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The Man Who Invented Fiction: How Cervantes Ushered in the Modern World
“A heroic history of novel-reading itself.” -- The Atlantic
In the early seventeenth century, a crippled, graying, almost toothless veteran of Spain's wars against the Ottoman Empire published a book. It was the story of a poor nobleman, his brain addled from reading too many books of chivalry, who deludes himself that he is a knight errant and sets off on hilarious adventures. That book, Don Quixote , went on to sell more copies than any other book beside the Bible, making its author, Miguel de Cervantes, the single most-read author in human history. Cervantes did more than just publish a bestseller, though. He invented a way of writing. This book is about how Cervantes came to create what we now call fiction, and how fiction changed the world.
The Man Who Invented Fiction explores Cervantes's life and the world he lived in, showing how his influences converged in his work, and how his work--especially Don Quixote-- radically changed the nature of literature and created a new way of viewing the world. Finally, it explains how that worldview went on to infiltrate art, politics, and science, and how the world today would be unimaginable without it.
William Egginton has brought thrilling new meaning to an immortal novel.
In the early seventeenth century, a crippled, graying, almost toothless veteran of Spain's wars against the Ottoman Empire published a book. It was the story of a poor nobleman, his brain addled from reading too many books of chivalry, who deludes himself that he is a knight errant and sets off on hilarious adventures. That book, Don Quixote , went on to sell more copies than any other book beside the Bible, making its author, Miguel de Cervantes, the single most-read author in human history. Cervantes did more than just publish a bestseller, though. He invented a way of writing. This book is about how Cervantes came to create what we now call fiction, and how fiction changed the world.
The Man Who Invented Fiction explores Cervantes's life and the world he lived in, showing how his influences converged in his work, and how his work--especially Don Quixote-- radically changed the nature of literature and created a new way of viewing the world. Finally, it explains how that worldview went on to infiltrate art, politics, and science, and how the world today would be unimaginable without it.
William Egginton has brought thrilling new meaning to an immortal novel.
272 pages, Paperback
First published February 2, 2016
50 people are currently reading
536 people want to read
About the author
William Egginton
22 books75 followersWilliam Egginton is a literary critic and philosopher. He has written extensively on a broad range of subjects, including theatricality, fictionality, literary criticism, psychoanalysis and ethics, religious moderation, and theories of mediation. William Egginton was born in Syracuse, New York in 1969. He received his PhD in Comparative Literature from Stanford University in 1999. His doctoral thesis, "Theatricality and Presence: a Phenomenology of Space and Spectacle in Early Modern France and Spain," was written under the direction of Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht. He currently resides with his wife, Bernadette Wegenstein, and their three children, in Baltimore, Maryland. William Egginton is the Decker Professor in the Humanities and Director of the Alexander Grass Humanities Institute at the Johns Hopkins University, where he teaches on Spanish and Latin American literature, literary theory, and the relation between literature and philosophy.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 44 reviews
October 26, 2015
This could more accurately be called The Man Who Invented (Meta)Fiction. Eggington dances back and forth between talking about Cervantes's life and his art, trying to explain both what Cervantes did that was unique and what in his life and personality gave him the perspective to try something new. But Eggington's claims that Cervantes was the first to give his characters a complex and contradictory inner life (Shakespeare? Montaigne?) or have characters disagree about how they perceive a situation (Chaucer? Boccaccio?) falls flat, and what remains is the fascinating idea that in the foreword and notes of Don Quixote, Cervantes became the first author to create fictional versions of himself and his friends, playing with the boundaries between fiction and reality.
There were some fascinating details of Cervantes's life throughout this book, such as the irony that he fled Spain and joined the army to avoid having his right hand cut off for dueling ... only to lose his left hand in battle. And Eggington's enthusiasm for Cervantes's wit, compassion, and insight are infectious. But I found it hard to trust his statements as facts because he declares that one brief passage where a fictional character meets a friend who "called me father and I called him son" means that Cervantes had a secret love child, and uses Cervantes's version of his actions in battle as simple fact without considering that Cervantes may have been exaggerating or gilding the lily. I also found Eggington's writing style difficult: every single chapter begins with "As Cervantes experienced X, he must have felt Y," followed by a quick sketch of context, some random facts, and some literary discussion, leaping about in time and not even totally focused on one subject. There were also times when Eggington made declarative statements and waited a dozen pages to give even oblique evidence or explanation. I would have liked a more linear biography that offered the details of Cervantes's early misadventures and later financial straits for context and then got into his failed career as a playwright and the ways in which he used his life experiences and his quirky view of theater to create a new genre.
