With its experimental form and literary playfulness, this classic is generally recognized as the first modern novel. Don Quixote has become so entranced reading tales of chivalry that he decides to turn knight errant himself. In the company of his faithful squire, Sancho Panza, these exploits blossom in all sorts of wonderful ways. While Quixote's fancy often leads him astray—he tilts at windmills, imagining them to be giants—Sancho acquires cunning and a certain sagacity. Sane madman and wise fool, they roam the world together—and together they have haunted readers' imaginations for nearly four hundred years. This Penguin Classics edition, with its beautiful new cover design, includes John Rutherford's masterly translation, which does full justice to the energy and wit of Cervantes's prose, as well as a brilliant critical introduction by Roberto Gonzalez Echevarriá.

近代小説の嚆矢とされる本作の神髄は、虚構が現実を侵食し、やがて新たな真実を創り出すというメタ・フィクションの極致にあります。騎士道物語に心酔した狂人と、現世利益を追う従者。この対照的な二人の彷徨は、単なる滑稽なドタバタ劇の枠を越え、人間の尊厳と想像力の勝利を謳い上げる崇高な叙事詩へと昇華されています。 正気と狂気、理想と打算が交錯する中で、キホーテの「崇高な迷走」は、冷酷な現実を生き抜くための唯一の武器として光を放ちます。セルバンテスが編み上げた言葉の迷宮は、四百年の時を経てもなお、読者の魂に「正しく狂うこと」の自由と勇気を植え付けます。これぞ、文字という媒体でしか到達し得ない人間賛歌の最高到達点なのです。