Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra (electric book reader TXT) π

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Don Quixote is a novel that doesnβt need much introduction. Not only is it widely considered the greatest Spanish literary work of all time, one of the greatest literary works in history, and a cornerstone of the Western literary canon, itβs also considered one of the firstβif not the firstβmodern novels.
This Standard Ebooks edition is believed to be the first ebook edition of Don Quixote to feature a full transcription of translator John Ormsbyβs nearly 1,000 footnotes. Ormsby as an annotator deftly explains obscure passages, gives background on the life and times of 1600s Spain, references decisions from other contemporary translators, and doesnβt hold back from sharing his views on the geniusβand flawsβof Cervantesβ greatest work.
The story is of the eponymous Don Quixote, a country noble who, in his old age, reads too many chivalric romances and goes mad. After convincing his grubby servant, Sancho Panza, to join him as his squire, he embarks on an absurd and comic quest to do good and right wrongs.
Today Don Quixoteβs two volumes are published as a single work, but their publication came ten years apart. Cervantes saw great success with the publication of his first volume, and appeared to have little desire to write a second volume until a different author wrote a spurious, inferior sequel. This kicked Cervantes into gear and he wrote volume two, a more serious and philosophical volume than the largely comic first volume.
Despite being written in 1605 and translated in 1885, Don Quixote contains a surprising amount of slapstick laughsβeven for the modern readerβand narrative devices still seen in todayβs fiction, including meta-narratives, frame narratives, and metafiction. Many scenes (like Quixoteβs attack on the windmills) and characters (like Sancho Panza and Lothario) are so famous that theyβre ingrained in our collective culture.
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- Author: Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
Read book online Β«Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra (electric book reader TXT) πΒ». Author - Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
βββAnd if that may not be,β said the wretched Durandarte in a low and feeble voice, βif that may not be, then, my cousin, I say βpatience and shuffle;βββ645 and turning over on his side, he relapsed into his former silence without uttering another word.
βAnd now there was heard a great outcry and lamentation, accompanied by deep sighs and bitter sobs. I looked round, and through the crystal wall I saw passing through another chamber a procession of two lines of fair damsels all clad in mourning, and with white turbans of Turkish fashion on their heads. Behind, in the rear of these, there came a lady, for so from her dignity she seemed to be, also clad in black, with a white veil so long and ample that it swept the ground. Her turban was twice as large as the largest of any of the others; her eyebrows met, her nose was rather flat, her mouth was large but with ruddy lips, and her teeth, of which at times she allowed a glimpse, were seen to be sparse and ill-set, though as white as peeled almonds. She carried in her hands a fine cloth, and in it, as well as I could make out, a heart that had been mummied, so parched and dried was it. Montesinos told me that all those forming the procession were the attendants of Durandarte and Belerma, who were enchanted there with their master and mistress, and that the last, she who carried the heart in the cloth, was the lady Belerma, who, with her damsels, four days in the week went in procession singing, or rather weeping, dirges over the body and miserable heart of his cousin; and that if she appeared to me somewhat ill-favoured or not so beautiful as fame reported her, it was because of the bad nights and worse days that she passed in that enchantment, as I could see by the great dark circles round her eyes, and her sickly complexion; βher sallowness, and the rings round her eyes,β said he, βare not caused by the periodical ailment usual with women, for it is many months and even years since she has had any, but by the grief her own heart suffers because of that which she holds in her hand perpetually, and which recalls and brings back to her memory the sad fate of her lost lover; were it not for this, hardly would the great Dulcinea del Toboso, so celebrated in all these parts, and even in the world, come up to her for beauty, grace, and gaiety.β
βββHold hard!β said I at this, βtell your story as you ought, SeΓ±or Don Montesinos, for you know very well that all comparisons are odious,646 and there is no occasion to compare one person with another; the peerless Dulcinea del Toboso is what she is, and the lady DoΓ±a Belerma is what she is and has been, and thatβs enough.β To which he made answer, βForgive me, SeΓ±or Don Quixote; I own I was wrong and spoke unadvisedly in saying that the lady Dulcinea could scarcely come up to the lady Belerma; for it were enough for me to have learned, by what means I know not, that you are her knight, to make me bite my tongue out before I compared her to anything save heaven itself.β After this apology which the great Montesinos made me, my heart recovered itself from the shock I had received in hearing my lady compared with Belerma.β
βStill I wonder,β said Sancho, βthat your worship did not get upon the old fellow and bruise every bone of him with kicks, and pluck his beard until you didnβt leave a hair in it.β
βNay, Sancho, my friend,β said Don Quixote, βit would not have been right in me to do that, for we are all bound to pay respect to the aged, even though they be not knights, but especially to those who are, and who are enchanted; I only know I gave him as good as he brought in the many other questions and answers we exchanged.β
βI cannot understand, SeΓ±or Don Quixote,β remarked the cousin here, βhow it is that your worship, in such a short space of time as you have been below there, could have seen so many things, and said and answered so much.β
βHow long is it since I went down?β asked Don Quixote.
βLittle better than an hour,β replied Sancho.
βThat cannot be,β returned Don Quixote, βbecause night overtook me while I was there, and day came, and it was night again and day again three times; so that, by my reckoning, I have been three days in those remote regions beyond our ken.β
βMy master must be right,β replied Sancho; βfor as everything that has happened to him is by enchantment, maybe what seems to us an hour would seem three days and nights there.β
βThatβs it,β said Don Quixote.
βAnd
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