There were some fascinating details of Cervantes's life throughout this book, such as the irony that he fled Spain and joined the army to avoid having his right hand cut off for dueling ... only to lose his left hand in battle. And Eggington's enthusiasm for Cervantes's wit, compassion, and insight are infectious. But I found it hard to trust his statements as facts because he declares that one brief passage where a fictional character meets a friend who "called me father and I called him son" means that Cervantes had a secret love child, and uses Cervantes's version of his actions in battle as simple fact without considering that Cervantes may have been exaggerating or gilding the lily. I also found Eggington's writing style difficult: every single chapter begins with "As Cervantes experienced X, he must have felt Y," followed by a quick sketch of context, some random facts, and some literary discussion, leaping about in time and not even totally focused on one subject. There were also times when Eggington made declarative statements and waited a dozen pages to give even oblique evidence or explanation. I would have liked a more linear biography that offered the details of Cervantes's early misadventures and later financial straits for context and then got into his failed career as a playwright and the ways in which he used his life experiences and his quirky view of theater to create a new genre.
August 3, 2016
"Don Quixote" is one of my favorite novels of all time and so I was destined to get a hold of this book as soon as I could. It was good to know more about Cervantes and to get a handle on some of the links between his life and works, but there was too little depth throughout and some of the links were a little tenuous. It started well and I really thought it was going to be enlightening, but it soon went downhill, and I just felt relief when it ended.
December 27, 2015
Disclaimer: ARC via Netgalley.
One of my dirty secrets is that I have never read all of Don Quixote. I have read parts at various points since I was about seven or eight. I have read some of Cervantes other work. But all of Don Quixote, nope.
But after reading this book, I think I am going to change that.
Egginton’s book about one of the most famous books in the world, argues, quite persuasively that Don Quixote was far more revolutionary than people give it credit for.
While Egginton does an excellent job at proving his thesis, what also comes across is his love for the book as well as his fascination with Cervantes. It’s hard not to feel excited about the book after Egginton’s book.
It is difficult not to see the humor in DQ, even without having read the whole book. Egginton makes an argument for a more subtle and important reading. He writes, “Cervantes’s narratives function by constantly leading us to question the intent behind the descriptions, by pointing to the difference between the masks the characters show to one another and the internal feelings and emotions that animate them”. This is something that carries over to almost every novel and writer afterwards. It is now that we have in good fiction moved beyond types.
And this is part of Egginton’s contention that whether or not Cervantes knew it, he was writing in rejection of Aristotle and the other critics, what was then canon. Egginton best sums this up when he writes, “Boccaccio’s characters end at the limits of what they can see; Cervantes’s begin there”. Furthermore, Egginton links Cervantes to the modern day, for the man’s humor, so Egginton, is of the human race as opposed to of a certain time.
Poop jokes rule the world.
True, that.
If anything, Egginton’s book proves that Cervantes is human and that he is great writer because he remembers that important fact.
Egginton’s book isn’t so much a biography or even a literary biography, but a history that becomes for pages and pages, a love letter that isn’t addressed to the book or to the author, but to the reader.
One of my dirty secrets is that I have never read all of Don Quixote. I have read parts at various points since I was about seven or eight. I have read some of Cervantes other work. But all of Don Quixote, nope.
But after reading this book, I think I am going to change that.
Egginton’s book about one of the most famous books in the world, argues, quite persuasively that Don Quixote was far more revolutionary than people give it credit for.
While Egginton does an excellent job at proving his thesis, what also comes across is his love for the book as well as his fascination with Cervantes. It’s hard not to feel excited about the book after Egginton’s book.
It is difficult not to see the humor in DQ, even without having read the whole book. Egginton makes an argument for a more subtle and important reading. He writes, “Cervantes’s narratives function by constantly leading us to question the intent behind the descriptions, by pointing to the difference between the masks the characters show to one another and the internal feelings and emotions that animate them”. This is something that carries over to almost every novel and writer afterwards. It is now that we have in good fiction moved beyond types.
