a book of knockabout comic incidents, a sort of chapbook.

    Samuel Butler’s Hudibras (1662–77) marked a changing response, that is already Augustan, to the novel. Butler followed Cervantes in exploiting a comic discrepancy between the outmoded ideals of his hero and the reality of the world in which he found himself. He was influenced by Bacon’s argument that it was necessary to sweep away the

    idols and false notions which . . . so beset men’s minds that truth can hardly find entrance.

    As a satirist, Butler used the folly of the ideals of epic and romance in order to expose error and hypocrisy, thereby releasing truth and reason.

    Many eighteenth-century writers followed this interpretation of the novel and Don Quixote became a model of taste and propriety. Indeed for writers like Fielding, Johnson, Smollett and Hume, not to mention many less well known writers, Don Quixote was an enlightenment text, and this fact may caution us that in a given cultural epoch, the books read may be more representative than the books written. In the Preface to his satirical comedy Don Quixote In England (acted 1733, published 1735) Henry Fielding wrote:

    Human nature is everywhere the same; and the modes and habits of particular nations do not change it enough, sufficiently to distinguish a Quixote in England from a Quixote in Spain.

    Fielding believed that theatrical ridicule could reform electoral corruption, stop the abuse of women through arranged loveless marriages and clear up the professions of medicine and law. His theatrical ridicule eventually proved too much for Walpole’s government, which introduced the censorship of the London stage that survived for over two hundred years. Fielding turned to prose fiction with a deliberate emulation of Don Quixote in his Joseph Andrews (1742). Charlotte Lennox in The Female Quixote (1752) adapts Cervantes’ burlesque for a delightful heroine who, from the reading of romances, believes aspiring suitors will die for her at the proverbial drop of a handkerchief. The philosopher David Hume cites an anecdote from the novel, Sancho’s account of the discovery of a key with a leathern thong tied to it at the bottom of a hogshead of wine (Volume Two, Book I, Chapter 13), to exemplify his classical argument Of The Standard of Taste (1757), which like wine tasting itself, is an appeal to connoisseurship. Hume clearly had every confidence that the general reader would be familiar with a minor piece of chat in a very long novel. Mrs Thrale’s description of Don Quixote as

    a sort of common property, and almost universal classic

    plainly caught the English mid-eighteenth-century popularity of the novel (Anecdotes of the Late Samuel Johnson, 4th Edition, 1786). Tobias Smollett’s 1755 translation arose directly out of mid-century English public demand.

    Fifty years later, the taste we associate with the Romantic movement expressed a directly contrary view of the novel. Charles Lamb declared that Cervantes’ intention was tears. Byron wrote:

    Of all tales ’tis the saddest – and more sad

    Because it makes us smile.

    (Don Juan, Canto 13)

    This significant cultural shift was strongly influenced by German thinking which treated the novel as myth. Don Quixote was changed into a lonely outsider, a sort of tragic hero fighting for the nobler aspirations of man, the novel thus becoming a battle between the Ideal and Real. By this interpretation the novel has a transcendental meaning: Dulcinea, for example, is some sort of unattainable ideal love; madness is no longer funny, but a tragic condition perhaps capable of insights denied to reason. The Romantic response to the novel from the turn of the nineteenth century has dominated the reading and even the translation of the novel to the present day: Don Quixote with some teeth knocked out, the ‘Knight of the Ill-favoured Face’ in Shelton, and Smollett’s ironical and detached ‘Knight of the Rueful Countenance’ (Volume One, Book III, Chapter 5) becomes a sort of superior or Christlike ‘Knight of the Sad Countenance or Sorrowful Figure’.

    It has been wisely observed that Cervantes himself would have been mystified by such interpretations; his declared purpose was to entertain through an extended epic parody. There is then excellent reason for revisiting Tobias Smollett’s translation of 1755.

    In a foreword, Smollett gives as one of his aims as translator to retain the spirit and ideas, without servilely adhering to the literal expression, of the original; from which, however, he has not so far deviated, as to destroy that formality of idiom, so peculiar to the Spaniards, and so essential to the character of the work. He further adds that he has spent four years in translating and correcting. The dedication is to the Spanish ambassador at the Court of St James, Richard Wall.

