From a legendary translator: a magnificent new rendering of Spain's national epic
Venture into the heart of Islamic Spain in this vibrant, rollicking new translation of The Song of the Cid , the only surviving epic from medieval Spain. Banished from the court of King Alfonso, the noble warrior Rodrigo Diaz, know as the Cid, sets out from Castile to restore his name. In a series of battles, he earns wealth and honor for his men and his king, as well as fame and admiration for himself. But it is in rescuing his daughters from their ill-suited marriages that the Cid faces the ultimate challenge to the medieval heroic ideal.

《堂吉诃德》是塞万提斯最具国际影响的杰作，书名全称为《匪夷所思的拉曼查绅士堂吉诃德》。 作品描写了读骑士小说入迷的没落绅士吉哈达，自号堂吉诃德，试图用虚幻的骑士之道还世界以公正与太平，先后三次骑着老马出外行侠。他雇请崇尚实际的农夫邻居桑丘·潘萨作为侍从，与自己一起经历了风车大战、英勇救美、客栈奇遇、恶斗群羊、挑战雄狮、人地穴探奇等等奇特事变。他不分青红皂白，乱砍乱杀，不断闹出笑话，被人捉弄，屡遭惨败，直至临终之前才翻然醒悟。小说通过塑造与刻画堂吉诃德这一滑稽可笑、可爱而又可悲的人物形象，成功反映了西班牙当时的人文主义思想和现实之间的矛盾，揭露了封建贵族阶级的骄奢淫逸，表达了人民对社会变革的要求和愿望。
Publisher Comments:
The text reprinted here is based on award-winning translator Burton Raffel's masterful translation of Don Quijote, which is consistent, fluid, and modeled closely on the original Spanish.
Backgrounds and Context invites readers to explore the creative process that culminated in the publication of Don Quijote. Included are selections from works parodied by Cervantes (Amadis of Gaul and Orlando Furioso) and a portion of the spurious sequel to Part 1 written by Fernándes de Avellaneda.
Criticisms presents fifteen major interpretations of both the novel and selected episodes, describing Cervantes' intellectual milieu, revealing how he infused new life into the literary modes and motifs he had inherited, and illustrating the fundamental importance of Don Quijote in the history of modern fiction.
Synopsis
Part parody and part cautionary tale, "Don Quijote" is considered a literary masterpiece. This critical edition is based on Burton Raffel's translation that comes as close as possible to recreating Miguel de Cervantes' prose style - it is consitent, fluid and modelled on the original Spanish. Carefully selected background materials bring readers into the creative process that culminated in Don Quijote. Included is other writing by Cervantes as well as contemporary works by other authors and a modern account of the novel's influence throughout the ages. Fifteen critical essays present interpretations of both the novel and selected episodes.
From Library Journal
A translator of Horace, Balzac, Rabelais, and Salvador Espriu, as well as a theorist (The Art of Translating Prose, Pennsylvania State Univ. Pr., 1994), Raffel (Univ. of Southwest Louisiana) undertook the formidable task of translating Cervantes's masterpiece because he was uncomfortable recommending any of the existing translations. There are some real differences here. Raffel has junked the traditional transcription of Cide Hamete, the pseudoauthor, in favor of the less "colonialist" and more authentic Arabic, Sidi Hamid. Proper names that contain puns are explained within square brackets, and footnotes are kept to a minimum. A more vernacular style reigns: The blow on the neck and the stroke on the shoulder that dub Don Quijote a knight are, respectively, a "whack" and a "tap." The women at the inn, usually called "wenches," are "party-girls" or "whores." Sancho dreams that his "old lady" will someday be a queen and that his "kids" will be princes. In the proofs, "Castile" has been misspelled as "Castille," an oversight one would hope to see corrected in the final book. This is a lively alternative to the wide assortment of truly old-fashioned translations.
Book Dimension
Height (mm) 234 　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　Width (mm) 142

"The old Greek poetry has a freshness and immediacy about it that is partly a witty irony, partly a commitment to speaking only about the core concerns of humanity, partly a strange dazzling down-to-earthness, and partly the tragic bite of the Greek conceptual language. Who better to introduce us to the lesser-known voices of that tradition than Burton Raffel and Guy Davenport?" --Frederick Turner, author of The Culture of Hope and former editor of The Kenyon Review
"This superb gathering of ancient Greek lyrics, pungently translated by Burton Raffel, could not be more timely or more timeless. The poems are by turns hilarious and heartrending, erotic and elegaic, as fresh as the morning and shadowy as the dusk, yet always living, inescapable, and wise. Guy Davenport contributes an arresting introduction to this very welcome collection.” --Robert Fagles, translator of The Iliad and The Odyssey
"Burton Raffel has added titles and translated with great translucency--real panache!--a marvelous array of lesser known poems and poets from ancient Greece. These brief and entrancing lyric intensities ("drink, and get drunk with me," Alkaios insists) are perennially fresh and inviting, surprised by time, quick with life.” --Edward Hirsch, author of How to Read a Poem and Fall in Love with Poetry and Lay Back the Darkness
"The ancient Greek anthologists collected many of the world's funniest, and saddest, raunchiest, and wisest poems, which Burton Raffel, a guardian angel among American translators, has delivered breathtakingly alive into our own idiom. If poetry ever mattered, which we know it did and does, this book reminds us why." --Brooks Haxton, author of Uproar and translator of Dances for Flute and Thunder
"These are the Greek poets who have endured through the millennia. Burton Raffel's wonderful translations capture their poetry in all its originality, freshness, and rhythm." --Peter Constantine, winner of the 1998 PEN Translation Award and the 1999 National Translation Award
"These epigrams, epitaphs, fragments, and short poems of the Greek lyricists are witty, wise, and elegant, and they demand of a translator an almost impossible range of humanity and fastidious craftsmanship that I delight to see demonstrated, over and over in Burton Raffel’s splendid English versions." --David R. Slavitt, co-editor of the Penn Complete Greek Drama series and of the Johns Hopkins Complete Roman Drama series
From the Hardcover edition.

Beyond its importance as a literary work of unvarnished genius, Geoffrey Chaucer’s unfinished epic poem is also one of the most beloved works in the English language–and for good reason: It is lively, absorbing, perceptive, and outrageously funny. But despite the brilliance of Chaucer’s work, the continual evolution of our language has rendered his words unfamiliar to many of us. Esteemed poet, translator, and scholar Burton Raffel’s magnificent new unabridged translation brings Chaucer’s poetry back to life, ensuring that none of the original’s wit, wisdom, or humanity is lost to the modern reader. This Modern Library edition also features an Introduction by the widely influential medievalist and author John Miles Foley that discusses Chaucer’s work as well as his life and times.