To the Editor:

It has come to my attention that on the subject of "Don Quixote," generally considered the first and the greatest of novels, that Academe is breathtakingly clueless. That of course is just my opinion, but it does seem to me that this applies even to the novel's notable translators from Motteux through Putnam, Smolett, Jarvis, Starkie, Rutherford, Ormsby, Cohen and Grossman.

Just for smiles, then, let me propose a competition open to a champion from each of ten universities. I would make up 20 questions on "Don Quixote" that would be published in your newspapers on a Monday with the responses of the local champion listed on a Friday. The following Monday I would give the answers and send the winner a check for a hundred dollars.

The choice of contestants is not entirely random, as I believe the libraries of each of the selected universities carry my book "The Shakespeare-Cervantes Code." It would be helpful with some of the answers but not most of them; my book was published in 2004, and much has been revealed since then.

There would be nothing to stop a local Champion from bringing in help, but — not to belabor the obvious — if the winner has done the work himself or herself, $100 makes for a nice dinner for two. If a support group is brought, however, the situation points more to coffee and a doughnut.

I appeal to the sporting instinct of the varsity scholars of your universities. The questions will be taken from the Grossman translation, with some of the text in the Spanish.

David Yuhas
Author, “The Shakespeare-Cervantes Code”

Editor’s note: Other newspapers addressed include The Brown Daily Herald, The Chicago Maroon, The Colorado Daily, The Daily Northwestern, The Observer (Notre Dame University), The Oxford Student, The Varsity (Cambridge University), The Stanford Daily and The Trinity News (The University of Dublin).