    Two hundred years later, in 1955, an American scholar, Carmine Rocco Linsalata, published his doctorate in a book entitled Smollett’s Hoax (University of Stanford) in which he argues that Smollett knew no Spanish, employed a hack school of assistants and substantially plagiarised the translation of the dead painter Charles Jervis (or Jervas), published by his widow in 1742. His evidence is over four hundred passages collating Smollett, Jervis and the Spanish original. Such a volume of evidence may seem incontrovertible and damning. There are however commonsense considerations that may moderate Linsalata’s heat: as printed, Smollett’s translation runs to over nine hundred pages; translators of works like the Bible and Don Quixote have always examined and, where appropriate, drawn on earlier renditions. Smollett’s foreword concedes that he is trying

    to improve upon a task already performed.

    Jervis’ translation has always been well known for accuracy but it lacks fluency. Certainly Smollett had no formal training in modern languages like Linsalata, but then few but the social élite did. He had a sound Scottish schooling and went to Glasgow University where he studied to be a surgeon. However the course of his life indicates little real interest in medicine but a prolific facility with language. On the basis of a good grounding in Latin, he was most probably self-taught in derived romance languages. It may surprise a modern reader that formerly it was common practice to learn Italian, Spanish and Portuguese as parallel morphological evolutions of Latin, but such was indeed the case. Smollett’s Travels Through France and Italy (1766) indicates considerable facility with spoken and written French and Italian, as well as Latin. Smollett returned to Italy where he died in 1771. His other writings show considerable influence of Cervantes’ comic epic and Spanish picaresque fiction in general. In fact the charge of linguistic unpreparedness and dependence on a dictionary was also laid at Jervis’ door. Linsalata should not have admitted such contemporary innuendo without substantiation and should have attended to the second of Dryden’s two precepts, which he himself quotes, on the art of translation:

    A Translator that would write with any force or spirit of an original, must never dwell on the words of an author [page 2]

    Carlos Fuentes was surely correct in praising Smollett’s translation as

    the one where the feeling and the tone both come through . . . the homage of a novelist to a novelist. It is a novelist’s translation.

    Smollett’s Life of Cervantes and footnotes reflect educated and informed understanding of that time. They are not without value or interest but have been overtaken by the serious Cervantine scholarship which began in the following century. In contrast with recent twentieth-century translations, Smollett breaks each part or volume of Don Quixote into four books. Mrs Thrale’s remarks confirm that this was common eighteenth-century publishing practice. The reader should not be deterred either by this or by intercalated stories which may not appeal to his or her taste, but should approach the novel as Smollett did, with gusto and in the spirit of entertainment, in short should read for enjoyment. Here indeed is God’s plenty.

    Keith Whitlock

    Suggestions for Further Reading

    Those wishing to explore further Cervantes’ fiction and cultural background are recommended to read six of his Exemplary Stories (1613) in C. A. Jones’ excellent translation (Penguin Classics, 1984), Melveena McKendrick’s thoroughly readable biography, Cervantes (Little Brown, Boston and Toronto, 1980) and the superb down to earth critical analysis of Don Quixote in P. E. Russell’s Cervantes (Past Masters, Oxford University Press, 1985). Highly recommended as background are John H. Elliott’s Imperial Spain 1496–1716 (London, 1963) and Fernand Braudel’s The Mediterranean and the Mediterranean World in the Age of Philip II (2 vols., London, 1972–73).

    Two other biographies which incorporate much background and illustrative material are William Byron’s Cervantes, A Biography (Doubleday, New York, 1978) and Richard L. Predmore’s Cervantes (Dodd Mead, New York, 1973).

    The fictional influences of Don Quixote may be readily apparent. Amongst those novels which emulate the epic comic absurdity or modulate it for a different society and audience are Henry Fielding’s Joseph Andrews (1742), Tobias Smollett’s uproarious last novel The Expedition of Humphry Clinker (1771), Charles Dickens’ Pickwick Papers (1837), Fyodor M. Dostoevsky’s The Idiot (1886) and Graham Greene’s entertaining Monsignor Quixote (1982). There are of course lots more.

