Don Quixote

Don Quixote (/ˌdɒn ˈkwɪksət/ or /ˌdɒn kiːˈhoʊtiː/; Spanish: [ˈdoŋ kiˈxote]), fully titled The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha (Spanish: El ingenioso hidalgo don Quijote de la Mancha), is a Spanish novel by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra. Published in two volumes, in 1605 and 1615, Don Quixote is considered one of the most influential works of literature from the Spanish Golden Age and the entire Spanish literary canon. As a founding work of modern Western literature and one of the earliest canonical novels, it regularly appears high on lists of the greatest works of fiction ever published, such as the Bokklubben World Library collection that cites Don Quixote as authors' choice for the "best literary work ever written".

The story follows the adventures of a nameless hidalgo who reads so many chivalric romances that he loses his sanity and decides to set out to revive chivalry, undo wrongs, and bring justice to the world, under the name Don Quixote. He recruits a simple farmer, Sancho Panza, as his squire, who often employs a unique, earthy wit in dealing with Don Quixote's rhetorical orations on antiquated knighthood. Don Quixote, in the first part of the book, does not see the world for what it is and prefers to imagine that he is living out a knightly story. Throughout the novel, Cervantes uses such literary techniques as realism, metatheatre, and intertextuality. It had a major influence on the literary community, as evidenced by direct references in Alexandre Dumas' The Three Musketeers (1844), Mark Twain's Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884) and Edmond Rostand's Cyrano de Bergerac (1897), as well as the word "quixotic". Arthur Schopenhauer cited Don Quixote as one of the four greatest novels ever written, along with Tristram Shandy, La Nouvelle Héloïse and Wilhelm Meister.

Don Quixote (Nik Kershaw song)

"Don Quixote" was written and recorded by 1980s pop singer Nik Kershaw for his 1984 studio album The Riddle. Released in August 1985 as the final single from that album, it reached #10 on the UK Singles Chart in September 1985, and became Kershaw's seventh (and last) consecutive UK Top 20 hit single.

A month before "Don Quixote" was released as a single, it was the last of four songs played by Kershaw at Live Aid. The others were previous singles "The Riddle", "Wouldn't It Be Good" and "Wide Boy".

Chart performance

References

Don Quixote (1933 film)

Don Quixote (1933) is the English title of a film adaptation of the classic Miguel de Cervantes novel, directed by Georg Wilhelm Pabst, starring the famous operatic bass Feodor Chaliapin. Although the film stars Chaliapin, it is not an opera. However, he does sing four songs in it. It is the first sound film version of the Spanish classic. The supporting cast in the English version includes George Robey, René Donnio, Miles Mander, Lydia Sherwood, Renée Valliers, and Emily Fitzroy. The film was made in three versions—French, English, and German—with Chaliapin starring in all three versions.

The producers separately commissioned five composers (Jacques Ibert, Maurice Ravel - who wrote three songs -, Marcel Delannoy, Manuel de Falla and Darius Milhaud) to write the songs for Chaliapin. Each composer believed only he had been approached.

Ibert's music was chosen for the film, but this caused him some embarrassment as he was a close friend of Ravel's. Ravel considered a lawsuit against the producers. He dropped the action, and the two composers remained close friends.EMI released excerpts from the soundtrack of the French version on 78-rpm and LP discs.

Don Quixote (ballet)

Don Quixote is a ballet in four acts and eight scenes, based on episodes taken from the famous novel Don Quixote de la Mancha by Miguel de Cervantes. It was originally choreographed by Marius Petipa to the music of Ludwig Minkus and first presented by the Ballet of the Imperial Bolshoi Theatre of Moscow, Russia on 26 December [O.S. 14 December] 1869. Petipa and Minkus revised the ballet into a far more expanded and elaborated edition in five acts and eleven scenes for the Imperial Ballet, first presented on 21 November [O.S. 9 November] 1871 at the Imperial Bolshoi Kamenny Theatre of St. Petersburg.

All modern productions of the Petipa/Minkus ballet are derived from the version staged by Alexander Gorsky for the Bolshoi Theatre of Moscow in 1900, a production the ballet master staged for the Imperial Ballet of St. Petersburg in 1902.

History

Earlier versions

The two chapters of the novel that the ballet is mostly based on were first adapted for the ballet in 1740 by Franz Hilverding in Vienna, Austria. In 1768, Jean Georges Noverre mounted a new version of Don Quixote in Vienna to the music of Josef Starzer, a production that appears to have been a revival of the original by Hilverding.

Don Quixote (Teno)

Don Quixote is a sculpture by Aurelio Teno located at the northeast corner of the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., United States. The sculpture of Don Quixote was a gift from Spain for the United States Bicentennial. In 1993, the Smithsonian Institution's Save Outdoor Sculpture! program surveyed and assessed the work and found that it needed treatment.

Description

Don Quixote depicts a bronze and stone figure of Don Quixote wearing a full suit of armor riding his horse Rosinante which emerges from a jagged piece of stone. The jagged stone is Colmenar stone from Pamplona. Only the front portion of Don Quixote and his horse are visible. The horse appears to be charging forward out of the stone with his head raised, mouth open, and hooves kicking. The left foot of the horse is not formed, intentionally, by Teno. In Don Quixote's hand is a 12 feet (3.7 m) lance of steel. Both figures are loosely modeled and the figures and stone rest on a 66 short tons (60,000 kg) oval base measuring 4 by 5 by 12 feet (1.2 m × 1.5 m × 3.7 m) which was cut into three pieces for transport by ship to the United States.

Don Quixote (1973 film)

Don Quixote is a 1973 Australian ballet film starring Rudolph Nureyev and Robert Helpmann.

Cast

Production

The ballet had been added to the repertoire of the Australian Ballet in 1970 and was one of Nureyev's most popular parts. Finance to film it was raised mostly in the USA with most of the crew coming from Australia but a British cinematographer was used. It was shot over four weeks starting 13 November 1972 in a converted airport hangar in Essendon. They used a soundtrack which had been pre-recorded a month earlier.

Don Quixote (1923 film)

Don Quixote is a 1923 British silent comedy film, directed by Maurice Elvey, based on the novel Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes. The film stars Jerrold Robertshaw, George Robey, Frank Arlton, and Marie Blanche.

Cast

References

External links