Photo by John Cross
Jim Grabowska (left) and Kimberly Contag are spearheading the efforts behind next week's Don Quixote conference at Minnesota State University. The conference, which runs Thursday and Friday, includes two days of presentations, music and art exhibits. The theater department is presenting "Man of La Mancha," a play based on the book.
MANKATO — It's Don Quixote's 400th birthday, and Minnesota State University is throwing him a two-day party.
There will be drama, there will be art. Music will be played, thoughts will be shared. No word yet on the availability of windmills, but a full lineup of experts are ready to spend two days discussing at length the cultural impact of the Miguel De Cervantes novel, "Don Quixote."
"We wanted to let people know how much this has touched people's lives," said Jim Grabowska, who along with Kimberly Contag spearheaded coordination of the conference.
Whether it's taking in the play "Man of La Mancha," dreaming an impossible dream or describing things as "quixotic," references to Quixote in cultures around the world are endless. The book routinely shows up on "best of" lists and was voted the world's best work of fiction a few years ago in a survey of the world's leading authors. It beat out Shakespeare, Homer and Tolstoy among others.
This year marks 400 years since the novel hit the Spanish scene. Within a few years, it hit the rest of the world. It makes sense to pay it some homage, tip the hat, so to speak, to a piece of art that still captures the imagination.
"It is as funny as Steve Martin and George Carlin combined," Grabowska says. "Throw in Gallagher, and you've got him.
"Pulling this together has taken about a year of planning. One of the key successes early on was securing the cooperation of the theater department. When the theater department agreed to put "Man of La Mancha" on its schedule, Grabowska says, it was a boon to the conference's momentum.From there they sought cooperation from other groups, including the art and music departments, and put out a call for academic papers to be presented at the two-day conference.
Among the presenters will be William Dyer of MSU's Humanities Department. In addition to doing his own presentation, "Disillusioning Dulcinea: Vargas Llosa's Death in the Andes," he also is getting his students involved.
The students have put together a presentation on the role of women in Spain's 1600s, and compared it with how Cervantes portrayed women.
He says "Don Quixote" and all the book's characters provide plenty of material for discussion."The incredible idealism," Dyer said of the lesson Quixote teaches us, "and the notion that one can think about re-creating oneself or making one's life a work of art."
As for the scholarly aspect of the conference, it includes some of the heavy hitters in Quixotic studies. John Jay Allen from the University of Kentucky and Patricia Finch from Centre College are among the foremost scholars on Quixote in America and will deliver the keynote address Thursday.
Other scholars are coming from across the country to present papers. And some presenters, such as Dyer, Grabowska and Contag, need only walk across campus to get there.
Grabowska says there have been many Don Quixote conferences around the country in the past, but this one will be different. It will bridge colleges and departments so they can come together and pull off a conference that doesn't just boast scholars, but also music and drama and other things you don't normally associate with an academic endeavor.
"What we did not want was another boring scholarly conference," Grabowska said. "We wanted to do something fun. And we think this is going to be fun."
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