The Art of Cervantes in Don Quixote: Critical Essays

Four centuries after his death in 1616, Cervantes's great novel (the first novel), Don Quixote (1605; 1615), continues to fascinate readers and generate debate about key questions. Were the efforts of the deluded hidalgo and his corpulent squire to revive the lost age of chivalry intended simply to amuse? Or to be the vehicle for a sustained reflection on the acts of writing and reading, the state of Spanish society, the nature of reality itself? And if so, from what political and ideologic...