“The Impossible Dream” -- Joe Darion (Lyrics) and Mitch Leigh (Music)
On feast day of Saint Michael the Archangel in 1547, Miguel de Cervantes is thought to have been born in the ancient Castilian city of Alcalá de Henares. Dated some ten days thereafter, an entry in Register of Baptisms at the parish church of Santa María la Mayor makes the first known mention of this infant:
On Sunday, the ninth day of the month of October, the year of our Lord one thousand five hundred forty and seven, Miguel, son of Rodrigo Cervantes and his wife Leonor, was baptised; his godfathers were Juan Pardo; he was baptised by the Reverend Bachelor Bartolomé Serrano, Priest of Our Lady. Witnesses, Baltasar Vázquez, Sexton, and I, who baptised him and signed this in my name. Bachelor Serrano.
On Sunday, the ninth day of the month of October, the year of our Lord one thousand five hundred forty and seven, Miguel, son of Rodrigo Cervantes and his wife Leonor, was baptised; his godfathers were Juan Pardo; he was baptised by the Reverend Bachelor Bartolomé Serrano, Priest of Our Lady. Witnesses, Baltasar Vázquez, Sexton, and I, who baptised him and signed this in my name. Bachelor Serrano.
Much of Cervantes’ life remains shrouded by the distance of time, but some details emerge from the shadows. His family, his life, his adventures are the stuff we would expect to find in tacky historical novels. Miguel’s maternal grandfather was a nobleman who had burned through his fortune and thought to sell his daughter Leonor de Cortinas into matrimony to better his lot. Unfortunately, Rodrigo Cervantes did not prove to be the sort of husband the young bride might have desired. Rodrigo’s father was a much respected and distinguished lawyer. Rodrigo himself was a barber-surgeon -- frighteningly, the two professions overlapped in that era -- cutting hair when not fixing broken bones and bleeding patients. His proud pedigree and occupation aside, Rodrigo was a financial failure, leading to his being legally denied permission to practice his trade. In his duties as a husband, Rodrigo would also be found lacking. Poor Leonor would learn that her husband Rodrigo was far more successful in his pursuit of mistresses than in his career. Throughout his childhood, Cervantes and his family would be constantly on the move, relocating from town to town seeking some means of security. Such was the state of the family purse that when young Cervantes and the barmaid Josefina Catalina de Parez fell passionately in love and planned to wed, her father blocked the union, thinking the impoverished boy beneath his daughter’s station.
Once he escapes the clutches of childhood, Cervantes' life began to diverge from the dull, dire path it seemed fate had destined him to tread. To be sure, much remains unknown. Was Cervantes educated at the venerable Cathedral School at Salamanca? Did Jesuits educate the young man? No one knows.
Cervantes was forced to leave his native Castile in 1569. Again, no one can say why with certainty although some accounts suggest he was fugitive from justice, avoiding having to answer for wounds inflicted on a certain Antonio de Sigura in a duel. But we do know he relocated to Rome, then being transformed by reaction to the Protestant Reformation. His time in the Eternal City was fleeting but sufficiently long enough to suffuse the young man with a lasting appreciation of literature and art from the recently late Renaissance era. It might be said that the Renaissance aesthetic changed the man, and the man changed the world.
Miguel de Cervantes
by Eduardo Balaca
When Cervantes drew his first birth as an infant, King Charles I occupied the throne of Spain. Confusingly, King Charles I of Spain is better remembered to history as Emperor Charles V of the Holy Roman Empire. Charles is easily one of the most influential individuals ever to have lived, but that is a story best left for another day. I mention him only because, in addition to his role in shaping the political and religious shape of the modern world, he would also indirectly give direction to humanity’s literary conventions by creating the world’s first marine corps some ten years before Cervantes, birth. In that age, Naples was a Spanish holding although that claim was hotly contested and maintained only by force of arms. In 1537, Charles attached the Compañías Viejas del Mar de Nápoles (Naples Sea Old Companies) to the Escuadras de Galeras del Mediterráneo (Mediterranean Galley Squadrons), thus creating the Infantería de Armada (Navy Infantry). After his brief stay in Rome, Cervantes would make his way to Naples where he enlisted in the Infantería de Armada. Now he is remembered as the most famous marine in all Spanish history.
Seeschlacht von Lepanto
(The Battle of Lepanto)
by Pieter Brünniche
Beginning with the gradual dismantling of the Byzantine Empire and ultimately its utter eradication in 1453, the Ottoman Turks had been extending their empire westward into Christendom. All the Balkans, much of Central Europe, and even parts of Austria fell to their formidable Janissary corps. Cervantes fought as a marine in the Battle of Lepanto in which a Spanish-led allegiance decisively defeated an Ottoman fleet in the Western World’s last conflict between rowed navies. On that 7 October 1571, Cervantes sustained three wounds, being shot twice in the chest and once in the left arm.
Cervantes recovered sufficiently to return to service, albeit with lasting disability to his left arm. And his misadventures with the Turks were yet to continue. On 26 October 1675, Ottoman pirates intercepted a galley transporting Cervantes to Barcelona. He was captured and spirited off to Algiers where he would spend five years a slave. With the assistance of the Trinitarian Order, a Catholic religious founded expressly to redeem Christian captives, Cervantes' parents ransomed their son.
