Thoughts on Don Quixote by Miguel De Cervantes - so far...

I'm 600 pages into Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes, and boy, what a journey it has been. In Chapter XVIII of Part 2, I came across the idea that Don Quixote became a knight-errant because he wanted others to believe in knight-errantries. It broke his heart as he grew into adulthood that he never encountered any knights like those from the tales of the past, so he took it upon himself to become one.

This realization made me think deeply about the idea of Don Quixote himself. While much of his behavior is silly and can be harmful to those around him, he simply wanted the world to believe in magic, valiant knights who save the land, and the nobility of duty and love.

What a burden he placed upon himself, and although most people just brushed him off as crazy, the few whose eyes he managed to make sparkle with wonder were certainly touched by his vision. He brought them out of the normalcy we've all grown accustomed to. And all it took was just one "Sancho Panza" to believe enough of it and follow him to make it all possible.

I can't wait to finish the rest of this book and see what other realizations I'll come across, but this is definitely one of the best books I've read in a long time.

Note: this was proofread by ChatGPT and Claude.ai.