And this is part of Egginton’s contention that whether or not Cervantes knew it, he was writing in rejection of Aristotle and the other critics, what was then canon. Egginton best sums this up when he writes, “Boccaccio’s characters end at the limits of what they can see; Cervantes’s begin there”. Furthermore, Egginton links Cervantes to the modern day, for the man’s humor, so Egginton, is of the human race as opposed to of a certain time.
Poop jokes rule the world.
True, that.
If anything, Egginton’s book proves that Cervantes is human and that he is great writer because he remembers that important fact.
Egginton’s book isn’t so much a biography or even a literary biography, but a history that becomes for pages and pages, a love letter that isn’t addressed to the book or to the author, but to the reader.
March 23, 2024
Fully 4 Stars.
Possibly 5.
Accessible and Knowledgeable.
The joy Professor Eggington finds in reading and discussing Don Quixote the novel proves to be contagious. The compassion Eggington feels for Cervantes shines through. Words flow out of Eggington's understanding out onto pages and out on audiobook.
I read this book in preparation of rereading Don Quixote. I have read the novel several times in various forms. Yet I could never really wrap my brain around the text. It was already a struggle. Until now.
If you are struggling to understand the novel, I recommend reading this book. Eggington makes the subject accessible.
Possibly 5.
Accessible and Knowledgeable.
The joy Professor Eggington finds in reading and discussing Don Quixote the novel proves to be contagious. The compassion Eggington feels for Cervantes shines through. Words flow out of Eggington's understanding out onto pages and out on audiobook.
I read this book in preparation of rereading Don Quixote. I have read the novel several times in various forms. Yet I could never really wrap my brain around the text. It was already a struggle. Until now.
If you are struggling to understand the novel, I recommend reading this book. Eggington makes the subject accessible.
December 27, 2017
I read this in preparation of reading the Quixote. The bibliographical information and basic cultural and historical contexts were really incredibly well done--and another bonus is it is easy and pleasurable to read. Did you know Cervantes had to flee Spain after dual when he was found guilty and would lose his right hand as punishment? Ironically, he lost his left hand in the Battle of Lepanto where he had gone to fight in order to do something so heroic that they would have to let him back into Spain. He was a courageous fighter and was allowed back but as luck would have it, his boat was boarded by Barbary pirates and he was taken hostage. I am really looking forward to reading a book by Cervantes scholar María Antonia Garcés called Cervantes in Algiers that explores how this history of being held hostage influenced his literary mind. Garcés was herself held hostage and claims that the books she was allowed by her captors kept her alive.
Egginton does a great job exploring all of this. He also is fantastic on imperial Spain--a decidedly cruel period of imperialistic history by all accounts. The obsession with blood purity had begun well before Cervantes birth and Egginton is great on how this effected Cervantes life trajectory.
As to the central argument and the book's title; well, it is problematic to say the least. Tale of Genji was hundreds of years prior and was modern in many of the ways that Don Quixote is claimed to be. That said, I am fine with unprovable arguments like this one since the level of correlation between Cervantes' fiction, Descartes philosophy and the modern idea of the self is really noteworthy. This was an extremely fun and thought-provoking read.
Egginton does a great job exploring all of this. He also is fantastic on imperial Spain--a decidedly cruel period of imperialistic history by all accounts. The obsession with blood purity had begun well before Cervantes birth and Egginton is great on how this effected Cervantes life trajectory.
As to the central argument and the book's title; well, it is problematic to say the least. Tale of Genji was hundreds of years prior and was modern in many of the ways that Don Quixote is claimed to be. That said, I am fine with unprovable arguments like this one since the level of correlation between Cervantes' fiction, Descartes philosophy and the modern idea of the self is really noteworthy. This was an extremely fun and thought-provoking read.
Read
October 20, 2016“Life is absurd,” William Egginton tells us in his new book about Miguel de Cervantes and Don Quixote, “so laugh—but also feel, because life’s travails hurt others as much as they hurt you.”
