quixotic
adjective
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Quixotic Has Roots in Literature
If you guessed that quixotic has something to do with Don Quixote, you're absolutely right. The hero of Miguel de Cervantes' 17th-century Spanish novel El ingenioso hidalgo don Quijote de la Mancha (in English "The Ingenious Hidalgo Don Quixote of La Mancha") didn't change the world by tilting at windmills, but he did leave a linguistic legacy in English. The adjective quixotic is based on his name and has been used to describe unrealistic idealists since at least the early 18th century. The novel has given English other words as well. Dulcinea, the name of Quixote's beloved, has come to mean "mistress" or "sweetheart," and rosinante, which is sometimes used to refer to an old horse, comes from the name of the hero's less-than-gallant steed, Rocinante.
Examples of quixotic in a Sentence
Walter Kirn, New York Times Book Review, 22 Feb. 2009
The history of biblical oil prospecting is filled with quixotic quests and colorful characters, starting with Welsie Hancock, a wealthy California man who in the 1960s dreamed that Jesus told him he would find black gold in the Holy Land. He sunk his entire fortune into two dry holes.
—Mariah Blake, Mother Jones, January and February 2008
Mumey had announced his candidacy as an independent in the partisan election, which meant that he needed 2,300 signatures of registered voters in order to get on the ballot in the fall. It seemed a quixotic adventure, given the small size of Celebration and Mumey's lack of name recognition outside the town.
—Douglas Frantz et al., Celebration, USA, 1999
They had quixotic dreams about the future.
in this age of giant chain stores, any attempt at operating an independent bookstore must be regarded as quixotic
Ilan Stavans, The Atlantic, 15 Apr. 2025
Our devastation of nature is so deep and vast that to reverse its effects, on any front, often entails efforts that are so painstaking and quixotic as to border on the ridiculous.
—Nick Paumgarten, The New Yorker, 10 Feb. 2025
Or the sudden, quixotic tariffs on Canada and Mexico.
—Tom Rogers, Newsweek, 21 Feb. 2025
Tarantino has a quixotic belief about what film can accomplish.
—Paul Fitzgerald, Rolling Stone, 7 Feb. 2025
See All Example Sentences for quixotic
Cite this Entry
“Quixotic.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/quixotic. Accessed 10 May. 2025.
Copy CitationKids Definition
quixotic
adjective
from Don Quixote, hero of the novel Don Quixote de la Mancha by Cervantes
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