Themes In Don Quixote

Have you ever heard of the phrase “Art is not what you see, but what you make others see”? To me this means that it’s not what you see in it, but what you can lead others to believe. During the novel Don Quixote he reads many, many books and convinces himself that he, although being nothing but a poor man, is in fact a knight as well. Being so strong willed about his knightly abilities he does not heed the warnings of his squire and almost dies. In Victor Vasnetsov’s piece shows a knight who has come to a crossroad, continue on his path as someone he is not and face the same consequences, or to accept himself as whom he is. He also learns that by not heeding the advice that lies before him he could receive the same fate. This art work and novel are connected in that they both share the same strong main themes of: trying to be someone you

The driving force behind the writing of this tale is due to the fact that Don Quixote believes himself to be a knight, even though he is not. “he should make a knight-errant of himself, roaming the world over in full armor and on horseback in quest of adventures”. To hide this fact, that he is not a true knight he covers his face with a mask. Pictured in the painting is a knight whose face appears to be also covered by a mask as if hiding himself, the same as Don Quixote. Hiding who he really is from the world and trying to make the world perceive him as someone he is not. As seen in the artwork the knight has the same type of mask that Don Quixote, the fabled mask of the knights. By wearing these mask both false knights attempt to hide from all of the others that they are not true knights. Don Quixote is nothing but a poor man dreaming to be more. The knight pictured is all alone; rare for most knights who know that to travel alone is death. This suggest that he travels alone as a way to hide who he truly is on the