Research

Miguel de Cervantes dared to offer wise advice.

“Dream of the impossible dream, fight the impossible enemy, run where the brave dared not, reach the unreachable star”: one of the most inspiring quotes from Don Quixote de La Mancha, ideal for finding motivation.

“Good deeds never lack a reward”: a perfect quote to remember that good deeds always have their reward.

“He who reads a lot and travels a lot, sees a lot and knows a lot”: a quote that undoubtedly highlights the importance of reading and its irreplaceable quality.

“Freedom, Sancho, is one of the most precious gifts that heaven has bestowed upon mankind; no treasures on earth or sea conceal can equal it: for freedom, as for honour, one can and should risk one’s life”: a reminder of the importance of freedom and the need to value and live it every day.

“A man is not more than another if he does not do more than another”: in the words of Miguel de Cervantes, simple but full of meaning. The importance of doing above all else.

“There is no memory that time does not end, nor pain that death does not consume”: a reminder that everything is fleeting.

“Ingratitude is the daughter of pride”: those who seek the praise of others above all else will never know how to be grateful.

“He who retreats does not flee”: a reminder that removing oneself from harmful situations is good.

In his protagonist, Don Quixote, Cervantes poses the struggle between lofty ideals and harsh reality.

Don Quixote, a man who has read too many books of chivalry, decides to embark on his own heroic adventure, seeing the world in a completely different way than objective reality. This creates a duality between the chivalric fantasy he perceives and the mundane reality that surrounds him, leading to both comic and tragic situations.

In addition, Cervantes also touches on themes such as:

1. Idealism versus pragmatism: Don Quixote represents pure idealism, while his faithful squire, Sancho Panza, embodies practicality. Throughout the work, these two characters demonstrate the tensions between living a life chasing unattainable dreams or facing reality sensibly.
   
   

2. Madness and Sanity: The book questions what it means to be sane or mad. Don Quixote is seen as mad by others, but his madness leads him to act nobly, which calls into question whether his worldview is truly irrational.
   
   

3. Social Criticism: Cervantes uses the novel to criticize both the society of his time and its institutions. He questions social conventions, honour, nobility, and the class system, while reflecting on the loss of chivalric values in the modern age.
   
   

In short, “Don Quixote” is a profound reflection on human nature, dreams, aspirations, and how perceptions of the world can clash with harsh reality. Ultimately, the novel invites the reader to consider the importance of ideals, even if they don’t always reflect reality.

A. M. Jiménez

In his protagonist, Don Quixote, Cervantes poses the struggle between lofty ideals and harsh reality.

Don Quixote, a man who has read too many books of chivalry, decides to embark on his own heroic adventure, seeing the world in a completely different way than objective reality. This creates a duality between the chivalric fantasy he perceives and the mundane reality that surrounds him, leading to both comic and tragic situations.

In addition, Cervantes also touches on themes such as:

1. Idealism versus pragmatism: Don Quixote represents pure idealism, while his faithful squire, Sancho Panza, embodies practicality. Throughout the work, these two characters demonstrate the tensions between living a life chasing unattainable dreams or facing reality sensibly.
   
   

2. Madness and Sanity: The book questions what it means to be sane or mad. Don Quixote is seen as mad by others, but his madness leads him to act nobly, which calls into question whether his worldview is truly irrational.
   
   

3. Social Criticism: Cervantes uses the novel to criticize both the society of his time and its institutions. He questions social conventions, honour, nobility, and the class system, while reflecting on the loss of chivalric values in the modern age.
   
   

In short, “Don Quixote” is a profound reflection on human nature, dreams, aspirations, and how perceptions of the world can clash with harsh reality. Ultimately, the novel invites the reader to consider the importance of ideals, even if they don’t always reflect reality.

A. M. Jiménez

The adventures of Don Quixote inspired me to travel to Spain. In December 2025, I travelled to Madrid and onwards to Alcalá de Henares, the birthplace of Cervantes. Walking around the town, you feel you are in the footsteps of Don Quixote. There are artworks and murals celebrating Don Quixote and Sancho Panza throughout the streets. The historic buildings, churches, public squares and the Cervantes Museum conjure up images of the author going about his daily life. I walked around taking photographs, especially of the artworks and public sculptures. Like Don Quixote, I had my own small adventures, getting lost looking for an Irish bar and wandering the streets of Alcalá at night.

