Short unreliable biography of Miguel de Cervantes

Miguel de Cervantes is believed to have been born on the 29th of September 1547 in Alcalá de Henares, a small university town next to Madrid, the day of St Miguel in Spain although no official record of his birth has ever been traced and his first residence is not undoubtedly established. He was the second son and fourth out of seven children of Rodrigo de Cervantes and Leonor de Cortinas. The pedigree of Cervantes is not without its bearing on "Don Quixote." A man who could look back upon an ancestry of genuine knights-errant extending from well-nigh the time of Pelayo to the siege of Granada was likely to have a strong feeling on the subject of the sham chivalry of the romances. It gives a point, too, to what he says in more than one place about families that have once been great and have tapered away until they have come to nothing, like a pyramid. It was the case of his own history. The Spain of his time was one of transition, with chivalry dying away, absolutism of the sovereign being re-established with the help of the clergy and the Inquisition, the nobles being stripped of their powers and liberal town constitutions being dismantled. With the spread of printing, literature was undergoing major changes as well, with Spaniards returning back from Italian wars they carried back with them the cultural flows of Post-Renaissance pastoral poetry, with novelty airs entrapped within them. At the time old and traditional pastoral songs, songs ballads and stories of the peasant life were assembled and printed. But the most noticeable printing effect was the flood of the literature world with chivalry romances. All of these had an immense impact on a youth growing up at that age, with a special inclination towards the theatrical and literary world and also growing up in a university town that was taking over older historical printing centres with its expanding publishing activity.


Little is known for Cervantes early childhood years. It is assumed that he travelled a lot due to his father search for a job. His educational background is also vague with the only confirmed entry being Cervantes study under Juan López de Hoyos, a well-known humanist situated in Madrid. In 1568 he followed Guilio Acquavita back to Rome to serve as his chamberlain. In 1570 he resigned his post, which was endowed with opportunities for a career in the Papal state, to enrol as a soldier during stirring times. Spain at the time entered into an alliance with Venice and the Pope against the expanding Turks. Cervantes fought against the Turks in the battle of Lepanto under the commands of Don John (Don Juan) of Austria. The allied forces secured a decisive naval victory while the personal history of Cervantes has it that he was shot 3 times, one of the bullets striking his left hand to leave it permanently disabled. This however did not leave him totally unfit for service, and in 1572 he returned under the commands of Manuel Ponce de Leon, this time fighting side by side with his brother and taking part in the captures of Tunis and Goletta. He obtained leave to return to Spain in 1575 upon the Sun, endowed with letters of recommendation from Don John (Austria) and the Duke of Seca (Venice) for the king of Spain.


The Sun, the galley upon which Cervantes was returning to Spain, was captured by Algerine galleys and were shipped to Algiers were both brothers were kept as hostiles for ransom. Due to the letters Cervantes held on him, he was considered to be a person of importance and the first ransom collected by his family was deemed as insufficient and rejected. During his 5 year captivity, Cervantes led a number of escape attempts all ending in disaster. One of his attempts, which involved other prisoners as well as his recently freed brother returning to the rescue with a vessel, had as a result the murder of a Spaniard helper, and Cervantes being bought by the Dey from the private prisoner that previously held him. Cervantes on this occasion defied torture and admitted to be the sole cause of the plan. During his imprisonment he held 2 further escape attempts, both resulting in failure and nearly costing him his life. In 1580 he was finally set free with a ransom partly raised by his family and partly by Father Juan Gil.


Upon his return, he rejoined his regiment being now penniless. He took part of the expedition of Azores in Portugal and returned to Spain in 1583 with the end of the war bringing with him a daughter and the first manuscript of Galatea, his first pastoral romance. With no possibility of advancement within the army due to his crippled hand and the death of Don John, he turned to literature publishing Galatea in Alcala, his birth city. During the time Galatea was being published, he married Dona Catalina de Palacios Salazar y Vozmediano in 1585, 18 years younger than him, making him the owner of a fortune that could make him survive his prosecutors for a while. He proceeded to write theatrical plays that were not of the best quality but survived the stage as Cervantes exclaimed. He was however more successful in prose writing winning the first prize (3 silver spoons) in a literary contest in Saragosa in 1595. In 1594 he had been appointed as a collector for the state of Granada but was sent to prison in Seville in 1597 for mishandling of state money. He was soon released as the balance against him was a small one, and was later appointed as the king’s tax collector travelling from town to town in the course of his business. His where-about is lost from 1598 until 1603 but it is widely believed based on his introduction to Don Quixote that he captured the idea in the prison of Seville and initiated the writing of the great novel behind bars.


Cervantes sold the publishing rights of Don Quixote to Francisco Robles of Madrid in 1604 and publication was completed in 1605. The book’s initial welcome is controversy with clashing beliefs. However a certainty is established in that Cervantes, with his highly critical/ironic work came into open conflict with the established men of letters and power that ridiculed in his writings. Don Quixote’s popularity however grew, crossing the borders of the Pyrenees as early as 1610 into a Milan publishing house and in 1611 into Brussels. Cervantes literary activity continued by publishing in 1613 the Novelas Exemplares, a collection of short stories written over the years after Don Quixote. In its preface, the first proof is provided for a second Don Quixote part. We learn however that Cervantes did not hold into great esteem his greatest work, by failing to correct publishers and by actually stating that he considered himself the stepfather, rather than the father of the book.


Taking advantage of the reputation Don Quixote secured him, he proceeded into attempts of recognition of his person as a dramatist, trying to compose dramas and comedies that would be worthy of comparison with ancient Greek works. However, he went on to write several chapters of the second part of Don Quixote when in 1614 a print of "Second Volume of the Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha: by the Licentiate Alonso Fernandez de Avellaneda of Tordesillas came into his hands. Avellaneda, whose identity and history are unknown, unleashes a personal attack on Cervantes through his preface by presenting him as old, with one less arm, a former convict, a present friendless poor person with a built in hatred towards López works. In this, Avellaneda presents himself as a follower of López, possibly one of his drama students. Avellaneda’s assault and forgery prompted Cervantes to embark on his long standing task of finishing the second part of Don Quixote which was published towards the end of 1615. The fear of further “Avellanedas” appears to have pushed Cervantes into an early “murder” of his hero.


Cervantes himself died on April 23 1616, the same day with Shakespeare’s casualty to humanity although the two losses are quoted on different calendars and also it is believed that in Spain of the time, the tomb engraved date is the day of the funeral rather than the date of death of the diseased.