Biography
Miguel de Cervantes was a Spanish writer and poet, best known as the author of Don Quixote, one of the masterpieces of world literature and a work often regarded as one of the first modern novels.
He was born in Alcalá de Henares, near Madrid, probably on September 29, 1547. He was one of seven children in the family of Rodrigo de Cervantes, a barber-surgeon whose search for work took the family from place to place. In 1569, Miguel travelled to Italy, where he served in the household of Cardinal Giulio Acquaviva. Around 1570, he began a military career. The following year, he fought in the Battle of Lepanto, where he was seriously wounded. He received medical care in Messina, and his left hand was permanently disabled.
In 1575, while returning to Spain, Cervantes was captured by corsairs and taken to Algiers. He remained a captive there for nearly five years, until his release in 1580 after a ransom was raised by his family and the Trinitarian friars. In 1584, he married Catalina de Salazar, who was about eighteen years younger than he was. The following year, he published his first novel, La Galatea. He also wrote plays, though they brought him little success.
Cervantes later worked as a government commissary and tax collector. Financial difficulties led to his imprisonment in Seville for several months in 1597, after the failure of a banker who held public funds. Cervantes later recalled that the idea for Don Quixote came to him in prison, although the precise circumstances are uncertain. The first part of the novel was published in 1605 and became a great success. He published its second part in 1615, a year before his death in Madrid, on April 22, 1616.
