Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes | Part 2, Dedication and Prologue

Course Hero Literature Instructor Russell Jaffe provides an in-depth summary and analysis of Part 2, Dedication and Prologue from Miguel de Cervantes's novel Don Quixote.


Miguel de Cervantes's satirical novel Don Quixote relates the absurd quest of a low-level nobleman to defend the valor of his imagined love.

Alonso Quixano is obsessed with chivalric romances and reimagines himself as the knight Don Quixote, who is dead set on proving his love to Dulcinea, who he has never met.

The aging knight is accompanied by the peasant Sancho Panza, who he dubs his squire. The dense but good-hearted Panza enables his master's delusions—which include tilting at windmills in the belief that they are dangerous giants.

Quixote's exploits grow in fame when his story is published and he is exploited by several people, notably a duke and duchess who subject him to ridicule in their court.

Quixote ultimately renounces his life as a knight and dies soon thereafter.

Spanish writer Miguel De Cervantes’s Don Quixote was first published in 1605 and 1615 in Spanish. After a decade in the Spanish Navy—the last half as a prisoner of war—Cervantes turned toward writing. While his first works were critical flops, his epic novel about a delusional knight continues to be hailed as a literary masterpiece.

The famous satire Don Quixote contains many powerful themes, including honor, as an obsession with upholding honor rarely ends without someone getting hurt; the fickleness of love, as romantic interests change with the winds, and even knights fictionalize their damsels; idealism versus realism, as the imagination is powerful, and happiness comes from balancing hope and realism. Important symbols include transportation, Mambrino’s Helmet, and Inns.


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