Egginton, an accomplished scholar of Romance literatures, is not solely to blame for this kind of silly TED Talk. We don’t really want to read Cervantes, or any other classics for that matter. Instead, we want to read memoirs about other people reading them. Rather than Middlemarch, these days we read Rebecca Mead’s memoir of reading Middlemarch; Maryanne Wolf and Alain de Botton on Proust; Stephen Marche on Shakespeare; A.J. Jacobs on the Bible; Sarah Bakewell on Montaigne; Christopher Beha on the Harvard Classics; and now, coinciding with the 400th anniversary of Cervantes’s death, William Egginton on Don Quixote. Unlike the demure reading guides of years past—Harry Blamires’s New Bloomsday Book for Ulysses comes to mind, and also B.C. Southam’s A Student’s Guide to the Selected Poems of T.S. Eliot for The Waste Land—these newer efforts are assuredly self-focused, offering first-person arguments for why these books continue to matter, not in and of themselves, but to us, for us.
http://www.theamericanconservative.co...
Egginton, an accomplished scholar of Romance literatures, is not solely to blame for this kind of silly TED Talk. We don’t really want to read Cervantes, or any other classics for that matter. Instead, we want to read memoirs about other people reading them. Rather than Middlemarch, these days we read Rebecca Mead’s memoir of reading Middlemarch; Maryanne Wolf and Alain de Botton on Proust; Stephen Marche on Shakespeare; A.J. Jacobs on the Bible; Sarah Bakewell on Montaigne; Christopher Beha on the Harvard Classics; and now, coinciding with the 400th anniversary of Cervantes’s death, William Egginton on Don Quixote. Unlike the demure reading guides of years past—Harry Blamires’s New Bloomsday Book for Ulysses comes to mind, and also B.C. Southam’s A Student’s Guide to the Selected Poems of T.S. Eliot for The Waste Land—these newer efforts are assuredly self-focused, offering first-person arguments for why these books continue to matter, not in and of themselves, but to us, for us.
http://www.theamericanconservative.co...
September 5, 2016
I learned that in 1995 UNESCO declared April 23rd the International Day of the Book, partly because it of the nearly simultaneous death of Miguel de Cervantes and William Shakespeare in 1616. This book has a great deal of interesting information on Miguel de Cervantes, his life and times, his writing and Don Quixote. Though very interesting and enlightening, I did find the book a tough read. The idea that Cervantes invented fiction was thought provoking. The author also implies that Cervantes influenced Descartes and the modern world with his ideas and perspectives. This is a book that I may reread after having read some of Cervantes' body of work.
February 22, 2018
Would have rated it higher if I'd finished the book. Had to return it to the library, so hopefully at some point I will be able to finish this book. It was a fascinating biography, and while a lot of the literary analysis was interesting, he may have overstated the importance of some of what Cervantes did by failing to acknowledge the influence other authors and other countries have had on the concept of fiction.
February 14, 2017
A bit too theoretical/academic/"lit crit" for my taste. The biographical bits were more interesting.
June 2, 2019
Den var spændende, en god blanding af litterær teori, historisk kontekst og Cervantes egen fortælling, men jeg er endnu ikke helt sikker på, at jeg køber påstanden, der præsenteres allerede i titlen.
July 8, 2017
Despite its grandiose title and flawed central thesis (more on that in a moment), this is an eminently readable, informative, and fun book. In a brisk 184 pages, Egginton simultaneously traces the biography of Cervantes with the development of his most eminent creation, Don Quixote de La Mancha. Tackling the central theme of that epic story, the human desire/incapability of discerning reality from what we WANT it to be, Egginton claims that this is in fact the definition of fiction, that we concurrently know we are watching/reading an illusion but also closely identifying with the reality within that construct and how it mimics or betters our lives. He claims that Cervantes invented fiction, the idea that "real" life is reflected in literary art but also blurred by imagination. This simply ignores the history of literature on multiple levels, proving Egginton himself to be quixotic in his search for Cervantes himself. Cervantes isn't even the first author to place himself within his own literary construct (Chaucer springs to mind). And certainly he can't sustain the claim that no other authors have explored this dichotomy, from Greco-Roman drama and mythology to Cervantes's contemporary, Shakespeare. However, this is one of the first attempts to do so in the modality of the novel, the idea of a work of sustained prose, a differentiation that Egginton never makes. Semantics aside, this is a fun and great book that is as fun to read as Cervantes himself. Highly recommended for all lovers of Don Quixote.
Read
May 2, 2018With a claim as provocative and unarguable as Harold Bloom’s claim in his Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human, I expected a greater preponderance of evidence. Instead William Egginton provides mostly biography mixed with a touch of literary analysis. Which is neither good or bad. I simply wanted a better defense of his claim. The subtitle to this book is “How Cervantes Ushered in the Modern World.” Egginton never really explains how Cervantes did this..
