ABSTRACT
The epigraph suggests a relationship between Don Quixote and Middlemarch, and Casaubon may be considered a quixotic type. Two distinct critical points of view concerning Don Quixote have emerged since the eighteenth century. One group of critics has looked at the novel and has considered the protagonist as a hero, as the restorer of traditional values — Byron, Auden, Thomas Mann, and Ortega y Gasset are proponents of this point of view. Another group of critics — Hegel, Heine, Novitsky, Unamuno — sees Don Quixote as a man with good intentions. To Casaubon, the Key to All Mythologies is no less a tangible ideal than is the magical helmet of Mambrino to Don Quixote. For Don Quixote, obtaining such an enchanted helmet would be the culmination of all knightly aspirations; for Casaubon, completing the great work about which all Middlemarch knows, would be the quintessence of his achievement. Thus, both Casaubon and Don Quixote would be immortalized.
