Miguel de Cervantes

Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra was born in Alcalá de Henares, Spain in 1547. Little is known of his early life, other than that he was one of seven children and grew up in poverty. The course of his adulthood is fascinating, at various stages he was a fugitive, a soldier, a tax collector, held captive by pirates, sold as a slave, and imprisoned by the Spanish government. He finally settled into a more sedate life in Madrid shortly after the publication of the first part of his masterpiece, Don Quixote, in 1605. The second part was published in 1615, and Cervantes’ literary output continued until his death in April 1616.
Ned Halley is an award-winning newspaper columnist.