It starts promisingly enough, with a great picture of Cervantes delivering his manuscript to the publisher. It’s a strange picture to envision, and something not many of us do--to imagine the geniuses immediately after finishing their work but before making it known to the world. But besides this, a lot of the biography is standard fare and does not illuminate how Cervantes invented fiction with Don Quixote. Some of the text analysis does bolster his mighty claim… but most of the text analysis in the book has already been expounded on by others. There’s little fresh or new here.
I don’t know. I do admire this book, and I do believe Egginton’s claim that Cervantes invented fiction. Or at least something along those lines. I don’t doubt that what Cervantes with Don Quixote is something akin to invent fiction. It doesn’t take a good writer to notice that. But it does take a good writer to defend such a claim. I mean, as a popular intro to Cervantes this book is fine. But for in-depth analysis go to Miguel de Unamuno and Erich Auerbach.
It starts promisingly enough, with a great picture of Cervantes delivering his manuscript to the publisher. It’s a strange picture to envision, and something not many of us do--to imagine the geniuses immediately after finishing their work but before making it known to the world. But besides this, a lot of the biography is standard fare and does not illuminate how Cervantes invented fiction with Don Quixote. Some of the text analysis does bolster his mighty claim… but most of the text analysis in the book has already been expounded on by others. There’s little fresh or new here.
I don’t know. I do admire this book, and I do believe Egginton’s claim that Cervantes invented fiction. Or at least something along those lines. I don’t doubt that what Cervantes with Don Quixote is something akin to invent fiction. It doesn’t take a good writer to notice that. But it does take a good writer to defend such a claim. I mean, as a popular intro to Cervantes this book is fine. But for in-depth analysis go to Miguel de Unamuno and Erich Auerbach.
December 17, 2021
While I was reading this book, I mentioned the title to several friends and family and asked them to whom they thought "The Man Who Invented Fiction" applied. I got a number of good answers, but none were Cervantes. This is not necessarily a reflection on the lack of literary chops of my homies as Professor Egginton himself admits that not all of his colleagues in erudite literary circles agree with his premise. I read Don Quixote as a high school junior so I will not be too hard on my callow self for missing all of the insights that Egginton has derived from that work. I may well read it again to try to figure out what he is talking about. I valued this book primarily as a biography of Cervantes and as a history of the status of literature in the 15th and 16th centuries. Most of the stuff about why fiction was created by Cervantes was too deep for me, although I tried to wade through it as best I could waiting for more of the story of Cervantes's life and times.
March 6, 2022
A biography of Cervantes written from the point of view of his greatest creation The Don. Blending the highest skills of a novella with the academic rigour of a post doc researcher. Egginton has truly done himself and his teacher proud for producing such an honest account of events drawing on sources most of which a centuries old.
While his thesis is open to critique at multiple points the trajectory of the book makes it abundantly clear that while the better part of human attainment can be attributed to man's capacity to reproduce. Cervantes can be justifiably recognised for truly inventing something a new. The novel as we know it with character development and plos which has their highs and lows truly did not exist prior to the crippled war veteran from the crusades- Cervantes
A must read for anyone who has found Solace in a novel.
While his thesis is open to critique at multiple points the trajectory of the book makes it abundantly clear that while the better part of human attainment can be attributed to man's capacity to reproduce. Cervantes can be justifiably recognised for truly inventing something a new. The novel as we know it with character development and plos which has their highs and lows truly did not exist prior to the crippled war veteran from the crusades- Cervantes
A must read for anyone who has found Solace in a novel.
July 11, 2016
A hungry reporter with a need to pay the rent tells an approximate fairy tale about someone long dead. Greek drama, stories about how the gods quarrel, or delirious accounts of how the Earth was made by some god who thought the sky was hard as a hardwood floor. Fairy tales (like this one), and hero legends, yet is Cervantes the one who invented fiction. Nice.
William Egginton seems to have read the comics about the life of Cervantes and now he is ready to tell it all. Smartphones, tanks and vaccination were 'ushered' by an old man somewhere where today there is Spain.
What about novels in China and Japan? Who cares! White power!
