Don Quixote in His Library

At a desk, a man in a striped cap sits in a chair, one hand supporting his head and his gaze lost in the air. A book lies open on the desk, books and papers are scattered on the floor, and something like a round piece of armor lies at the lower right. Behind him, men in black and a woman in a white head covering stand, bewildered.

The subject is the novel "Don Quixote" by the 17th-century Spanish writer Cervantes. It tells of a country gentleman who, from reading too many chivalric romances, loses his sanity and sets out as a knight-errant under the name Don Quixote. According to the museum's commentary, the figures behind him are the village priest, the barber Master Nicholas, and the housekeeper, who in their concern for him burn his books. This scene does not appear in the novel as such, however; it summarizes the opening of the story, chapters 1 to 6.

Delacroix was a Romantic painter who favored the literature of Byron, Hugo, Dante, Shakespeare, and others. On a nearly square small surface, the inner state of the Don Quixote who has lost his sanity is painted, and the museum's commentary says that the unnatural movement of his left hand looks as if he were trying to cut his reason loose from himself.