The awful thing about masterpieces is that they belong to the common weal, and thus as well to people you hate and despise. It goes for Hamlet, as for the Don. An old man leads us through a classroom full of open-mouthed schoolchildren to a side room where the books are displayed, open for all to see. Who has not read Don Quixote? All the rich and famous appear to have donated their personal copies – Mitterrand, Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands, Margaret Thatcher, Adolf Hitler, Hindenburg, Mussolini, King Juan Carlos of Spain, Alec Guinness, Juan Peron, Ronald Reagan, a collection of saints and sinners, from which Stalin is absent only because the copy he sent with a dedication on the flyleaf has been lost.

from Cees Nooteboom, Roads to Santiago.