    Note to the Text

    Spelling and punctuation have been modernised to some extent, and some attempt has been made to achieve consistency in spelling; but Smollett’s own robust approach to proper names (Andalousia and Andaluzia; Sevil and Sevile and Seville; Nicolas and Nicholas; Reynaldos and Rinaldo; Lancelot and Lançarot, to give just a few) has largely been left unchanged.

    The Life of Cervantes

    Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra was at once the glory and reproach of Spain; for, if his admirable genius and heroic spirit conduced to the honour of his country, the distress and obscurity which attended his old age, as effectually redounded to her disgrace. Had he lived amidst Gothic darkness and barbarity, where no records were used, and letters altogether unknown, we might have expected to derive from tradition, a number of particulars relating to the family and fortune of a man so remarkably admired even in his own time. But, one would imagine pains had been taken to throw a veil of oblivion over the personal concerns of this excellent author. No inquiry hath, as yet, been able to ascertain the place of his nativity; and, although in his works he has declared himself a gentleman by birth, no house has hitherto laid claim to such an illustrious descendant.

    One author [1] says he was born at Esquivias; but, offers no argument in support of his assertion: and probably the conjecture was founded upon the encomiums which Cervantes himself bestows on that place, to which he gives the epithet of Renowned, in his preface to Persiles and Sigismunda. Others affirm he first drew breath in Lucena, grounding their opinion upon a vague tradition which there prevails: and a third [2] set take it for granted that he was a native of Seville, because there are families in that city known by the names of Cervantes and Saavedra; and our author mentions his having, in his early youth, seen plays acted by Lope Rueda, who was a Sevilian. These, indeed, are presumptions that deserve some regard, tho’, far from implying certain information, they scarce even amount to probable conjecture: nay, these very circumstances seem to disprove the supposition; for, had he been actually descended from those families, they would, in all likelihood, have preserved some memorials of his birth, which Don Nicholas Antonio would have recorded, in speaking of his fellow-citizen. All these pretensions are now generally set aside in favour of Madrid, which claims the honour of having produced Cervantes, and builds her title on an expression [3] in his Voyage to Parnassus, which, in my opinion is altogether equivocal and inconclusive.

    In the midst of such undecided contention, if I may be allowed to hazard a conjecture, I would suppose that there was something mysterious in his extraction, which he had no inclination to explain, and that his family had domestic reasons for maintaining the like reserve. Without admitting some such motive, we can hardly account for his silence on a subject that would have afforded him an opportunity to indulge that self-respect which he so honestly displays in the course of his writings. Unless we conclude that he was instigated to renounce all connection with his kindred and allies, by some contemptuous flight, mortifying repulse, or real injury he had sustained; a supposition which, I own, is not at all improbable, considering the jealous sensibility of the Spaniards in general, and the warmth of resentment peculiar to our author, which glows through his productions, unrestrained by all the fears of poverty, and all the maxims of old age and experience.

    Whatever may have been the place of his nativity, we gather from the preface to his novels, that he was born in the year 1549: and his writings declare that his education was by no means neglected; for, over and above a natural fund of humour and invention, he appears to have possessed a valuable stock of acquired knowledge: we find him intimately acquainted with the Latin classics, well read in the history of nations, versed in the philosophy, rhetoric, and divinity of the schools, tinctured with astrology and geography, conversant with the best Italian authors, and perfectly master of his own Castilian language. His genius, which was too delicate and volatile to engage in the severer studies, directed his attention to the productions of taste and polite literature, which, while they amused his fancy, enlarged, augmented, and improved his ideas, and taught him to set proper bounds to the excursions of his imagination.

    Thus qualified, he could not fail to make pertinent observations in his commerce with mankind: the peculiarities of character could not escape his penetration; whatever he saw became familiar to his judgment and understanding; and every scene he exhibits, is a just well drawn characteristic picture of human life.

    How he exercised these talents in his youth, and in what manner the first years of his manhood were employed, we are not able to explain, because history and tradition are altogether silent on the subject; unless we admit the authority of one author, [4] who says, he was secretary to the duke of Alva, without alleging any one fact or argument in support of his assertion. Had he actually enjoyed a post of such importance, we should not, in all probability, have wanted materials to supply this chasm in his life; nor should we find him afterwards in the station of a common soldier.

