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Don Quijote | ||
Tags: Literature | Spanish | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Questions About Your Target Languages |  | |
| LittleKey Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5960 days ago 146 posts - 153 votes  Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French, Japanese | Message 1 of 11 12 June 2009 at 2:46am | IP Logged | |||||
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I was wondering; how similar is "Don Quijote" to how Spanish is today? Is the language similar to modern day, or is it like Shakespeare is to modern English? Because I want to read it, but if it's really outdated, then I'd rather not try.
The text is here: http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext99/2donq10h.htm. Muchos gracias para todos sus respuestas =). 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
 Hencke Tetraglot Moderator Spain Joined 6902 days ago 2340 posts - 2444 votes Speaks: Swedish*, Finnish, EnglishC2, Spanish Studies: Mandarin Personal Language Map | Message 2 of 11 17 June 2009 at 12:34am | IP Logged | |||||
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My quick opinion: It is quite outdated language, but not as much so as Shakespeare. If you need to ask about it at all, then you'll be better off leaving it for later.
I wouldn't recommend anyone to try tackling "El Quijote" before high intermediate or advanced level. It will be too challenging for your level, inefficient as a learning aid, and much of what you did manage to learn would not be applicable, or not be understood or sound ridiculous if used today. I did read it myself, back when I was at an early intermediate level, and I stuck with it and got through the whole thing over the space of a few months by pure stubbornness and pig-headedness. But it was time spent very ineffectively and probably didn't help my progress one bit at the time. So, if you want to do yourself a favor, don't repeat my mistake with this one. If it's classics you fancy, there are plenty of those that are a little more recent than "El Quijote". Anything from up to a hundred years back or so will be mostly OK for language style, not totally up to date but also not terribly dated. And some of these are suitable for less advanced levels too, Pío Baroja is one author that comes to mind, since I remember reading a thing or two by him, but there are many others. By the way, there is a peculiar historical coincidence connecting Shakespeare and Cervantes: Did you know that they both died on the same day ? Edited by Hencke on 17 June 2009 at 12:44am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Marc Frisch Heptaglot Senior Member Germany Joined 6673 days ago 1001 posts - 1169 votes Speaks: German*, French, English, Spanish, Portuguese, Turkish, Italian Studies: Persian, Tamil | Message 3 of 11 17 June 2009 at 1:23pm | IP Logged | |||||
Fascinating! 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| babelpoint Newbie United Kingdom babelpoint.org Joined 5632 days ago 26 posts - 31 votes Speaks: Russian | Message 4 of 11 02 July 2009 at 2:00am | IP Logged | |||||
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yes, indeed. It is difficult to understand, also for native speakers. Generally it has a lot of notes with explanations. It is funny to discover that some words are used in Portuguese nowadays. Well I found it easier in German and Russian, probably because the translations were not really good.
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| rNajera Triglot Groupie Canada rafaelnajera.com Joined 6145 days ago 45 posts - 60 votes Speaks: Spanish*, EnglishC2, French Studies: Latin, German, Korean | Message 5 of 11 03 July 2009 at 4:13pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I read Don Quijote for the first time when I was 13 and even though there were difficult parts I didn't find it extremely hard. My edition didn't have too much notes and I would have not read it if I had to "study" it. Of course, I was mostly hooked with the story and didn't care too much if I knew the exact meaning of every single word. I remember it took me several pages to figure out whart a "yelmo" was. I guess part of my obsession with Don Quijote in my teen years, besides the fact that it is a extremely funny novel, was actually that it forced me to stay with it and decipher it.
The thing is that Don Quijote is such a good book that it accepts, and I would say, demands, different readings at different levels. I've read it twice more ever since, and I understand much more. Reading the scholarly notes now I realize that I could not have possibly understand those at 13 either. So, I suggest you have a crack at it. Try to read it. Unless you're getting so lost that it's not fun anymore, keep going. If not, just put it aside and come back to it later. Don't worry. You should read it for fun not as an assignment. Cheers, Rafael. PS. Some people say that it's easier to read for us Latinamericans because we have kept some words and turns of phrase that are now obsolete in Spain. Could be, but I'm not sure. Edited by rNajera on 03 July 2009 at 4:14pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| karottetrekker Pentaglot Newbie Belgium Joined 5630 days ago 2 posts - 2 votes Speaks: Dutch*, Afrikaans, English, German, French Studies: Spanish | Message 6 of 11 04 July 2009 at 7:03am | IP Logged | |||||
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Practice your Spanish, and wait for it as our friends have told you already. With a dictionary in your hand it's not pleasant reading isn't it? :)
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| karagarga Diglot Newbie United States Joined 5629 days ago 3 posts - 3 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish | Message 7 of 11 07 July 2009 at 5:30pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I tried listen-reading DQ for several months, and didn't make it through one sweep of the book. It was just too long for me, and I got fed up with reading the words "caballero andante" over and over again. I'd recommend almost any other book over it, at least for LRing.
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| DaraghM Diglot Senior Member Ireland Joined 6159 days ago 1947 posts - 2923 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French, Russian, Hungarian | Message 8 of 11 09 July 2009 at 4:26pm | IP Logged | |||||
The Mexican writer Carlos Fuentes even surmised they were the same person. This sometimes gets mentioned in Shakespeare authorship discussions. Edited by DaraghM on 09 July 2009 at 4:29pm 1 person has voted this message useful |
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