Meditations on Quixote, published in 1914, is the first major philosophical work by José Ortega y Gasset, and it marks the beginning of his distinctive intellectual path. Conceived as both a literary and philosophical essay, the book uses Cervantes's Don Quixote as a framework to explore fundamental questions about reality, art, and the human condition. Ortega does not offer a mere interpretation of the novel; rather, he turns it into a meditation on how individuals construct meaning within their circumstances and how culture emerges from the tension between imagination and reality.
The work opens with Ortega's famous declaration that "I am I and my circumstance, and if I do not save it, I do not save myself." This phrase encapsulates his philosophy of vital reason, which asserts that human life cannot be understood apart from the concrete world in which it unfolds. Through Don Quixote, Ortega examines the relationship between idealism and reality: Don Quixote's adventures symbolize the human tendency to impose dreams and ideals upon a resistant world. Yet, rather than dismissing this idealism as folly, Ortega interprets it as a necessary expression of life's creative energy - the will to transcend one's condition while still being bound to it.
In his meditations, Ortega also reflects on Spain's cultural identity, seeing in Don Quixote a mirror of the Spanish spirit: passionate, idealistic, and deeply introspective. He laments that Spain has often been unable to reconcile its poetic imagination with the demands of reason and progress. Thus, Meditations on Quixote becomes both a philosophical treatise and a cultural diagnosis - a call for Spain, and by extension humanity, to rediscover a balance between life, reason, and imagination.
José Ortega y Gasset was a Spanish philosopher and essayist, widely regarded as one of the most influential intellectual figures of 20th-century Spain. His work is characterized by a profound reflection on culture, reason, and human life, proposing a vitalist philosophy that sought to renew European thought from a distinctly Hispanic perspective.
