Tilting at Windmills: My Quixotic Quest

Several years ago, never mind how many, I came across an academic who claimed that Don Quixote was one of the few works that really stood up to multiple readings throughout life. In fact, the scholar claimed that Don Quixote required multiple readings. Specifically, he recommended that everyone read Don Quixote at least three times, once as a young adult, once in middle age, and once in old age.

I’ve thought a lot about this recommendation in the intervening years. In fact, the idea of books that warrant and reward multiple readings has shaped the way I think about literature, and I’ve created my own short list of books that could reward multiple readings every twenty years or so. I’ve identified six works that I found especially meaningful and rewarding when I first read them in my twenties. Those six are the Bible, “Oedipus Rex”, “King Lear”, Don Quixote, Moby Dick, and The Brothers Karamazov. Now, as I approach the end of my forties, I find myself revisiting that list, and rereading works that I read in my twenties. I have a couple of years left in my 40’s, and a couple more works to finish: Don Quixote and The Brothers Karamazov.

So, for the next several weeks, I’ll be spending time with Don Quixote, as part of my Quixotic quest to revisit some rewarding literature, and to live like literature can have an impact on one’s life.

To be honest, I struggle with Don Quixote. I remember from my first reading twenty years ago that the second part of the book really began to feel painful, that the mockery that Don Quixote is subjected to by the other characters in the book seemed extreme and almost sadistic. I also remember that the saving feature of the book was the presence of Sancho Panza, and the caring relationship that develops between Quixote and Panza.

With that in mind, I’ve begun this reading already sensitive to the mockery and mistreatment of Don Quixote and Sancho Panza, and even the first part of the book has been painful to read. I clearly don’t view the novel the same way this reading that I did in my first reading. I think I was able to enjoy the slapstick, and laugh at the misadventures of Don Quixote and Sancho. Now it feels too much like I am expected to laugh at Don Quixote and Sancho, and I don’t view them as only comic characters anymore. They are much deeper than that. Sancho has an earthly wisdom mixed in with his simplicity. I’m still struggling with how to view the knight himself. My initial reaction with this reading is that he is a deluded old man, and I find myself responding to him more with pity than amusement. Perhaps that’s inspired from the very first page of the novel, where we are told “Our gentleman, who bordered upon fifty, was of a tough constitution, extremely lean, and hard-featured, an early riser, and in point of exercise, another Nimrod.” (Apparently, the reference to Nimrod is not in the original Spanish. The translation I’m reading, by Tobias Smollett, comes highly recommended, but even on page one there is brought up the dilemma of translation; how much is lost in moving a work from one language into another? A lot, I’m sure, but there’s no getting around it.)

My point in that last quote? Quixote and I are the same age! No wonder I’m a little more sensitive to his mistreatment. So, like the knight, I’ll turn my shoulders toward the task and march through this reading. I know once I really get moving, I will get caught up in the book.