Me too! Or shall I say yo también? Luckily, tilting at windmills is a favorite activity of mine

I've read bits of this in Spanish, but I think it will be much more fun to read it straight through in my native language.

I still only count as one head but I got the book today, so I'll be able to start reading much sooner than I originally anticipated.

Musicophilia and Don Quixote here we go...whoo hoo!!

Chris OConnor wrote:Is Don Quixote the guy with the big nose?

Chris, you're thinking of Cyrano de Bergerac.

Or Steve Martin in Roxanne, which is a modern adaptation of Cyrano.

Both excellent entertainment.

or Baron Munchausen maybe?

Don Quixote has my sympathy. Sent mad by reading too many fictitious old books, he stands as the embodiment of chivalrous virtue (except for his murderous actions) in an age of squalor.

His "none shall pass" caper reveals itself as the template for Monty Python's Black Knight in the Quest for the Holy Grail.

Cervantes kindly points out that his writing method, improving an Arabic text of unknown provenance, shares much with the chronicles of chivalry. We might note his method shares much with older texts as well, such as the Bible, that are also reputed to be history, and that have as much claim to be fact as the celebrated Man of La Mancha.

Cervantes takes the opportunity of his entertaining buffoonery to satirise the entire courtly world of Holy Spain, safe in the modern confidence that his deft style can deflect any claims of impiety and other unwelcome attention from censors and critics.

Hey all,

I haven't been around for a while but I have ordered this book and will give it a try. I read this long ago as a teenager and really enjoyed it. Each time I think of the premise in DQ I think "how dumb" but somehow, whenever I revisit the concepts I can't help being drawn in.

Let's do this thing!

But take it easy on me 'cause I'm reading and discussing two books at once, and both require and deserve my full attention.

bleachededen wrote:

Chris OConnor wrote:Is Don Quixote the guy with the big nose?

Chris, you're thinking of Cyrano de Bergerac.

Or Steve Martin in Roxanne, which is a modern adaptation of Cyrano.

Both excellent entertainment.

Or Slawkenbergius's Diego in Tristram Shandy which some say mimics the style of Cervante's Don Quixote.

Robert Tulip wrote:Dear Chris and other readers

I'm up to chapter seven in Don Quixote. I would like to lead the discussion on this book if you like.

It is racy and unputdownable. The Man of La Mancha is a valiant mad knight fighting for the lost imaginary world of heraldry and nobility, one hundred years after Columbus found America and just as Galileo worked out the solar system. Cervantes is a brilliant genius, satirising the remnants of medieval thinking in the new modern world.

Robert

You are terrific, Robert! Thank you for volunteering.

bleachededen wrote:Let's do this thing!

But take it easy on me 'cause I'm reading and discussing two books at once, and both require and deserve my full attention.

I'm right there with you....I hope I can read fast enough