Don Quijote Truthful History Summary

2. Skeptics question the authenticity of Marco Polo’s account, citing his omission of such things as the great wall, tea, and calligraphy. How important is the veracity of the narrative to our overall assessment of its value to history.

“One of the great themes of historical literature over the past five centuries has been the assessment of the European discovery of the Americas as one of the two greatest events in human history.” (2). A similar, better-known pronouncement was penned by Francisco Lopez de Gomara, Hernan Cortes’s private secretary

In my opinion, this source is very reliable due to the fact that Diaz, a Spanish soldier who took part in the conquest, was an author who wrote eyewitness accounts of many events that took place. (POV)

Any student of history has come to recognize the fact that history is written by the victor and in lieu of this, research becomes essential to uncover where the truth lies. The True History of the Conquest of New Spain, so ironically named, is a personal account for historical events leading up to the conquest of New Spain, formerly known as the City of Mexico. The author, Bernal Diaz, was a soldier of the conquering army who composed the document well after the events took place sometime between 1552 and 1557. Though the document did provide insight in regards to the victor’s perspective, it also served as a tool to rewrite the account of the conquered people.

The protagonist, Don Quixote's obsessive reading of books of chivalry plays a major role in defining his character; his inspiration for his travels as a knight errant comes from the literature about chivalry that he reads, the literature that causes him to lose his mind and go mad. Everything that he usually experiences in his journey, first happened in the books that inspired his travels. The character, Dulcinea’s role as Quixote’s lady-love becomes equivalent with the position a king might hold in a true and honorable knight’s life.

During the Spanish golden era, books about codes of chivalry and true knights-errant were extremely popular and expressed religious values. Religious devoutness has been used to establish truth and fairness in societies. Don Quixote himself is symbolic of idealistic pursuits, he is not only seen as a symbol of faith in ideals but always having faith in a religious nature of his own rational world. In the novel Don Quixote, religion plays a major role in Don Quixote's life because his religious morals and social codes are what drive him to prove that he is a true knight-errant. Don Quixote's religious beliefs forced himself to perceive the world/society he lives in differently than those who did not have the same religious

“The story is told through the photographs, and so what may appear to be autobiographical is not always so. On the other hand, many of the events are completely fictional, although they may be true in a historical context. For some of these events, there are photographs; for others, the image is a collage; and in all cases, the result is entirely of my doing. So although it may appear that these stories are my family’s, they are not precisely, and yet they are. (xi)”

At the beginning, the author (Equiano) gave an apologia, stating why he had chosen to write his narrative. He did not wish to be senseless, which is the danger when writing about one’s self. Somewhat, he wished to celebrate God, for God had made him a favorite and presented him with a great deal of favor,

As a historian, or anyone studying to be one, one must understand who is responsible for the historical text we study every day. Lucretius did not just survive time because it was passed down, but because one single man never gave up his search. Historians praise Poggio and his correspondents for the finding, restoring, and distribution of these important texts. To understand past historians, we are to understand the correspondence between these past historians. Examining these four letters and the text by Stephen Greenblatt, “The Swerve,” will help me understand what History is. What one piece of historic information conveyed clearly by these sources most deeply qualifies, limits, undermines or eve negates what you believe to be Greenblatt’s fundamental argument

Produced by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in 1787, Don Giovanni is regarded as one the best operas ever made. The piece is based on the legend of Don Juan, an illusory libertine and seducer of women (Kerns, 2010). At first, Mozart’s opera seems more like a story of the romantic adventures of a dissolute nobleman and his disgrace. However, there is much more to Don Giovanni than just a series of events and serious laughs, just as the protagonist is much more than a notorious, single-minded, and unprincipled seducer. Closer examination of the piece reveals its core themes of social classes and divisions as depicted by Leporello’s complaints about his servitude to his employer in the first scene (Mozart, Fisher, & Ponte, 2007). The play also touches on vital human traits and principles, including loyalty, faithfulness, and sincerity. More importantly, Don Giovanni centers on the ambiguity intrinsic to human relations, the intricate connection between life and death, and the interminable tension between love and the risk of its extermination.

omissions and partiality of the historical master narrative, the alternative Ondaatje proposes is to privilege and celebrate a plurality of private and local narratives that give voice to the forgotten of History. Caravaggio, for example, is sadly aware of his

A historian picks and chooses what information to analyze. By leaving out some information it is also a form of manipulation and twisting the past. I think that this shows a direct link between a historian and a mythologizer, whose job it is to twist history for another purpose.

Throughout the satire Don Quixote, Cervantes selectively uses humor to emphasize a point in which he openly disagrees with. Cervantes takes advantage of this humor when he specifically retells the Marcela and Eugenio’s tragic story. In Marcela’s story, Marcela becomes a shepherdess in order to avoid marriage. However her decision leads to one of her suitors killing himself leading to public out roar. On the other hand, Eugenio retells a story involving his love Leandra.

He is not able to dissociate fiction from reality. In the eyes of Don, the novels of knight errantry serve as a guide for how to live. The Don believes that the knights are role models that all able people should strive to live by. It is the utmost honor to live the life of a knight errant. He defends all accounts of knight errantry, and if he happens upon someone who disagrees with his opinions, he disregards them because he assumes they are not a knight errant and, therefore, would not understand. When the Canon defamed his precious books the Don replied, “I consider that it is you who are out of your senses and under some spell, for you have taken it upon yourself to utter such blasphemies again what has been so well received in the world and so widely accepted as the truth that anyone who denies it, as you do, deserves the same punishment that you say you inflict on books that annoy you when you read them” (453). The Don then continues to combine historic facts with those of his chivalric fantasy in his explanation to the Canon of reliability of the novels. Don Quixote truly cannot separate fact from fiction. In the truest sense of insanity, he believes that the novels of night errantry with their absurd claims are not only plausible, but also

Luis Cervantes was a character who portrayed those people who were well educated about the revolution and knew exactly what they were fighting for. Because he was so knowledgeable, he could be looked at as Demetrio's "right hand," as many leaders had trustworthy people they turned to in the wake of the revolution. However, he abandons Demetrio and his men towards the end of the book. This makes the reader wonder if he was tired and gave up on the cause, as many followers of the revolution did, or if he foresaw the defeat of Demetrio and got out while he could. Both of