The reception of Cervantes' Don Quixote by the early German romanticists

Several of the German translations cited in this examination as being the most important were studied, as well as all of the correspondence among various German translators, authors, and critics of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. General background information is given to aid in the understanding of particular literary terminology and literary movements prevalent during that period.

The most significant findings concerning the reception of Don Quixote were that as early as the mid-to-late-seventeenth century critics and translators judged the novel from second-hand French translations; hence they did not have a thorough knowledge of the original Spanish work. As improved German translations, done directly from the original were more available, the criticism of Don Quixote became far more knowledgeable, although many of the early German Romanticists appeared to interpret the novel through what romantic literature meant to them, and failed to judge Don Quixote as a work of the Golden Age of Spanish literature.

Once sufficient time had passed since the best German translations were first made available to the German critics, a far more sound and objective stance was taken by them in determining the value and lasting influence of Don Quixote.