    Others imagine that he served as volunteer in Flanders, where he was raised to the rank of ensign in the company commanded by Don Diego de Urbina; grounding this belief on the supposition that the history of the Captive, related in the first part of Don Quixote, is a literal detail of his own adventures. But, this notion is rejected by those who consider that Cervantes would hardly have contented himself with the humble appellation of soldier, which, in speaking of himself, he constantly assumes, had he ever appeared in any superior station of a military character. In a word, we have very little information touching the transactions of his life but what he himself is pleased to give through the course of his writings; and from this we learn that he was chamberlain to cardinal Aquaviva in Rome, and followed the profession of a soldier for some years, in the army commanded by Marco Antonio Colona, [5] who was, by Pope Pius V, appointed general of the ecclesiastical forces employed against the Turk, and received the consecrated standard from the hands of his holiness, in the church of St Peter.

    Under this celebrated captain, Cervantes embarked in the Christian fleet commanded by Don John of Austria, who obtained over the Turks the glorious victory of Lepanto, where our author lost his left hand by the shot of an arquebus. This mutilation, which redounded so much to his honour, he has taken care to record on divers occasions: and, indeed, it is very natural to suppose his imagination would dwell upon such an adventure, as the favourite incident of his life. I wish he had told us what recompense he received for his services, and what consolation he enjoyed for the loss of his limb, which must have effectually disqualified him for the office of a common soldier, and reduced him to the necessity of exercising some other employment.

    Perhaps it was at this period he entered into the service of cardinal Aquaviva, to whose protection he was entitled by his gallantry and misfortune; and now, in all likelihood, he had leisure and opportunity to prosecute his favourite studies, to cultivate the muse, and render himself conspicuous by the productions of his genius, which was known and admired by several authors of distinction even before his captivity; for, Louis Galvez de Montalvo, in his poem prefixed to Galatea, says, the world lamented his misfortune in tears, and the muse expressed a widow’s grief at his absence. I will even venture to suppose, that, in this interval, his situation was such as enabled him to raise an independent fortune; for, we find him afterwards relieving the wants of his fellow-captives in Barbary, with such liberality as denoted the affluence of his own circumstances; and, in his voyage to Parnassus, which was published in his old age, Apollo upbraids him with want of economy, and reminds him of his having once made his own fortune, which in the sequel he squandered away.

    I make no doubt but this was the most fortunate period of Saavedra’s life, during which he reformed and improved the Spanish theatre, and ushered into the world a number of dramatic performances which were acted with universal applause. He [6] tells us that he had seen plays acted by the great Lope de Rueda, who was a native of Seville, and originally a gold-beater: when this genius first appeared, the Spanish drama was in its infancy: one large sack or bag contained all the furniture and dress of the theatre, consisting of four sheepskin jackets with the wool on, trimmed with gilt leather; four beards and periwigs, and the same number of pastoral crooks. The piece was no other than a dialogue or eclogue between two or three swains and a shepherdess, seasoned with comic interludes, or rather low buffoonery, exhibited in the characters of a blackamoor, a bravo, a fool, and a Biscayan. The stage itself was composed of a few boards, raised about three feet from the ground, upon four benches or forms. There was no other scenery than a blanket or horse-cloth stretched across, behind which the musicians sung old ballads unaccompanied by any sort of instrument. Lope de Rueda not only composed theatrical pieces, but also acted in every character with great reputation; in which he was succeeded by Naharro, a Toledan, who improved and augmented the decorations, brought the music from behind the blanket and placed it forwards to the audience, deprived the actors of their counterfeit beards, without which no man’s part had been hitherto performed, invented machines, clouds, thunder and lightning, and introduced challenges and combats with incredible success: but, still the drama was rude, unpolished, and irregular; and the fable, tho’ divided into five acts, was almost altogether destitute of manners, propriety, and invention.

    From this uncultivated state of ignorance and barbarity, Cervantes raised the Spanish theatre to dignity and esteem, by enriching his dramatic productions with moral sentiments, regularity of plan, and propriety of character; together with the graces of poetry, and the beauties of imagination. He published thirty pieces, which were represented at Madrid with universal applause; so that he may be justly deemed the patriarch of the Spanish drama; and, in this particular, revered above Lope de Vega himself, who did not appear until he had left off writing for the stage.

