Miguel de Cervantes
Overview
 
Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra (miˈɣel de θerˈβantes saˈβeðɾa; baptised
Baptism
In Christianity, baptism is for the majority the rite of admission , almost invariably with the use of water, into the Christian Church generally and also membership of a particular church tradition...

 9 October 1547; died 23 April 1616) was a Spanish
Spanish people
The Spanish are citizens of the Kingdom of Spain. Within Spain, there are also a number of vigorous nationalisms and regionalisms, reflecting the country's complex history....

 novelist, poet
Poet
A poet is a person who writes poetry. A poet's work can be literal, meaning that his work is derived from a specific event, or metaphorical, meaning that his work can take on many meanings and forms. Poets have existed since antiquity, in nearly all languages, and have produced works that vary...

, and playwright
Playwright
A playwright, also called a dramatist, is a person who writes plays.The term is not a variant spelling of "playwrite", but something quite distinct: the word wright is an archaic English term for a craftsman or builder...

. His magnum opus
Magnum opus
Magnum opus , from the Latin meaning "great work", refers to the largest, and perhaps the best, greatest, most popular, or most renowned achievement of a writer, artist, or composer.-Related terms:Sometimes the term magnum opus is used to refer to simply "a great work" rather than "the...

, Don Quixote, considered the first modern novel
Modern novel
The first modern novel has generally been ascribed to a series of picaresque novels, most famously Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes....

, is a classic of Western literature
Western literature
Western literature refers to the literature written in the languages of Europe, including the ones belonging to the Indo-European language family as well as several geographically or historically related languages such as Basque, Hungarian, and so forth...

, and is regarded amongst the best works of fiction ever written. His influence on the Spanish language
Spanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...

 has been so great that the language is often called la lengua de Cervantes ("the language of Cervantes").
Quotations

A father may have a child who is ugly and lacking in all the graces, and the love he feels for him puts a blindfold over his eyes so that he does not see his defects but considers them signs of charm and intelligence and recounts them to his friends as if they were clever and witty.

Prologue

You are a king by your own fireside, as much as any monarch in his throne.

Prologue

I was so free with him as not to mince the matter.

Prologue

They can expect nothing but their labor for their pains.

Prologue

En un lugar de la Mancha, de cuyo nombre no quiero acordarme, no hace mucho tiempo que vivía un hidalgo de los de lanza en astillero, adarga antigua, rocín flaco y galgo corredor.

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

Which I have earned with the sweat of my brows.

Part I, Book I, ch. 4 File:Honoré Daumier 017.jpg|144px|thumb|right|Can we ever have too much of a good thing?

By a small sample we may judge of the whole piece.

Part I, Book I, ch. 4

Put you in this pickle.

Part I, Book I, ch. 5

Can we ever have too much of a good thing?

Part I, Book I, ch. 6

The charging of his enemy was but the work of a moment.

Part I, Book I, ch. 8

 
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