William Egginton seems to have read the comics about the life of Cervantes and now he is ready to tell it all. Smartphones, tanks and vaccination were 'ushered' by an old man somewhere where today there is Spain.
What about novels in China and Japan? Who cares! White power!
May 1, 2017
This is a very readable work of Cervantes criticism (which can't be said for many others), and Egginton's claim that Cervantes created (modern) fiction and therefore changed the way we thought about our world and ourselves is convincing (but reading Don Quixote already convinced me of that!). I suppose what I wanted more of was analysis of his fiction--a close reading and a break down of what, specifically, in DQ and others, was so revolutionary for the time--to prove the case, rather than a mostly historical and biographical approach. Overall, though, I thoroughly enjoyed it.
April 30, 2016
An exceptional delving into the work of Don Quixote and its author. I enjoyed the writing, and thought the book was organized well. Lots of food for thought here on the central topic of Cervantes as the inventor of fiction as a space where the illusion of reality and the judgments on those illusions can coexist. I highly recommend to others interested in the philosophy of art and fiction.
April 25, 2017
I read this book because I have never read Don Quixote. I wanted to know what all the fuss wa about. This book by Egginton answers the question in great detail. As a result I stopped about 2/3 of the way through as I felt I had gotten the idea. Well worth the read.
September 8, 2019
Approachable scholarship that challenges my presuppositions about literature before Cervantes.
September 15, 2024
I enjoyed the Rigor of Angels so much I decided to read this book about Cervantes by William Egginton. The first time I tried to read Don Quixote I gave up after a few chapters. I thought Don Quixote would join the list of books that I have tried to read and failed to finish. The list includes The Critique of Pure Reason by Emmanuelle Kant, which I mentioned in a recent review, Of Grammatology by Jacque Derrida, The Order of Things by Michael Foucault, S/Z by Roland Barthes, a collection of essays by Charles Pierce and Semiotics and the Philosophy of Language by Umberto Eco.
I returned to Don Quixote after a couple of years and this time I finished. I read it as an audio book and I remember listening to it on a stationary bicycle at the YMCA outpost in Winooski. That branch of the Y closed a while ago.
I read Don Quixote for the last time when I was in a book club. I believe Don Quixote is a very important book, which has influenced writers ever since its publication but it is not one of my favorites. Maybe part of the reason is my focus on books written in English. I have more context for Shakespeare, for example, than Cervantes. They were contemporaries. Whenever I venture into a literary tradition I am not familiar with I soon feel overwhelmed by the number of authors I have not read. If I were to study Cervantes seriously I would want to read all the books of chivalry mentioned in Don Quixote, and that would be just the beginning. I also felt lost when I read The Divine Comedy and when I read the Russian classics. There is always so much more to learn!
March 31, 2023
The line between what is reality and what is a person’s interpretation of it hasn’t always been clear. For centuries, monarchies and governments used their monopoly on power and censorship to ensure that everyone’s reality aligned with the interests of those in power.
There was only two types of prevalent literature - history and poetry. History, written by the victors, was always romantic and told in a way that encouraged more of a certain behavior. Poetry was an attempt as telling the future and the direction of society.
The printing press and Don Quixote allowed for a new type of literature - one where the author challenged people to view the same event from multiple perspectives. It was no longer about right and wrong, but about how multiple different people can have different interpretations of the same event. It opened people up to the idea that maybe there was more to their story than the ideas that they had been handed, and perhaps the world was more nuanced and subjective than they’d been led to believe.
The book itself I give 3 stars for chasing a million rabbit trails. It could’ve been a short, 100-page book. A ton of fluff.
There was only two types of prevalent literature - history and poetry. History, written by the victors, was always romantic and told in a way that encouraged more of a certain behavior. Poetry was an attempt as telling the future and the direction of society.
The printing press and Don Quixote allowed for a new type of literature - one where the author challenged people to view the same event from multiple perspectives. It was no longer about right and wrong, but about how multiple different people can have different interpretations of the same event. It opened people up to the idea that maybe there was more to their story than the ideas that they had been handed, and perhaps the world was more nuanced and subjective than they’d been led to believe.
The book itself I give 3 stars for chasing a million rabbit trails. It could’ve been a short, 100-page book. A ton of fluff.