    In the year 1574, he was unfortunately taken by a Barbary corsair, and conveyed to Algiers, where he was sold to a Moor, and remained a slave for the space of five years and a half; during which he exhibited repeated proofs of the most enterprising genius and heroic generosity. Though we know not on what occasion he fell into the hands of the Barbarians, he himself gives us to understand, in the story of the Captive, that he resided at Algiers in the reign of Hassan Aga, a ruffian renegado, whose cruelty he describes in these terms: ‘He was every day hanging one, impaling another, maiming a third, upon such slight occasions, frequently without any cause assigned, that the Turks themselves owned he acted thus out of mere wantonness of barbarity, as being naturally of a savage disposition, and an inveterate enemy to the whole human race. The person who used the greatest freedom with him, was one Saavedra, a Spanish soldier, who, tho’ he did many things which those people will not soon forget, in attempting to regain his liberty, he never gave him one blow, nor ordered him once to be chastised, nor even chid him with one hasty word; and yet, the least of all his pranks was sufficient, as we thought, to bring him to the stake; nay, he himself was more than once afraid of being impaled alive. If time would permit, I could here recount some of that soldier’s actions, which, perhaps, might entertain and surprise you more than the relation of my own story.’

    Thus, Cervantes ascertains the time of his own slavery, delineates, with great exactness, the character of that inhuman tyrant, who is recorded in history as a monster of cruelty and avarice; and proves to demonstration, that his own story was quite different from that which the Captive related of himself. Saavedra’s adventures at Algiers were truly surprising; and tho’ we cannot favour the public with a substantial detail of every incident, we have found means to learn such particulars of his conduct, as cannot fail to reflect an additional lustre on a character which has been long the object of admiration.

    We are informed by a respectable historian, [7] who was his fellow slave and an eye witness of the transaction, that Don Miguel de Cervantes, a gallant enterprising Spanish cavalier, who, tho’ he never wanted money, could not obtain his release without paying an exorbitant ransom, contrived a scheme for setting himself free, together with fourteen unhappy gentlemen of his own country, who were all in the like circumstances of thraldom under different patrons. His first step was to redeem one Viana, a bold Mayorcan mariner, in whom he could confide, and with whom he sent letters to the governor of that island, desiring, in the name of himself and the other gentlemen captives, that he would send over a brigantine, under the direction of Viana, who had undertaken, at an appointed time, to touch upon a certain part of the coast, where he should find them ready to embark. In consequence of this agreement, they withdrew themselves from their respective masters, and privately repaired to a garden near the seaside, belonging to a renegado Greek, whose name was Al-Caid Hassan; where they were concealed in a cave, and carefully screened from the knowledge of the owner, by his gardener, who was a Christian captive. Viana punctually performed his promise, and returned in a vessel, with which he was supplied by the governor of Mayorca; but, some Moors chancing to pass, just as he anchored at the appointed place, the coast was instantly alarmed; and he found himself obliged to relinquish the enterprise. Meanwhile, the captives, being ignorant of this accident, remained in the cavern, which they never quitted except in the night, and were maintained by the liberality of Cervantes, for the space of seven months, during which the necessaries of life were brought to them by a Spanish slave, known by the appellation of El Dorador or The Gilder. No wonder that their hope and patience began to fail, and their constitutions to be affected by the dampness of the place, and the grief of their disappointment, which Don Miguel endeavoured to alleviate by the exercise of his reason, good humour and humanity; till, at last, their purveyor turned traitor, and, allured by the hope of receiving a considerable reward, discovered the whole affair to Hassan Basha. This tyrant, transported with joy at the information, immediately ordered the guardian Basha, with a body of armed men, to follow the perfidious wretch, who conducted them to the cave, where they seized those unhappy fugitives, together with their faithful gardener, and forthwith carried the whole number to the public Bagnio, except Cervantes, touching whose person they had received particular directions from Hassan, who knew his character, and had been long desirous of possessing such a notable slave. At present, however, his intention was to persuade Don Miguel to accuse Oliver, one of the fathers of the redemption then at Algiers, as an accomplice in the scheme they had projected, that he might, on this pretence, extort from the friar, by way of composition, the greatest part of the money which had been collected for the ransom of Christian slaves. Accordingly, he endeavoured to inveigle Saavedra with artful promises, and to intimidate him with dreadful threats and imprecations, into the confession or impeachment, on which he wanted to lay hold: but, that generous Spaniard, with a resolution peculiar to himself, rejected all his offers, and despising the terrors of his menaces, persisted in affirming that he had no associate in the plan of their escape, which was purely the result of his own reflection.

