How to Read Don Quixote by Cervantes (10 Tips)

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Hardcore Literature Lecture Series
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Happy reading!

0:00 why Don Quixote means so much to me
0:30 how to choose the right translation of Cervantes
2:14 do not patronise or pity the knight and squire
2:45 why everyone reads Don Quixote differently
3:15 Don Quixote is the ultimate mirror
4:20 why does Cervantes so brutally batter Don Quixote?
5:00 Shakespeare vs Cervantes
5:20 Cervantes' traumatic life
6:00 the plagiarised second part of Don Quixote
7:50 read the novel over the long term
8:45 why you should read Don Quixote now
9:30 fast vs slow reading (and bookish regrets)
10:00 the length of Don Quixote
11:00 laughing and crying whilst reading
11:30 the novel form is Cervantes' gift to the world
13:00 reading about chivalry
13:00 returning to the good old days
14:04 how to talk to other people (Chekhov, Hegel & Proust)
15:00 the love between knight and squire
15:35 collect your favourite passages
16:30 the importance of rereading
17:20 reading along with a group

[dataspice]

Don't make the mistake of reading Don Quixote quickly. The best scenes are those of Don Quixote and Sancho conversing as they amble across the countryside. Try to imagine you are moving alongside this mismatched pair as they discuss life, love and virtue. Take your time, as they did.

[acarnold]

One of the great things about Quixote is that the chapters are basically very brief, and story arcs generally are wrapped up in two or three chapters at most. This makes for good episodic, gradual reading.

[EduardoPerez-kupx]

Finished Don Quixote few days ago, the original version as I am Spanish. Could not agree more with what you say. I sent your video to my father and he said this was the best literature class of his entire life.

[romina]

I’m a native Spanish speaker from Mexico and the high school Spanish literature class I took last year spent an entire semester just in the first few chapters of Don Quijote. This book was really difficult for me since the Spanish is so archaic and so unlike the Spanish I use every day. This video has inspired be to reread Don Quijote. It’s a story I love but I’m so excited to experience it again. I feel so lucky to be able to experience it in its original language, so thank you for this video! I’m feeling so inspired to read this novel again :D

[tyronebiggums]

I once tried reading Don Quixote, but, for whatever reason, I disliked it. My mom—who loves the book and great literature—gave me excellent advice: if you don’t like it, stop reading it—for it would be a tragedy not to enjoy reading Don Quixote—and instead come back to it at a later date. So I stopped reading at about 200 pages in. But this video inspired me to pick it back up again. I read the whole thing and found it to be one of the greatest things ever written.

[xabelesor]

I have recently discovered your channel and I love it. I am Spanish and I have repeatedly read Don Quixote. Your comments are the most accurate and enlightening I have ever heard. Your love of literature is truly commendable. Thank you very much. Excuse my English.

[christopherpaul]

I read the several chapters from Quixote in a Comparative Literature class years ago. The professor asked us to raise our hands if we thought Quixote was crazy. I was the only one in the class who didn't raise their hand. I think he's discontented with the reality of his surroundings and of the time in which he lives and wants things to be different. I'm finally starting to read it all the way through for the first time! I'm so excited. The first modern novel. The first work of metafiction. I can't wait!

[jamesbrakewood]

I just got Don Quixote today at my local used book store and happened to purchase the Rutherford translation! Im so excited and hearing you speak so eloquently glowing about the book makes me beyond excited to dive in, thanks for the tips!!

[Qoht]

I felt the same way about this book. Don Quixote and Sancho seem to me real people. I can't think of a more lovable duo in all of fiction. It is also a treasure trove of wisdom, humor, and wit. I could not put it better than Dostoevsky, who wrote, “Of all the beautiful individuals in Christian literature, one stands out as the most perfect, Don Quixote. But he is beautiful only because he is ridiculous.”

[jackwalter]

William Faulkner told an interviewer Don Quixote was his favorite novel. The interviewer said, "Isn't it too long?" Faulkner replied, "I hadn't noticed."

[lukeradelaide]

Thankyou Ben,
I’m only 20 Chapters in, and felt compelled to come back to this video and happily say thanks for your advice to take your time with this great piece of work.
Reading slow, learning about Cervantes’ real life, journaling and sharing experiences with family and friends… all of this is making this read so much more meaningful.

[AndreMagnol]

Don Quixote it's an experience that cannot really be expressed in words.
Fortunately you can read the original version with 400 years old spanish and still enjoy it completely

[merce]

Hello, Benhamin, from Barcelona, Spain! First time commenting and couldn't resist to tell you THANK YOU in capital letters!! First time watching an English-speaking booktuber talking about this enormous book as Don Quijote is and showing such a great love for it and its writer Don Miguel de Cervantes. Although I haven't read it I have the first paragraph on my mind "En un lugar de La Mancha, de cuyo nombe no quiero acordarme...". When I was a child I used to watch on TV some cartoon series, one episode every weekend and I have loved this book since then. If you re-read it again in a group I would love so much to participate in it. Happy reading!📚🤗🙋‍♀️

[foodforthesoul]

Love what you are doing! Thanks for taking the time to share a few tips on reading this novel. Been absolutely absorbed over the last few months falling in love with this classic tale.

[juanmunozferrando]

Brilliant explanation of this wonderful many-sided book. For me is undoubtedly the best novel in Spanish and probably one of the best in world’s literature. As an Spaniard, reading it in Spanish is an utter delight, though there are many good versions in English and several other languages. As all the great books it is open to many interpretations and your own one will probably will change with time. For me, right now it is the story of a great friendship and of how one person’s idealism, if truly lived, as Don Quijote’s is, can end up by enthuse others. That and many more things. It is a work where Cervantes pours his experience and views of life, that is, in my opinion, what makes is so long lasting and consistent four centuries after having been written.

[orthobro]

If you love Don Quixote (which I absolutely do) and want more of his style, I would strongly recommend Steinbeck, namely Tortilla Flat (1935), Cannery Row (1945), and Sweet Thursday (1954). Like Cervantes, his style and musings are humourous, innocent, charming, and irresistibly endearing. If any author after Cervantes has earned the honorific title of being "quixotic, " it is most certainly Steinbeck.

[erldagerl]

Fun fact: Marco Polo wrote much of his “Travels” while in prison, too. Of course, he claimed his book was entirely factual. DQ is presented as fiction, but it is chock full of truths! I did read it in Spanish. Bear in mind that you will not learn Cervantes’ Spanish in any 21st century conversational Spanish class.

[Jose-ruwf]

Cervantes' plays are as underrated as Don Quixote. I think Numancia is a monumental achievement also. And there is theatre even within Don Quixote. The bit with Dorotea as a fictional princess for instance feels like a play.

[camillobenso]

Dostoiesky wrote that Don Quixote is the greatest novel ever written. Don Quixote represents for me the tragedy of a man that refuses to surrender to the boredom of a common life and voluntarily choose to follow the imagination and the madness. This is clear also in some discussion he has with Sancho Panza where he admits his choice..

[thorhelga]

Thank you for a great video. I' m rereading Don Quixote after 25 years since the first time. Reading one chapter daily and enjoying it immensely. I'm reading the Tom Lathrop translation from 2011. Lathrop was a Cervantes scholar and has hundreds of very helpful footnotes.