‘Book, treasure’, they remember reading ‘Don Quixote’

Spain’s ambassador to Panama, Guzmán Palacios, encouraged “all Spaniards and Panamanians” to read this Friday by recalling the famous popular phrase “book, treasure”, during a reading of “Don Quixote” to celebrate International Book Day.

“I have always said that the book is a treasure and nothing better than today to encourage all Spaniards and Panamanians to have time to open a good novel and enjoy it,” Palacios told EFE at the Cultural Center of Spain, located in Casco Antiguo in Panama City.

The Embassy of Spain in Panama they organized a book reading this Friday “Don Quixote de la Macha”the most outstanding work of Spanish literature that he wrote Miguel de Cervantes in the 17th century, with the presence of embassy officials, students, cultural figures, the University of Panama, officials of the National Library and the Panamanian Academy of Languages.

The participants read nine chapters, from the hardbound edition kept by the embassy, ​​starting with the well-known phrase that opens the work: “In one place in La Mancha…”.

“It’s a very nice project, we’re very happy to reissue this reading of Don Quixote on a very special day for more than 500 million people who speak Spanish,” said Palacios.

The Spanish ambassador pointed out that “Castilian has already crossed the borders of the (Iberian) peninsula and that we share it with 500 million people (…) and right now they want to respect that language”.

“I believe that there is no greater instrument of cohesion than when we share a language (…) we address our children in the same language. I believe that this makes countries like Panama and Spain sisters for life,” he added.

“The book always has something new to tell you”

For cultural journalist and university professor Daniel Domínguez, reading a fragment of Don Quixote was “exciting” because of “the possibility of reading a work that has not lost its validity”.

It is a book “that always has something new to tell you even though you have read it several times,” he explained to EFE.

“That’s the message we need to carry: to have a broken heart where half has given up on dreams, longing and hope to follow, (and the other) Sancho’s logic, follow the dream but with coherence and knowing where to put your feet,” he added.

Reading Don Quixote is a traditional activity that Spanish embassies around the world carry out to celebrate International Book Day.

International Book Day is celebrated on April 23, a symbolic date for world literature, since on that day, in 1616, cult writers Cervantes (author of Don Quixote), Garcilaso de la Vega (“Los Commentarios reales”) and Shakespeare (” Romeo and Juliet”).

One of the characters in Don Quixote says the following: “There is no book so bad that there is not something good in it”, a reflection of how the book has maintained itself over time as one of the most famous works of literature.