Miguel de Cervantes

Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra was a Spanish writer, born around 29 September 1547 in Alcalá de Henares and died on 22 April 1616. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the Spanish language and one of the world’s pre-eminent novelists. His name itself carries a small history: he signed it as “Cerbantes,” while his printers used “Cervantes,” the form that became common. In later life he used “Saavedra,” the name of a distant relative, though the origin and meaning of that choice remain debated.

Cervantes is best known for Don Quixote, published in two parts in 1605 and 1615. The book is considered the first modern novel, and many well-known authors have called it the “best book of all time” and the “best and most central work in world literature.” His other works include La Galatea, published in 1585; the 12 Novelas ejemplares; the long poem Viaje del Parnaso; and Ocho comedias y ocho entremeses. His novel Los trabajos de Persiles y Sigismunda was published after his death in 1617.

The facts of Cervantes’ life are often uneven and uncertain, but the known record is full of strain, movement, and public service. He was the second son of Rodrigo de Cervantes, a barber-surgeon, and Leonor de Cortinas, who could read and write and supported the family when Rodrigo was imprisoned for debt. The family moved often, with periods in Córdoba, Seville, and Madrid. Some scholars contend that Cervantes attended the Jesuit college in Seville, though the record is not settled.

In 1569 Cervantes was forced to leave Spain and went to Rome, where he worked in the household of Giulio Acquaviva, later a cardinal. In 1570 he enlisted in a Spanish Navy infantry regiment. The next year, while serving with the Holy League fleet at the Battle of Lepanto, he was badly wounded, receiving injuries to his chest and to his left arm and hand. The wound left that arm useless, and he was later called “El manco de Lepanto.” He remained a soldier until 1575, when Barbary pirates captured him. After five years in captivity, he was ransomed and returned to Madrid.

Even after La Galatea, Cervantes did not live as a writer set apart from ordinary pressures. He worked as a purchasing agent and later as a government tax collector, and much of his life was spent in relative poverty and obscurity. Many of his early works were lost. Yet his influence is such that Spanish is often called “the language of Cervantes.” The cave of Medrano in Argamasilla de Alba has long been known in local tradition as the prison where he conceived and began to write Don Quixote. Whether read as comedy, adventure, or a new kind of novel, his work continues to matter because it joined hard experience to a form that changed literature.