MOST OF US know the story of Miguel de Cervantes’s Don Quixote—whether we’ve seen it as a ballet, heard it as a musical, or watched it as a Mr. Magoo cartoon. Alonso Quixano, a gentleman in the Spanish countryside, renames himself “Don Quixote de la Mancha” and embarks on a series of ridiculous misadventures as a knight. Dressed in an old suit of armor and riding a bony horse, Don Quixote sets out to win the love of “Dulcinea del Taboso”—actually a local farm girl. Don Quixote, published in 1605 and 1615, poked fun at novels exaggerating the heroics of knights; it also highlighted an idealist’s frustrations in a materialistic world. You don’t need to dream the impossible dream to learn more about Don Quixote—just take this quick quiz.
1. What does Don Quixote mistakenly attack, thinking that it is a giant?
2. Who is Don Quixote’s sidekick?
3. What is the source of Don Quixote’s illusions?
4. Who, in Don Quixote, is Cide Hamete Benengeli?
5. Who are Rocinante and Dapple?
ANSWERS
1. A windmill. This is where the phrase “to tilt at windmills,” meaning to fight an imaginary enemy, came from. The scene also inspired a 1971 movie called They Might Be Giants, from which the popular band took its name.
2. Sancho Panza, a peasant whom Don Quixote makes his squire.
3. He has read too many chivalric romances, or books about the adventures of knights.
4. The fictional author of the tale. Cervantes writes that he has translated the work of this Moorish writer into Spanish.
5. Don Quixote’s horse and Sancho Panza’s mule.