    After having in vain tampered with his integrity, in repeated trials that lasted for several days, he restored him and his companions to their respective patrons, notwithstanding the remonstrances of Al-Caid Hassan, owner of the garden in which they had been apprehended, who, probably with a view to manifest his own innocence, strenuously exhorted the Basha to inflict the most exemplary punishment on the offenders, and actually put his own gardener to death. Cervantes had so often signalised his genius, courage, and activity, that Hassan resolved to make him his own, and purchased him from his master for five hundred ducats: then he was heard to say, ‘While I hold that maimed Spaniard in safe custody, my vessels, slaves, and even my whole city are secure.’ For, he had not only concerted a number of schemes for the deliverance of his fellow captives, but his designs had even aspired to the conquest of Algiers, and he was at four different times on the point of being impaled, hooked, or burned alive. Any single attempt of that kind would have been deemed a capital offence, under the mildest government that ever subsisted among the Moors; but, there was something in the character or personal deportment of Cervantes, which commanded respect from barbarity itself; for, we find that Hassan Basha treated him with incredible lenity, and his redemption was afterwards effected by the intercession of a trinitarian father, for a thousand ducats. [8]

    From this account of his behaviour in Barbary, it appears that he acted a far more important part than that of a poor mutilated soldier: he is dignified with the appellation of Don Miguel de Cervantes, and represented as a cavalier whose affluent fortune enabled him to gratify the benevolence and liberality of his disposition. We must therefore take it for granted that he acquired this wealth after the battle of Lepanto, where he surely would not have fought as a private soldier, could he have commanded either money or interest to procure a more conspicuous station in the service. Be that as it will, his conduct at Algiers reflects honour upon his country, and while we applaud him as an author, we ought to revere him as a man; nor will his modesty be less the object of our admiration, if we consider that he has, upon this occasion, neglected the fairest opportunity a man could possibly enjoy, of displaying his own character to the greatest advantage, and indulging that self-complacency which is so natural to the human heart.

    As he returned to his own country, with those principles by which he had been distinguished in his exile, and an heart entendered and exercised in sympathising with his fellow creatures in distress; we may suppose he could not advert to the lessons of economy, which a warm imagination seldom or never retains; but, that his heart glowed with all the enthusiasm of friendship, and that his bounty extended to every object of compassion which fell within his view.

    Notwithstanding all the shafts of ridicule which he hath so successfully levelled against the absurdities of the Spanish romance, we can plainly perceive, from his own writings, that he himself had a turn for chivalry: his life was a chain of extraordinary adventures, his temper was altogether heroic, and all his actions were, without doubt, influenced by the most romantic notions of honour.

    Spain has produced a greater number of these characters, than we meet with upon record in any other nation; and whether such singularity be the effect of natural or moral causes, or of both combined, I shall not pretend to determine. Let us only affirm, that this disposition is not confined to any particular people or period of time: even in our own country, and in these degenerate days, we sometimes find individuals whom nature seems to have intended for members of those ideal societies which never did, and perhaps never can exist but in imagination; and who remind us of the characters described by Homer and Plutarch, as patriots sacrificing their lives for their country, and heroes encountering danger, not with indifference and contempt, but, with all the rapture and impetuosity of a passionate admirer.

    If we consider Cervantes as a man inspired by such sentiments, and actuated by such motives; and at the same time, from his known sensibility and natural complexion, suppose him to have been addicted to pleasure and the amusements of gallantry; we cannot be surprised to find his finances in a little time exhausted, and the face of his affairs totally reversed. It was probably in the decline of his fortune, that he resolved to reappear in the character of an author, and stand candidate for the public favour, which would be a certain resource in the day of trouble: he, therefore, composed his Galatea in six books, which was published in the year 1584, dedicated to Ascanio Colonna, at that time abbot of St Sophia; and afterwards cardinal of the holy cross of Jerusalem.

