Don Quixote

Author: Miguel de Cervantes (Spain) / Country: Mainland China
Publisher:
Publishing Date: 1987-02-01
Features: Not long ago, there was a gentleman living in a village in La Mancha, the name of which I won't mention. Such gentlemen usually had a long sword on the rack, an old shield, a lean horse, and a hunting dog. His daily stew was more beef than mutton, his dinner was often leftover meat with scallions, on Saturdays he ate fried and salted meat with scrambled eggs, on Fridays he ate beans, and on Sundays he added a young pigeon, which cost him three-quarters of his annual income. On holidays, he wore a black fine wool overcoat, velvet pants, and velvet shoes, while on weekdays, he wore a set of good-quality undyed wool clothes, spending all the leftover money. His household had a middle-aged housekeeper in her forties, a young cousin under twenty, and a young man who could work in the fields and go to the market, who helped him saddle horses and weed the garden. Our gentleman was nearly fifty, strong and healthy. He was thin, with a gaunt face, rose early every day, and loved hunting. It was said his surname was Quijada, but some said it was Quesada, the records were inconsistent, and it was probably Quijana. However, this was not important in the book; as long as the story remained true, it didn't matter. Let's say this gentleman had more idle time than anything else all year round. When he had nothing to do, he would bury himself in knight-errant novels, reading them with great enthusiasm, almost forgetting hunting and even managing his estate. His curiosity was intense, and he was so deeply immersed that he sold several acres of land to buy books and brought all the knight-errant novels he could get his hands on home. He highly praised the works of the famous author Feliciano de Silva because of their refined writing and skillful metaphors; he considered them treasures, especially the letters of pleading and complaint he often read, such as: "You have treated me unjustly with your reason, and this reason makes me both reasonable and unreasonable; therefore, I accuse you of beauty, and it is reasonable." Or: "The sublime heavens, with their sacred method, have adorned your divinity with stars, making you worthy of the value of your greatness." The poor gentleman was captivated by these words, staying awake at night, trying to understand the sentences and explore their meanings. In truth, even if Aristotle were to be reborn specifically for this purpose, he could not have understood them. This gentleman was always uneasy about the injuries Don Quixote had inflicted on others and the injuries he himself had suffered, because as he imagined, even if the surgeons were skilled, the wounds would leave scars all over his body and face. However, to be fair, the author declared at the end that the story was not yet finished, which the gentleman strongly approved. He often felt the urge to take up his pen and complete the story, but because he was always occupied with more important matters, he never did. Otherwise, he would have certainly written it and completed it. He often debated with a priest from his village (a learned man who had graduated from the University of Salamanca) about which knight-errant was the most outstanding: was it Balmesín de la Encina or Amadís de Gaucar. However, the barber of the village, Master Nicholas, believed that neither could compare to the Knight of the Sun. The only one who could rival the Knight of the Sun was Amadís de Gaucar's younger brother, Don Quixote, because he was both flexible and strong, not a timid knight like his brother, nor as prone to tears as his older brother. To make a long story short, he was so immersed in the books that he read from dusk till dawn every night and from dawn till dusk every day. With so little sleep and so much reading, his mind was exhausted, and he lost his reason. His head was filled with the absurdities he read about—magic, tournaments, battles, challenges, wounds, courtship, love, and suffering. He was stubborn in his beliefs, firmly convinced that the ridiculous stories he read were true and the most authentic history in the world. He often said: "The Cid Ruy Díaz was a great knight, but not as great as the Knight of the Burning Sword; with just a flick of his sword, the Knight of the Burning Sword could split two giants as fierce as demons in half. He particularly admired Bernardo del Carpio, because he imitated Hercules in strangling the son of the earth god Antaeus by pinning him with his arms, and killed the magically protected Roland in Roncesvalles. He highly praised the giant Mordred, because his kind were all arrogant giants, except for him, who was polite and gentle. But he especially liked Ruy Aldonza de Mancha, especially for breaking out of his castle, robbing people, and stealing the statue of the legendary Muhammad, made entirely of gold, from overseas. He also wanted to kick the traitor Carlon hard, even willing to give up a housekeeper or even his niece as compensation. In short, he had completely lost his reason, and no madman in the world had ever been as delusional as he was. He wanted to become a knight-errant, put on armor, pick up weapons, and travel the world on horseback, seeking adventures and following the deeds of the knight-errants in the books: he wanted to eliminate all evil, undertake all dangers, and achieve glory so that his name would be remembered for generations to come. He thought it was a good and necessary thing to bring honor to himself and serve his country at the same time. This poor fellow dreamed of becoming famous through his own strength, at least becoming an emperor of Trabzon. He was content with his plans and eager to see them come true. The first thing he did was to clean a set of armor that had been passed down from his great-grandfather. This armor had been piled in a corner for years, neglected and rusted. He tried every method to clean and restore it, but found a major flaw: it had no full helmet to protect the entire head and face, only a bare helmet without a visor. He came up with a clever idea to fix it, made a visor out of hard paper, and attached it to the helmet, making it look like a complete helmet. He drew his sword and struck it twice to test its strength and durability, but with one blow, he ruined a week's worth of work. He was greatly disappointed to see his craftsmanship shatter at the touch. To prevent further accidents, he used several strips of P13-14