Talk:Don Quixote

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[edit] Cleanup Underway

I have started in on the cleanup.

  1. I have added the plot summary section to be filled out.
  2. I have created a single cultural influence heading and then subheadings
  3. I have started to weed out some of the more dubious references. The fact that quixotic has entered the language does not mean that every band, singer or DJ who knows what the word means is making an explicit or noteworthy reference to the original Don.
  4. Cleanup of language and removal of a cartoonish image.

I think it would be a very good idea to use the Daumier and Picasso illustrations for this article if we can find them under GFDL. Eusebeus 19:56, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I have been bold and removed the Don Quixote Trivia section because it has become a pointless bin for even the most casual and insignificant reference to the book, characters, etc... If necessary, we could fork it into it's own article. The main focus of this article should be the novel and its legacy. With that in mind, I also think the lists of Quixote in the arts, movies, tv, and so on are also distracting and could perhaps be usefully forked. Eusebeus 12:09, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Significant changes and reflow/rewrite executed Jan 28-29 2007

I have made significant changes to the flow and contents of the article.

  • Added subheads; ordered list
  • Linguistic disambiguations, clarifications, and definitions
  • Rearrangement and editing of much of the text.

Please review and compare to previous changes for glaring wikisyntax.

PlasticDoor 19:14, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Article layout and extraneous matter

1. It has been noted that the article does not follow the encyclopedic wikipedia conventions for Novels entries. I agree. In my initial attempts at cleanup, I focused only on clarification of the existing entry (grammar, logical ordering, etc.) Much of the lead-in was subheaded under "Overview"; that, it is agreed, should be in the Lead-in. Plot summaries need further development. The history also needs more development. There is a substantial amount of information on the Spanish WIkipedia location, albiet it is deemed by some commenters there to be too overburdened and dense.

2. There is too much extraneous matter in the form of lists which are better purposed as redirects to their own articles. These lists interrupt the flow and readability of the main article. Subentries such as that about Foucault is not relevant to this main article. The article on Foucault should instead be referencing the Quixote article.

3. I also propose that a redirect page be created under the heading "Quijote" because that is the Spanish conventional spelling present-day. This would be to assist/provide cross-reference to non-English speakers who do not use the "ex" form of the spelling. (NB-could arguably be trivial.)

--PlasticDoor 16:15, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Translation of opening sentence

This article contains a rather poor translation of the opening line in Don Quijote.

"In some place in La Mancha, whose name I do not want to recall, it was not so long ago there dwelt a gentleman of the type wont to keep an unused lance, an old shield, a skinny old horse, and a greyhound for racing."

In English translations I remember it being translated as "In a village of La Mancha, the name of which I do not wish to recall, there lived not long ago a gentleman (more specifically a nobleman) of those who keep a lance in the rack, an aged shield, a broken-down horse/hack and a greyhound for racing" Angryafghan 20:00, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Sources section needs work

I agree that the Tirant is a source for the Quijote, but is only one of many other listed, and is somewhat of an anomaly in relation to other chivalric romances due to its realism. I'd be happy to help expand the "sources" section since it needs some serious work. Bewtros 03:32, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Section order and format

I moved the "see also" section to its normal position at the end of the article text but prior to references, simplified a few titles, and removed the non-standard level one titles. No other editorial material was added or removed with this edit. It would be nice to have the bibliographic section at the end (following references) with current English editions included. It looks like most of the ones listed in the commented out bib. are Spanish editions. Also, the whole cultural legacy area makes the article large enough (currently 51k) to consider making it a separate subarticle. --Blainster 20:18, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] What translation to use?

I had changed something using the Raffel translation, which was changed because "the first one [translation of the first sentence] sounded better" (see history). However, whoever changed this should change the entire sentence to the translation they are using and ALSO change the reference, since I was quoting from the published translation and we can't change this at will. I'm not familiar with the Grossman translation, which may be our best bet, but the Shelton one is a bit old-fashioned, if still helpful in places. Bewtros 21:04, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

OK, so I just looked at the Grossman translation and there is a gross error in the translation of the first sentence, as it reads "Somewhere in La Mancha, in a place whose name I do not care to remember, a gentleman lived not long ago, one of those who has a lance and ancient shield on a shelf and keeps a skinny nag and a greyhound for racing." A "lugar" is not the generic "place" but rather a population of specific size--something like "town" or would be more correct since the RAE states a lugar is "menor que villa y mayorf que aldea".

So, I'm proposing we use either the Raffel or some other more correct translation throughout the article for the sake of continuity. Bewtros 21:15, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

There are many ways to translate lugar. Place is one of them. Please wait for consensus before imposing edits upon cited sources. Ronbo76 21:39, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
This is true. However, almost every Spanish edition of the text notes that lugar is not used in the general sense of "place" but rather the following taken from the authoritative edition by Francisco Rico: lugar: no con el valor de ‘sitio o paraje’, sino como ‘localidad’ y en especial ‘pequeña entidad de población’, en nuestro caso situada concretamente en el Campo de Montiel (I, 2, 47, y 7,93), a caballo de las actuales provincias de Ciudad Real y Albacete. Seguramente por azar, la frase coincide con el verso de un romance nuevo. I will wait for others to confirm this reading before making changes, but anyone who has a knowledge of early modern Spanish and has read an annotated Spanish original would agree. Bewtros 22:06, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Translation of first sentence modified without correcting reference

