Audiobook · read by volunteers
Don Quixote - Vol. 1
Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra (1547–1616)
Read by Chip, Sara Schein, Anita Roy Dobbs, featherheadfop, Denny Sayers (d. 2015), Kirsten Ferreri, Cynthia Lyons (1946-2011), Gesine, Kathleen Dang, Marian Brown · 36 chapters · 21 h 16
About the book
A gentleman of La Mancha reads so many tales of chivalry that his mind gives way, and he decides to become a knight-errant himself. Don Quixote sets out in rusty armour on a thin old horse, accompanied by the earthy and practical Sancho Panza, to right wrongs, defend the weak and win glory for his lady Dulcinea. Windmills turn into giants, inns into castles and ordinary people into enchanters, and the results are as comic as they are touching. Cervantes created one of the great characters of world literature, and the first part of his novel is a feast of adventures, interludes and stories within stories. This recording uses the English translation by John Ormsby, read by ten LibriVox volunteers in about twenty-one hours.
Introduction
Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra (1547-1616) published the first part of Don Quixote in Spain in 1605, and a second part followed in 1615. It is often called the first modern novel, and it has influenced writers for four centuries. Cervantes had lived an adventurous life as a soldier and as a captive in Algiers before settling into writing, and the book draws on his shrewd understanding of human weakness.
The story begins as a parody of the chivalric romances that were popular at the time, but it grows into something far richer. It plays with the idea of authorship, claiming to be translated from an Arabic manuscript by a historian named Cide Hamete Benengeli. It mixes comedy and compassion, and it reflects on the difference between imagination and reality. Don Quixote and Sancho Panza develop as characters, and their friendship becomes the emotional core of the work.
This LibriVox recording of the first volume is based on John Ormsby's English translation, published in 1885. It has thirty-six sections, including the translator's preface and the commendatory verses, and it lasts around twenty-one hours. Ten volunteers share the reading. It remains one of the great works of European literature, and one that still makes readers laugh. Because the novel is built from many separate episodes, it is easy to listen to in stages, and each stage brings new surprises, new companions on the road and fresh evidence of Cervantes's inexhaustible invention.
Public domain
Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra died in 1616: the work is in the public domain in Switzerland, more than 70 years after the author’s death.
The LibriVox volunteers dedicated this recording to the public domain.
Sources : LibriVox page · Files at the Internet Archive · Original text