The newly freedCervantes returned to Spain, understandably determined to live out his days in conventional, non-eventful middle class method. Having a wealth of experience to draw upon, Cervantes turned to writing. However, Mistress Fortuna had not yet finished with him. Sadly, few authors of that era could survive by word alone, and so a second profession was required to subsidize the first. Cervantes found employment as a purchasing agent for the Spanish Navy. Unfortunately, he would deposited royal funds entrusted him with a banker -- the banker went bankrupt, the Crown money lost, and Miguel arrested. Again he found himself a captive, this time in a Seville prison.
Few people have used imprisonment more productively than did Cervantes in those few months. An idea took form in his mind, and his most famous literary creation was “engendered.” After his release, he penned furiously, putting thoughts to paper. Drawing upon his love of Renaissance culture, his wartime service as a marine, and his long enslavement, he would create one of the most enduring characters in all literature.
Cervantes recovered sufficiently to return to service, albeit with lasting disability to his left arm. And his misadventures with the Turks were yet to continue. On 26 October 1675, Ottoman pirates intercepted a galley transporting Cervantes to Barcelona. He was captured and spirited off to Algiers where he would spend five years a slave. With the assistance of the Trinitarian Order, a Catholic religious founded expressly to redeem Christian captives, Cervantes' parents ransomed their son.
The newly freedCervantes returned to Spain, understandably determined to live out his days in conventional, non-eventful middle class method. Having a wealth of experience to draw upon, Cervantes turned to writing. However, Mistress Fortuna had not yet finished with him. Sadly, few authors of that era could survive by word alone, and so a second profession was required to subsidize the first. Cervantes found employment as a purchasing agent for the Spanish Navy. Unfortunately, he would deposited royal funds entrusted him with a banker -- the banker went bankrupt, the Crown money lost, and Miguel arrested. Again he found himself a captive, this time in a Seville prison.
Few people have used imprisonment more productively than did Cervantes in those few months. An idea took form in his mind, and his most famous literary creation was “engendered.” After his release, he penned furiously, putting thoughts to paper. Drawing upon his love of Renaissance culture, his wartime service as a marine, and his long enslavement, he would create one of the most enduring characters in all literature.
Don Quixote
Title Page of First Edition, 1605
El Ingenioso Hidalgo Don Quixote de la Mancha (The History of the Valorous and Wittie Knight-Errant Don-Quixote of the Mancha, typically shorted to Don Quixote, tells the story of befuddled Spanish minor nobleman Alonso Quixano. A madness brought about by too little sleeping and too much the reading of absurdly fantastic stories or knightly chivalry convinces the middle-aged gentleman that he possesses the mettle of the heroes who inhabit the books that consume his every free moment. Consequently, he dons antiquated armor, saddles up his old farm nag Rocinante, and sets out to right the world’s wrongs. Every knight-errant needs a lady love, and Alonso is no exception. He will quest for the honor of Dulcinea del Toboso, a lovely princess whom the entire world, except for Alonso himself, believes to be merely local peasant woman Aldonza Lorenzo. Assuming the knightly appellation Don Quixote, Alonso recruits his servant, the dimwitted and greedy Sancho Panza as his squire. The delusional and gullible Don Quixote famously tilts at windmills, disrupts businesses, confounds and annoyed strangers, and even unknowingly accomplishes some good.
Don Quixote was originally published in two volumes. The first part was released on this day in 1605. The remainder was published in 1615, the year before Miguel’s death at the age of 68. In creating Don Quixote, Miguel did for Spanish what Shakespeare did for English and Martin Luther did for German. He created a medium in which his native tongue would thrive and grow all the while bearing his unique stamp.
Man of La Mancha began life as I, Don Quixote, a nonmusical 1964 teleplay. In 1965, following the inspired suggestion of stage producer Albert Marre, the play was rewritten for the stage as a musical. I had the good fortune to view the 1992 Broadway revival of Man of La Mancha. The lead was played by the always adroit Raul Julia. The roles of Dulcinea and Sancho went to the remarkably less inspiring Sheena Easton and Tony Martinez. The performance begins with Miguel in a dungeon awaiting trial reading to his fellow prisoners the story of his fictitious hero and companions. As the story unfolds, the actors playing the roles of Miguel and his fellow prisoners reenact the adventures being described. The play closes as a ladder descends into the darkened cell. Miguel, the text of Don Quixote in hand, ascends to face the judgement of the Spanish Inquisition. The details of the play do not match the events of the book, but were Miguel alive today, I wager he would find the musical’s most popular song to be a perfect fit for his Don Quixote.
“The Impossible Dream” -- Joe Darion (Lyrics) and Mitch Leigh (Music)
“It is the mission of each true knight... his duty... nay, his privilege!
To dream the impossible dream
To fight the unbeatable foe
To bear with unbearable sorrow
To run where the brave dare not go
To right the unrightable wrong
To love pure and chaste from afar
To try when your arms are too weary
To reach the unreachable star
This is my quest
To follow that star
No matter how hopeless
No matter how far
To fight for the right
Without question or pause
To be willing to march into Hell
For a heavenly cause
And I know if I'll only be true
To this glorious quest
That my heart will lie peaceful and calm
When I'm laid to my rest
And the world will be better for this
That one man, scorned and covered with scars
Still strove with his last ounce of courage
To reach the unreachable star
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