I'm writing since what we have quoted as Raffel's translation of the first sentence is incorrect. Raffel's translation reads "In a village in La Mancha (I don't want to bother you with its name) there lived, not very long ago, one of those gentlemen who keep a lance in the lance-rack, an ancient shield, a skinny old horse, and a fast greyhound" (p.13) and not "In a village in La Mancha (whose name I do not care to recall) there lived, not very long ago, one of those gentlemen who keep a lance in the lance-rack, an ancient shield, a skinny old horse, and a fast greyhound." I can see the previous user's logic in changing the translation, but if we agree that that's the best way to put it (another option would be to change the preceding paragraph) we should acknowledge that the translation we have is a modified version of Raffel's translation and not his translation as it appears in published form. Bewtros 22:58, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

Concur amigo. Please make the change. Morenooso 01:11, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Edith Grossman question

Hello, in the section about "Editions in translation", the text talks about other authors whose work Grossman has translated. Is that really necessary, because the article is about Don Quixote, and I'm sure that the other people have translated other works too. --Kyoko 03:14, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

I don't think it's necessary either. If others agree, it should be cut, as the article could use some trimming! Bewtros 21:24, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Madame Bovary

Can someone explain to me please how this is a re-telling of Don Quixote? Madame Bovary is a bored provincial wife married to an idiot. What does this have to do with DQ? I cannot see this comparison at all.SmokeyTheCat 14:08, 30 May 2007 (UTC) If no-one explains this in a week I so I will delete this reference.SmokeyTheCat 11:19, 13 June 2007 (UTC) Okay, deleted.  SmokeyTheCat  •TALK• 13:45, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

Like Quixote, Madame Bovary is stuck in a boring provincial town and uses books to fantasise about a more exciting life (in her case, she reads works of French Romanticism rather than tales of chivalry from the Middle Ages). Like Quixote, she confuses literature and life, leading to a series of adventures (in her case love affairs) which end in disillusion and death. (I'm also surprised Dostoyevsky's The Idiot hasn't been mentioned; Prince Myshkin is also modelled on Quixote). --Folantin 11:19, 23 June 2007 (UTC)
Could we have a source for the Madame Bovary? I will remove it for now: please cite an accepted scholarly source for the claim if reinserted. I think there is too much tendency to view every quixotic character or picaresque novel as somehow inspired by the original. That is too much of a stretch in my view for a credible encyclopedic treatment. Eusebeus 12:12, 27 August 2007 (UTC)
Flaubert's debt to Cervantes is common knowledge, but if you insist [1]. --Folantin 12:17, 27 August 2007 (UTC)
Yup, that'll do. Eusebeus 12:32, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Name Translation

there's about 50 conversations about the translation of the first line of the novel, and 0 about the remainder. i.e., the novel's title is translated from spanish 'don quixote' to english 'don quixote'. 'don' in spanish is the same as 'sir' in english. 'doña' being the feminine equivalent. its the same as the british calling their historical/political figures 'lord' and 'lady'. even american media put 'sir' in front of paul mccartney and elton john. but the same respect isnt afforded to spaniards/hispanics who are traditionally given the title 'don/doña' in spanish media. translating 'don' as 'don' may give many non-spanish speakers the impression that quixote's first name is 'don' (its even worse when 'doña' is misspelt as 'dona' and put in front of a woman's name, so some may think that that's the spanish version of 'donna' and part of her name). the same situation occurs in translating titles from other language, and many westerners assume that that's part of person's name. i cant do anything about those instances, but i can say something about this. the title should be revised to accurately indicate the title. but dont go as far to translate 'La Mancha', because 'The Stain' doesnt sound like a good place to be from.4.230.153.57 00:59, 25 August 2007 (UTC)

I'm afraid the title should remain as, if only because of 400 years of tradition in English translation (Shelton, the first translator, translated the title as The Historie of the Valorous and Wittie Knight-Errant, Don Quixote of the Mancha. Moreover, Don Quixote is what Don Quixote names himself in the novel--Cervantes is ridiculing the fact that a lower nobleman (an hidalgo) treats himself as if he were a caballero, a higher noble that actually does deserve the title 'don.' Thus the joke in the text's full title, "El ingenioso hidalgo Don Quijote de la Mancha." The disconnect between 'don' and 'hidalgo' would have been immediately apparent and humorous to contemporary Spanish readers. I also doubt that there would be much confusion with the character's first name being "Don." Bewtros 21:02, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Question about source of ballet plot

Someone wrote the following: "Georg Philipp Telemann wrote an orchestral suite entitled Don Quichotte and an opera called Don Quichotte auf der Hochzeit des Camacho, based on an episode from the novel.

Die Hochzeit des Camacho, an early opera by Felix Mendelssohn (composed in 1827) is based on the same section of the book on which Telemann based his opera."

As a matter of fact, it is my recollection from studying the book in school that the plot of the ballet, i.e., Kitri's wedding, does not actually appear in the book at all. Can someone clarify this? I seem to recall that I was told that this incident was just made up by someone else. The ballet receives its title not due to an incident but because it takes the theme from Don Quijote - namely based on the theme of his love for Dulcinea.

If it is in fact based on an incident from the book, I would appreciate it if someone would cite the chapter so I can look it up.

Thanks. 65.14.60.2 07:10, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Don Quixote (character)

We have articles about Sancho Panza and Rocinante, but no articles about the title character. Let's work on it.

Lovelac7 04:31, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Dulcinea

"'Dulcinea' (...), nor does she actually appear in the novel."

Who wrote this absurd??? 201.19.89.182 (talk) 21:14, 25 December 2007 (UTC)