Miguel de Cervantes

Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra (September 29, 1547 – April 23, 1616), was a Spanish novelist, poet and playwright, best known for his immortal masterpiece Don Quixote de la Mancha, which is considered by many to be the first modern novel, one of the greatest works in Western literature and certainly the greatest of the Spanish language. It is one of the Encyclopedia Britannica's "Great Books of the Western World" and the Russian author Dostoyevsky called it "the ultimate and most sublime word of human thinking".

Biography

Cervantes was born at Alcála de Henares, Spain, on a day not recorded, but since he was named Miguel it is guessed he was born on the feast day of St. Michael (Sept 29) in 1547. He was baptized on October 9, 1547. Although Cervantes' reputation rests almost entirely on his portrait of the gaunt country gentleman, El ingenioso hidalgo, his literary production was considerable. Shakespeare, Cervantes' great contemporary, had evidently read Don Quixote, but it is most unlikely that Cervantes had ever heard of Shakespeare.

Related Topics:
Alcála de Henares - Spain - St. Michael - 1547 - El ingenioso hidalgo - Shakespeare

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Cervantes lived an unsettled life of hardship and adventure. He was the son of a surgeon who presented himself as a nobleman, although Cervantes's mother seems to have been a descendant of Jewish converts to Christianity. Little is known of his early years, but it seems that Cervantes spent much of his childhood moving from town to town, while his father sought work. After studying in Madrid (1568-1569), where his teacher was the humanist Juan López de Hoyos, Cervantes went to Rome in the service of Guilio Acquavita. Once in Italy, he doubtless began straightway to familiarize himself with Italian literature, a knowledge of which is so readily discernible in his own productions. In 1570, he became a soldier, and fought bravely on board a vessel in the great battle of Lepanto in 1571, and was shot through the left hand in such a way that he never after had the entire use of it.

Related Topics:
Madrid - 1568 - 1569 - Juan López de Hoyos - Rome - Guilio Acquavita - Italy - Italian literature - 1570 - Battle of Lepanto - 1571

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When his wound was healed, he engaged in another campaign, one directed against the Moslems in Northern Africa, and then after living a while longer in Italy, he finally determined to return home in 1575. The ship was captured by the Turks, and the brothers were taken to Algiers as slaves. There he spent five years, undergoing great sufferings, some of which seem to be reflected in the episode of the "Captive" in Don Quixote, and in scenes of the play, El trato de Argel. After four unsuccessful escape attempts, he was ransomed by the Trinitarians, and returned to his family in Madrid in 1580. In 1584, he married 22 years younger Catalina de Salazar y Palacios. During the next 20 years he led a nomadic existence, working as a purchasing agent for the Spanish Armada, and as a tax collector. He suffered a bankruptcy, and was imprisoned at least twice (1597 and 1602) because of irregularities in his accounts, one due rather to some subordinate than to himself. Between the years 1596 and 1600, he lived primarily in Seville. In 1606, Cervantes settled permanently in Madrid, where he remained for the rest of his life.

Related Topics:
Northern Africa - 1575 - El trato de Argel - 1580 - 1584 - Catalina de Salazar y Palacios - Spanish Armada - 1597 - 1602 - 1596 - 1600 - Seville - 1606

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In 1585, Cervantes published his first major work, La Galatea, a pastoral romance, at the same time that some of his plays, now lost except for El trato de Argel (where he dealt with the life of Christian slaves in Algiers) and El cerco de Numancia, were playing on the stages of Madrid. La Galatea received little contemporary notice, and Cervantes never wrote the continuation for it, (which he repeatedly promised). Cervantes next turned his attention to the drama, hoping to derive an income from that source, but the plays which he composed failed to achieve their purpose. Aside from his plays, his most ambitious work in verse was Viaje del Parnaso (1614), an allegory which consisted largely of a rather tedious though good-natured review of contemporary poets. Cervantes himself realized that he was deficient in poetic gifts.

