Don Quixote Gone Insane

The tale of Don’t Quixote de la Mancha is noted as the first modernly written novel, and has impacted many different works throughout history. Within the tale of Don Quixote de la Mancha, by Miguel Cervantes, the reader is told early on that the protagonist, Don Quixote, has gone mad due to his incessant reading tales of knight-errantry, and chivalry. Although, throughout Cervantes’s story there are times where it seems Don Quixote may be aware that his delusions aren’t actually reality and it isn’t until the end of the tale that he admits to having his sanity. So, one may ask, did Don Quixote really keep his sanity whilst his overactive imagination mixed with an obsession and a desperation to live life as a knight-errant cause him to go
Due to this “he spent his nights from sunset to sunrise, and his days from dawn to dark, poring over them; and what with little sleep and much reading his mind got so dry that he lost his wits.” (Cervantes, 26). From almost the beginning the reader is left to decide that Don Quixote has gone insane and lost all concept of reality. Which this then led to his deciding to become a knight-errant himself and in his own honor and in service to the country of Spain. He collects his uncle’s old moldy armor and polishes it, to piece together his very own suit of armor. Before embarking on his quest as a knight-errant he creates a princess to love and vow for just as all the knights in the tales do. Don Quixote then sets out on a course for adventures and comes across an Inn in which he envisions as a castle and asks the innkeeper, or king, if he would do him the honor and dub him a knight so he can partake in battle with other knights if willing. The innkeeper seeing he is clearly out of his wits and Don Quixote is on his way. He later acquires a squire from his home village by the name of Sancho Panza and they continue onto many adventures and misfortunes on Don Quixote’s behalf. The two part tale ends with Quixote on his death bed insisting he is indeed sane. This leaves the reader to question if his preposterous
He chose to not write in poetry like the fictitious books of this era were written. According to Fuentes “it is known for being a modern novel for having various languages, before this all characters spoke the same language. It had recognizable and in depth characters, and the dialogues between Sancho and Don Quixote. It also contained a story within a story, with the narrator cutting off from the story to find where it left off” (Fuentes). Many different works have used Don Quixote de la Mancha as a source of influence, or simply used Don Quixote himself as a character type within the piece. It is said that the Disney film Toy Story had the characters Woody perceived as Sancho and the role of Don Quixote given to Buzz. Buzz “misreads reality in an attempt to play this self-assigned role while Woody throughout the film, suffers hardship and physical abuse due to his acquaintance with this deluded newcomer” (Burningham 159). Eventually, like the original Don Quixote Buzz comes to his senses and accepts that he is in fact just like everyone else, or in his case a toy and not a space