Don Quixote, by Miguel Cervantes

Not writing this review until 2 years after I finished it, so the memories are a bit vague and the below is based on notes I made at the time:

Until Roger drew my attention to it, I hadn't realised that the joy of this book is more in the style of writing as the actual plot. Reminds me a bit of Author, Author. You do have to pay attention to what's being said: you have to listen to reasonably long sentences and then parse them to get the understanding, so it's extremely easy, if you let your attention wander, to lose track of what's going on. When switching between listening to this and reading a Wilbur Smith novel I had to do a bit of mental work to get into the mode of reading stuff that wasn't quite so circumlocutionary.

Found out that "errant" (as in "knight errant") means "travelling in search of adventure".

To start with I wondered how Don Quixote would get through the whole book - in his first adventures he gets quite severely beaten and loses teeth etc. I thought that if it goes in like that he won’t make it. But quite a lot of the book isn’t actually about Quixote at all, but is the stories of people he meets, or even stories that they tell about other people.

I liked the bit where Sancho started telling a story about someone crossing a river and taking a herd of goats(?) one at a time. He said to Don Quixote "pay attention to how many goats go across, otherwise I won't be able to finish the story", and then some time after asks Quixote "so how many goats is that so far?" and Don Quixote doesn't know, so Sancho stops telling the story and he (and we) never get to find out how it ends.

When people tell stories which include women, the women are almost always described as unbelievably beautiful/most perfect ever.

I think I may have enjoyed the second volume more: at the beginning they talk about the fact that a book has been published about their adventures and someone who’s read it asks them to explain some stuff that wasn’t clear in first volume. They're a bit put-out that someone else has written part 2 of their story before they did it themselves (I think this actually happened to Cervantes).

Wordplay - I kept wondering how he managed to translate from Spanish. One E.g., Quixote says Sancho his suggestion is impertinent. Sancho says no, on the contrary, what he says is pertinent. I made a mentail note to check with Roger if that’s a translation that works in Spanish.

Rather sad that on his death bed he came to his senses and acknowledged that he’d been out of his senses to try and be a knight errant.

Stories of Sancho making judgements while he was governor were good.

Liked this

“Well then,” said the farmer, “this son of mine who is going to be a bachelor, fell in love in the said town with a damsel called Clara Perlerina, daughter of Andres Perlerino, a very rich farmer; and this name of Perlerines does not come to them by ancestry or descent, but because all the family are paralytics, and for a better name they call them Perlerines; though to tell the truth the damsel is as fair as an Oriental pearl, and like a flower of the field, if you look at her on the right side; on the left not so much, for on that side she wants an eye that she lost by small-pox; and though her face is thickly and deeply pitted, those who love her say they are not pits that are there, but the graves where the hearts of her lovers are buried. She is so cleanly that not to soil her face she carries her nose turned up, as they say, so that one would fancy it was running away from her mouth; and with all this she looks extremely well, for she has a wide mouth; and but for wanting ten or a dozen teeth and grinders she might compare and compete with the comeliest. Of her lips I say nothing, for they are so fine and thin that, if lips might be reeled, one might make a skein of them; but being of a different colour from ordinary lips they are wonderful, for they are mottled, blue, green, and purple—let my lord the governor pardon me for painting so minutely the charms of her who some time or other will be my daughter; for I love her, and I don’t find her amiss.” “Paint what you will,” said Sancho; “I enjoy your painting, and if I had dined there could be no dessert more to my taste than your portrait.” “That I have still to furnish,” said the farmer; “but a time will come when we may be able if we are not now; and I can tell you, señor, if I could paint her gracefulness and her tall figure, it would astonish you; but that is impossible because she is bent double with her knees up to her mouth; but for all that it is easy to see that if she could stand up she’d knock her head against the ceiling; and she would have given her hand to my bachelor ere this, only that she can’t stretch it out, for it’s contracted; but still one can see its elegance and fine make by its long furrowed nails.”

Enjoyed it but it was a mammoth read.

Completed : 01-Nov-2019 (audiobook)

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