Don Quixote 400th Anniversary

This year marks the 400th anniversary of Cervantes's literary masterpiece about the travels of Don Quixote. The famous publication has been translated into over 100 languages and is said to be the world's most widely published book after the Bible. The nomadic escapades of the knight and his sidekick Sancho have been celebrated around the world for years and especially since January of 2005, when this anniversary commemoration kicked off in the Castilla-La Mancha region of Spain.

In honor of the anniversary, regional government officials worked to create the "longest green tourism route", outlined on this interactive map of Quixote's travels. The map is fantastically detailed, with ten sections that each contain valuable travel info and historical "It might have happened here" landmarks.

If you can't make a trip to La Mancha to celebrate, maybe consider a stop at a new exhibit which opened last month at the George Peabody Library in Baltimore: Celebrating 400 Years of Don Quixote de la Mancha, which highlights selections from the library's collection of Quixote publications. "Don Quixote Round the World", a travelling exhibition featuring paintings, drawings and engravings, has also been on a world-wide tour of book fairs since April.

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