Related Topics:
1585 - La Galatea - El trato de Argel - El cerco de Numancia - Viaje del Parnaso - 1614

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If a remark which Cervantes himself makes in the prologue of Don Quixote is to be taken literally, the idea of the work, though hardly the writing of its "First Part", as some have maintained, occurred to him in prison at Argamasilla, in La Mancha. Cervantes' idea was to give a picture of real life and manners, and to express himself in clear language. The intrusion of everyday speech into a literary context was acclaimed by the reading public. The author stayed poor until 1605, when the first part of Don Quixote appeared. Although it did not make Cervantes rich, it brought him international appreciation as a man of letters. Cervantes also wrote many plays, only two of which have survived; short novels, and the vogue obtained by Cervantes's story led to the publication of a continuation of it by an unknown who masqueraded under the name of Alonso Fernández de Avellaneda. In self-defence, Cervantes produced his own continuation, or "Second Part", of Don Quixote, which made its appearance in 1615.

Related Topics:
Argamasilla - La Mancha - 1605 - Alonso Fernández de Avellaneda - 1615

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For the world at large, interest in Cervantes centres particularly in Don Quixote, and this work has been regarded chiefly as a novel of purpose. It is stated again and again that he wrote it in order to ridicule the romances of chivalry, and to destroy the popularity of a form of literature which for much more than a century had engrossed the attention of a large proportion of those who could read among his countrymen, and which had been communicated by them to the ignorant.

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Don Quixote certainly reveals much narrative power, considerable humour, a mastery of dialogue, and a forcible style. Of the two parts written by Cervantes, the first has ever remained the favourite. The second part is inferior to it in humorous effect; but, nevertheless, the second part shows more constructive insight, better delineation of character, an improved style, and more realism and probability in its action.

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In 1613, he published a collection of tales, the Exemplary Novels, some of which had been written earlier. On the whole, the Exemplary Novels are worthy of the fame of Cervantes; they bear the same stamp of genius as Don Quixote. The picaroon strain, already made familiar in Spain by the Lazarillo de Tormes and his successors, appears in one or another of them, especially in the Rinconete y Cortadillo, which is the best of all. He also published the Viaje del Parnaso in 1614, and in 1615, the Eight Comedies and Eight New Interludes. At the same time, Cervantes continued working on Los trabajos de Persiles y Sigismunda, a novel of adventurous travel completed just before his death, and which appeared posthumously in January, 1617.

Related Topics:
1613 - Exemplary Novels - Lazarillo de Tormes - Rinconete y Cortadillo - Viaje del Parnaso - 1614 - 1615 - Eight Comedies - Eight New Interludes - Los trabajos de Persiles y Sigismunda - January - 1617

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Cervantes's influence is seen among others in the works of Sir Walter Scott, Charles Dickens, Gustave Flaubert, Herman Melville, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, and in the works of James Joyce and Jorge Luis Borges.

Related Topics:
Sir Walter Scott - Charles Dickens - Gustave Flaubert - Herman Melville - Fyodor Dostoyevsky - James Joyce - Jorge Luis Borges

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He died in Madrid on April 23, 1616; coincidentally William Shakespeare also died on that date, though Cervantes died ten days earlier than Shakespeare, Spain being on the Gregorian calendar and England being on the Julian calendar calendar. In 1850 William Wordsworth died on April 23 and in 1915 Rupert Brooke died on the same date.

Related Topics:
Madrid - April 23 - 1616 - Gregorian calendar - Julian calendar - William Wordsworth - Rupert Brooke

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It is worth mentioning that the Encyclopedia Hispanica claims the date widely quoted as Cervantes' date of death, namely April 23, is the date on his tombstone which in accordance of the traditions of Spain at the time would be his date of burial rather than date of death. If this is true, according to Hispanica, then it means that Cervantes probably died on April 22 and was buried on April 23.

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