Visiting the windmills of La Mancha, famous as the giants Don Quixote battled on his horse Rocinante, was a highlight. Next to the castle, the windmills dominate a dry, flat landscape with mountains in the distance. The reds, oranges and ochre colours of the fields, and the greens of the olive trees, dominate the vista. The windmills carry the names of characters that bring the novel to life.

The visit to Spain provided the visual resources to produce the photographs I am showing as part of the Tilting at Windmills exhibition.

These photographs were taken by Alastair Scruton as part of the research process for his work in Tilting at Windmills.

They show the stainless steel public sculpture “Saxon King on Horse”, installed outside Olton railway station. The artwork was designed by John McKenna in 2002 and the work references the Anglo-Saxon history of the area and reflects themes of leadership, myth and historical memory.

Scruton documented the sculpture while developing ideas for his own piece in the exhibition, responding to themes of history, legend and the enduring image of the mounted warrior. Its bold, monumental presence helped inspire one of the artworks in Tilting at Windmills, where similar ideas of heroism, legend and imagined battles echo through the story of Don Quixote.

Image references below: 

Don Quixote has been explored in various iterations in Paul Newman’s work, along with other characters like Frankenstein’s Monster, depicting the never-ending quest in a shapeshifting, unstable environment.

The cover to the Beach Boys’ 1971 album Surf’s Up inspired a version of Don Quixote. Listening to the CD in his studio, Paul picked up the sleeve, which resonated and started a series of works inspired by it.

The painting on the cover was based on The End of the Trail, a mass-produced sculpture by James Earle Fraser that first appeared in 1894, depicting a weary Native American on horseback.

Paul’s painting is a metaphor for the personal and artistic journey to find stability in an increasingly uncertain world.

Image references below: 

Emma Woolley’s painting Once More draws on literary reference, particularly the line “Once more unto the breach, dear friends…” from Shakespeare’s Henry V. The phrase echoes the spirit of Cervantes’ Don Quixote, where belief, courage and delusion often sit side by side.

In her interpretation, the words “Once” and “More” appear across the knuckles of the figure, suggesting a moment of determination before stepping forward again into battle. The reference connects the defiant optimism of Shakespeare’s call to arms with the wandering knight of Cervantes’ novel, whose relentless belief drives him onward despite the absurdity of the quest.

Further context can be found within Woolley’s ongoing studio research and writing:

• Once More: Notes from the Studio While Painting Don Quixote

Image reference below: 

Don Quixote is a dreamer, his ideals imbibed through stories and romances that imagined an age of chivalry, feudal nobility and knightly virtue. He yearns for something noble in an ignoble world. The Europe of Cervantes was in freefall as religious wars raged throughout the sixteenth and early seventeenth century. Armies and insurgents burnt towns and cities to further sectarian bigotry and imperial ambition; neighbours and families turned against one another; ethnic and religious minorities were criminalised and persecuted. Sound familiar?

It was certainly a terrible time to be alive. Cervantes encapsulates that feeling of the rational world turned upside down, with the comfort blanket of cherished ideals and romantic self-delusion seared away by brutal reality. Don Quixote’s refusal to abandon his fantasies borders on insanity. His tragicomic knightly pilgrimage descends into sordid bar fights and farcical encounters with innkeepers, muleteers and galley slaves intent on survival in a merciless world.

There are two works of visual art that exemplify the spirit of this period. They bracket in time the work of Cervantes and shed some light on the plight of Don Quixote and, dare I say it, the new age upon which we are about to embark. They are The Triumph of Death by Pieter Bruegel (1562), an infernal landscape in which invincible armies of skeletons descend on humanity, destroying all hopes and dreams, all vanities of earthly love and temporal power. It is a living hell, a world abandoned by God without hope of redemption. The other work of art is The Miseries of War by Jacques Callot (1633), a grim series of etchings depicting with relentless detail the murderous invasion of his native Lorraine by the French army. It shows a side of mankind bereft of moral restraint, without mercy, chivalry or nobility: a war machine unleashed on the innocent. Bruegel views the human condition from a general perspective, while in contrast Callot’s images are brutally realistic reportage. Both artists reflect on the contemporary moral vacuum, and Cervantes provides a hero to inhabit and explore it: a dysfunctional knight errant in a dysfunctional world.

Maybe there’s a bit of Quixote in all of us dreamers? We share the same sense of vertigo as the world we grew up in, and the fundamental moral certainties that underpinned it are now fraying at the edges as the demagogues declare the “End of the Old World Order.” We know in our hearts that what’s coming after is going to be cruel, cold and dangerous. Perhaps the reason Don Quixote has stood the test of time is because each generation sees itself in its pages.

Brendan Flynn