    The rich vein of invention, the tenderness of passion, the delicacy of sentiment, the power and purity of diction, displayed in this performance, are celebrated by Don Louis de Vargas Manrique, in a commendatory sonnet, which is a very elegant and honourable testimony of our author’s success. Nevertheless, the production has been censured for the irregularity of its style, the incorrectness of its versification, and the multiplicity of its incidents, which encumber and perplex the principal narration; and, over and above these objections, the design is not brought to a conclusion, so that the plan appears meagre and defective. He himself pleads guilty to some part of the charge, in the sentence pronounced by the curate, in the first part of Don Quixote, who when the barber takes up the Galatea of Miguel de Cervantes: ‘That same Cervantes, says he, has been an intimate friend of mine these many years, and is, to my certain knowledge, more conversant with misfortunes than with poetry. There is a good vein of invention in his book, which proposes something, tho’ it concludes nothing. We must wait for the second part which he promises, and then, perhaps, his amendment may deserve a full pardon, which is now denied.’

    Whether the success of Galatea encouraged our author to oblige the world with some of those theatrical pieces, which we have already mentioned as the first regular productions of the Spanish drama, or the whole number of these was written and acted before his captivity, I have not been able to determine; but, in all probability, his first essays of that kind were exhibited in the interval between the battle of Lepanto and the commencement of his slavery, and the rest published after his redemption.

    Unless we suppose him to have been employed at Madrid in this manner for his subsistence, we must pass over two and twenty years, which afford us no particular information touching the life of Saavedra; tho’, in that period, he married Donna Catalina de Salazar, dissipated the remains of his fortune, experienced the ingratitude of those he had befriended in his prosperity, and, after having sustained a series of mortifications and distress, was committed to prison in consequence of the debts he had contracted.

    In this dismal situation, he composed that performance which is the delight and admiration of all Europe; I mean, the first part of Don Quixote, which he wrote with a view to ridicule and discredit those absurd romances, filled with the most nauseous improbability and unnatural extravagance, which had debauched the taste of mankind, and were indeed a disgrace to common sense and reason. Not that Cervantes had any intention to combat the spirit of knight-errantry, so prevalent among the Spaniards; on the contrary, I am persuaded he would have been the first man in the nation, to stand up for the honour and defence of chivalry, which, when restrained within due bounds, was an excellent institution, that inspired the most heroic sentiments of courage and patriotism, and on many occasions conduced to the peace and safety of the commonwealth. In the character of Don Quixote, he exhibits a good understanding, perverted by reading romantic stories, which had no foundation in nature or in fact. His intellects are not supposed to have been damaged by the perusal of authentic histories, which recount the exploits of knight and heroes who really existed; but, his madness seems to have flowed from his credulity and a certain wildness of imagination which was captivated by the marvellous representation of dwarfs, giants, necromancers, and other preternatural extravagance. From these legends he formed his whole plan of conduct; and tho’ nothing can be more ridiculous than the terms upon which he is described to have commenced knight-errant, at a time when the regulations of society had rendered the profession unnecessary, and indeed illegal; the criterion of his frenzy consists in that strange faculty of mistaking and confounding the most familiar objects with the fantastical illusions which those romances had engendered in his fancy. So that our author did not enter the lists against the memory of the real substantial chivalry, which he held in veneration; but, with design to expel an hideous phantom that possessed the brains of the people, waging perpetual war with true genius and invention.

    The success of this undertaking must have exceeded his most sanguine hopes. Don Quixote no sooner made his appearance, than the old romances vanished like mist before the sun. The ridicule was so striking, that even the warmest admirers of Amadis and his posterity seemed to wake from a dream, and reflected with amazement upon their former infatuation. Every dispassionate reader was charmed with the humorous characters of the knight and squire, who straight became the favourites of his fancy; he was delighted with the variety of entertaining incidents, and considered the author’s good sense and purity of style with admiration and applause.

    He informs us, by the mouth of the bachelor Sampson Carrasco, that even before the publication of the second part, twelve thousand copies of the first were already in print, besides a new impression then working off at Antwerp. ‘The very children, says he, handle it, boys read it, men understand, and old people applaud the performance. It is no sooner

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