From the Bookshelf of Don Quixote – Miguel de Cervantes…

Don Quixote

Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra,

Edith Grossman (Translator)

Start date: January 13, 2014

Finish date: March 16, 2014

Discussion: Discussion Threads

Why we're reading this: “Too much sanity may be madness. And maddest of all, to see life as it is and not as it should be.”
[close] “Too much sanity may be madness. And maddest of all, to see life as it is and not as it should be.”

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Discussion Threads

Week 2: Part I, Chapters 14–26
By Jason , Man of La Bamba · 18 posts · 24 views

last updated May 18, 2014 01:20PM

Week 1: Part I, Chapters 1–13
By Jason , Man of La Bamba · 65 posts · 59 views

last updated May 18, 2014 01:16PM

What Members Thought

Dec 24, 2012 Jason rated it it was amazing

Shelves: reviewed, thrill-me-chill-me-fulfill-me, for-kindle, groupthink

When I read excerpts of Don Quixote in high school, which I think must be a requisite for any Spanish language class taken by anybody ever, I was astounded that something so seemingly banal could be as wildly popular and possess such longevity as this book is and does. At the time, I did not find Don Quixote to be anything more than a bumbling fool chasing imaginary villains and falling into easily avoidable situations, and the forced hilarity that would ensue seemed to be of the same kind I rec When I read excerpts of Don Quixote in high school, which I think must be a requisite for any Spanish language class taken by anybody ever, I was astounded that something so seemingly banal could be as wildly popular and possess such longevity as this book is and does. At the time, I did not find Don Quixote to be anything more than a bumbling fool chasing imaginary villains and falling into easily avoidable situations, and the forced hilarity that would ensue seemed to be of the same kind I recognized in farcical skits performed by eegits like The Three Stooges.

But I suspected there was something more to Don Quixote than what my 14 year-old impressions were telling me, and I’m glad I finally read this book in its entirety. Having done so, I’ve discovered that Don Quixote is not a bumbling idiot—far from it, in fact. He is highly intelligent, highly perceptive and observant, and most surprisingly, and in spite of his delusions of being a knight errant, he is actually also highly self-aware. The combination of these traits makes him one of the most interesting characters in literature, and if it weren’t for his fallibility in misinterpreting reality (to put it nicely), the brilliance of Don Quixote would be elevated to unapproachable levels.

Putting the characters aside, though, I have to say that the storytelling here is simply superb. When reading an English translation, I never know whether credit for this ought to be awarded to the author or to the translator (or to both!), but nonetheless this is the kind of writing that just pulls a reader along effortlessly. Each episodic adventure rolls seamlessly into the next and even while the subject of many of these adventures covers similar ground—a maiden who has been dishonored by her man is one such theme, for example—it never seems recycled.

Don Quixote is actually comprised of two volumes written about a decade apart. Historically speaking, there was an erroneous book published in between Cervantes’s own two works under the pretense of being the “real” volume two of the tale of Don Quixote, but was attributed to an unidentified author with the pseudonym Avellaneda. It is likely that this fake version lit a match under Cervantes, and what I love about this little piece of history is that when Cervantes actually completes his authentic second volume, it is riddled with allusions to Avellaneda’s deceptive book, and these allusions become so ingrained in the text that it becomes difficult to separate fact from fiction. At one point Don Quixote meets someone who claims to know him, but as the story unfolds, it becomes clear that the claimant has actually met Avellaneda’s Don Quixote, and the real Don Quixote is horrified that someone should have the audacity, not just to impersonate him, but to do such a horrible job impersonating him, that he goes to great lengths (and yes, we’re talking about the character here) to prove to anyone and everyone that he is the real Don Quixote. He even changes his itinerary to avoid a city that the fake Don Quixote purportedly goes to, just to make it clear that Avellaneda is a lying whore and cannot be trusted. Metafictional stuff like that can be pretty entertaining in its own right, but the fact that it was implemented in a book written over four hundred years ago just makes it all the more mind blowing, or at least it does to me.

All in all, I had a hard time letting go of DQ when I finished this book. It turns out I really fell for the guy. ...more

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May 07, 2014 Cosmic Arcata rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: most-overrated-group-book-list

In short, he became so absorbed in his books that he spent his nights from sunset to sunrise, and his days from dawn to dark, poring over them; and what with little sleep and much reading his brains got so dry that he lost his wits. His fancy grew full of what he used to read about in his books, enchantments, quarrels, battles, challenges, wounds, wooings, loves, agonies, and all sorts of impossible nonsense; and it so possessed his mind that the whole fabric of invention and fancy he read of wa ...more

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Apr 14, 2017 ReemK10 (Paper Pills) rated it it was amazing

Brilliant!

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Aug 20, 2015 Cosmic Arcata rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

really enjoyed this book. I saw how people are manipulated by hope. How those that manipulate with hope often sound very convincing of things that they really do not have to give. Often people may believe in the reality of their hope to such an extent as to see it as having been attained. There are a lot of illusions that people buy into when they adopt a rigid way of thinking.

I also liked watching the relationships between Don Quixote and Sancho Panza. It reminded me of a parent child relation ...more

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Dec 28, 2011 Nathan rated it it was amazing

Shelves: fiction, favorites

Disclaimer: I had no idea what I was getting myself into with this one.

Although the plot is well known, the metafictional style in which Don Quixote's story is told came as quite a surprise to me. At the highest level of our observation we have Cervantes writing as Cide Hamete, Don Quixote's historian, chronicling the events of the knight errant and his squire, Sancho Panza. Within this framework, we are treated to nearly every fictional device I can think of at the moment, including: frame sto ...more

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Mar 13, 2015 P.A. Callaro rated it liked it

It's place on the short list of "greatest" novels ever written seems to me to be based on its originality as the first modern novel and its brilliantly drawn characters. In fact, think of Cervantes' genius to not only write the west's first novel but to devise the technique of creating a novel, within a novel within a novel. Sancho Panza is now perhaps my favorite fictional character. Grossman's translation is wonderfully readable and Cervantes' humor in writing Sancho was deliciously surprising ...more

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Apr 28, 2013 Pat rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: audiobook

A genuinely inventive book considering its the seminal novel of western literature. The writing style however took me time to get the hang of, particularly the stories within the stories, and how they added to DQ's journey and the evolution of his character - as well of Sancho Panza, who changes quite a bit. I wish I had read this book with a group to get the benefit of other insights. So I am now exploring various literary criticisms of DQ to add to my understanding of the book. This is a book ...more

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Jul 27, 2012 Jeremy C. Brown rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: the-great-conversation

“There is no book so bad...that it does not have something good in it.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote

Oh this is a funny book! A funny, and very long and tedious at times books. Because it’s so long there really is a lot of “something good in it.” :-)

The best parts were the characters that described perfectly the crazy people in my own life and the arguably crazier people around them supporting them in their ridiculous decisions!

There were parts in the first book that were tedious a ...more

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Oct 07, 2013 Carina rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: classic, inspirational, buddy-group-read

Read - 13/02/2014 - 23/09/2015. Dates removed as otherwise this is added to 2015 reading challenge.

I started this book as part of a group read in January 2014. I kept up to date (actually I think I was a teeny bit ahead) throughout part one of the book. Then part two hit... I stopped reading for about a year... read 5% more and stopped for another six months... I basically finished this on my morning commute through sheer will power alone - and because I did not want to hit a two year mark on re ...more

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