A master teacher and critic as well as a novelist, Nabokov created a fastidiously shaped series of lectures based on a chapter-by-chapter synopsis of the Spanish classic, recording his insights as he proceeded. Since his teaching methods relied heavily on quotation from the author under discussion, this summary consisted in part of his own narrative and in part of quotations from the Putnam translation.

Rejecting the common interpretation of Don Quixote as a warm satire, Nabokov perceives the work as a catalog of cruelty through which the gaunt knight passes, retaining both honor and innocence. Along with Lectures on Literature and Lectures on Russian Literature, this book allows the reader access to one of the truly original literary thinkers of our era as he focuses his eye on the masterworks of Western literature.

Edited and with a Preface by Fredson Bowers; photographs.