April 25, 2024
A mix of a biography of Cervantes, a history of Spain at the time of the writing of Don Quixote, and literary criticism of same. Not all of these elements are equally represented: Cervantes's biography is by far the weakest, though that's because the historical records are skimpy and, even when they do exist, not always trustworthy. The literary criticism is the strongest part of The Man Who Invented Fiction, and I appreciated it for being the first explanation of what people mean when they call Don Quixote the "world's first novel" that actually makes sense to me. It's less about the term 'novel' – which, no matter how you define it, is inevitably going to include many dozens of earlier books – and more about style of writing, focused on limited POVs and metanarratives. Plus the enthusiasm of a bunch of 19th century German philosophers, who decided to retroactively make their favorite book an important book.
There are better histories of Spain out there, but if you want one book that covers everything in relatively few pages and with an engaging narrative voice, this is the one to choose.
There are better histories of Spain out there, but if you want one book that covers everything in relatively few pages and with an engaging narrative voice, this is the one to choose.
July 11, 2025
I really enjoyed reading The Man Who Invented Fiction. The author, William Egginton, explains how Miguel de Cervantes, the writer of Don Quixote, helped create the kind of storytelling we now call fiction. Egginton shows how Cervantes changed the way stories were told by focusing on characters’ inner lives, imagination, and the blurry line between reality and fantasy.
The book is easy to follow, even if you're not an expert in literature. It mixes history, philosophy, and literary analysis in a very engaging way. I especially liked learning how Cervantes' personal experiences—like being a soldier, a prisoner, and a tax collector—influenced his writing.
After reading this book, I feel inspired to go back and re-read Don Quixote. I think I’ll appreciate it much more now, especially knowing how groundbreaking it was for its time.
The book is easy to follow, even if you're not an expert in literature. It mixes history, philosophy, and literary analysis in a very engaging way. I especially liked learning how Cervantes' personal experiences—like being a soldier, a prisoner, and a tax collector—influenced his writing.
After reading this book, I feel inspired to go back and re-read Don Quixote. I think I’ll appreciate it much more now, especially knowing how groundbreaking it was for its time.
April 1, 2018
Turgenev, in what remains my favorite piece of literary criticism, declared that "Before the invincible spirit of the English poet [Shakespeare] everything that is human seems to yield, whereas the wealth of Cervantes is derived solely from his own heart;a heart that is warm, genial and rich with experience yet not become callous." Egginton seeks to understand how this "warm, genial and rich" heart not only wrote the first piece of fiction, but how he responded to the centuries of tradition which emerged in his wake.
* The Turgenev essay: http://www.donquixote.com/uploads/4/3...
* The Turgenev essay: http://www.donquixote.com/uploads/4/3...
December 17, 2023
My review is very subjective and not really a diss of the book’s quality; I’m sure it’s me. I can’t seem to read non-fiction any more unless it’s extremely propulsive narratively. This felt slightly too academic for me, I think, though I’m quite interested in the themes - I really slogged through. I’d get into it for ten pages and then just - stuck. I’ve also never read Don Quixote though I’m not sure that matters. I don’t know what’s wrong with me; I think it’s where I’m at. Maybe it’s also because it’s a mix of biography and straight up literary criticism, and it really jumps around a lot. I just couldn’t get into it.
December 11, 2017
A fascinating book about the life of Miguel Cervantes, the importance of his most well known book Don Quijote and the history which informed and shaped his life and work. It is bold to say that he invented fiction, but just as painters of his era were experimenting with principles such as perspective that made painting more realistic and three dimensional, Cervantes was among the first authors to experiment with fiction that let us see into the inner life of the character as well as how the character appears to others.
January 26, 2021
An incredibly fascinating work that lets you see how Cervantes life and the time a he lived in impacted his most famous work. Well worth the read if you are at all interested in the creation an impact of Don Quixote.
June 16, 2021
A very well written and well referenced book .
I would have liked if it referred to the mother of all novels and fiction : The Arabian Nights, especially that Cervantes fictionally attributed his gem to an Arab author.
I would have liked if it referred to the mother of all novels and fiction : The Arabian Nights, especially that Cervantes fictionally attributed his gem to an Arab author.
October 19, 2017
An excellent primer on Quixote, and the world he inhabited and incorporated into his masterwork.
September 24, 2018
This is not easy read but it taught me a huge amount not only about Cervantes and the history of Spain.
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