Man of La Mancha is a 1964 musical with a book by Dale Wasserman, lyrics by Joe Darion, and music by Mitch Leigh. It is adapted from Wasserman's non-musical 1959 teleplay I, Don Quixote, which was in turn inspired by Miguel de Cervantes and his seventeenth-century masterpiece Don Quixote. It tells the story of the "mad" knight, Don Quixote, as a play within a play, performed by Cervantes and his fellow prisoners as he awaits a hearing with the Spanish Inquisition. The work is not, and does not pretend to be, a faithful rendition of either Cervantes' life or of Don Quixote. Wasserman complained repeatedly about taking the work as a musical version of Don Quixote.

The original 1965 Broadway production ran for 2,328 performances and won five Tony Awards, including Best Musical. The musical has been revived four times on Broadway, becoming one of the most enduring works of musical theatre.

The principal song, "The Impossible Dream", became a standard. The musical has played in many other countries around the world, with productions in Dutch, French (translation by Jacques Brel), German, Hebrew, Japanese, Korean, Icelandic, Gujarati, Uzbek, Hungarian, Serbian, Slovenian, Swahili, Finnish, Ukrainian and nine distinctly different dialects of the Spanish language.

Man of La Mancha is a 1972 film adaptation of the Broadway musical Man of La Mancha by Dale Wasserman, with music by Mitch Leigh and lyrics by Joe Darion. The musical was suggested by the classic novel Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes, but more directly based on Wasserman's 1959 non-musical television play, I, Don Quixote, which combines a semi-fictional episode from the life of Cervantes with scenes from his novel.

The film was financed by an Italian production company, Produzioni Europee Associates, and shot in Rome. However, it is entirely in English, and all of its principal actors except for Sophia Loren are either British or American. (Gino Conforti, who plays the Barber, is an American of Italian descent.) The film was released by United Artists. It is known in Italy as L'Uomo della Mancha.

The film was produced and directed by Arthur Hiller, and stars Peter O'Toole as both Miguel de Cervantes and Don Quixote, James Coco as both Cervantes' Manservant and Don Quixote's "squire" Sancho Panza, and Sophia Loren as scullery maid and prostitute Aldonza, whom the delusional Don Quixote idolizes as Dulcinea. Gillian Lynne, who later choreographed Cats, staged the choreography for the film (including the fight scenes).

La Mancha (Spanish pronunciation: [la ˈmantʃa]) is a natural and historical region located on an arid but fertile, elevated plateau (610 m or 2000 ft.) of central Spain, south of Madrid, from the mountains of Toledo to the western spurs of the hills of Cuenca, and bordered to the South by the Sierra Morena and to the North by the Alcarria region. La Mancha includes portions of the modern provinces of Cuenca, Toledo, and Albacete, and most of the Ciudad Real province. La Mancha historical comarca constitutes the southern portion of Castilla–La Mancha autonomous community and makes up most of the present-day administrative region.

Name

The name "La Mancha" is probably derived from the Arab word المنشا al-mansha, meaning "the dry land" or "wilderness". The name of the city of Almansa in Albacete also has the same origin. The word mancha in Spanish literally means spot, stain, or patch, but no apparent link exists between this word and the name of the region.

Geography

The largest plain in Spain, La Mancha is made up of a plateau averaging 500 to 600 metres in altitude (although it reaches 900 metres in Campo de Montiel and other parts), centering on the province of Ciudad Real. The region is watered by the Guadiana, Jabalón, Záncara, Cigüela, and Júcar rivers.

This is a list of goat breeds. There are many recognized breeds of domestic goat (Capra aegagrus hircus). Goat breeds (especially dairy goats) are some of the oldest defined animal breeds for which breed standards and production records have been kept. Selective breeding of goats generally focuses on improving production of fiber, meat, dairy products or goatskin. Breeds are generally classified based on their primary use, though there are several breeds which are considered dual- or multi-purpose goats, so there is some crossover between lists.

List

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Bibliography

La Mancha is a Spanish Denominación de Origen (DO) for wines, with over 190,000 ha planted to vines, and is the largest continuous vine-growing area in the world. It is located in the autonomous region of Castile-La Mancha in central Spain and includes 182 municipalities: 12 in the province of Albacete, 58 in Ciudad Real, 66 in Cuenca and 46 in Toledo. 22,000 grape-growers and over 300 wineries (bodegas) are registered with the DO, which was formally created in 1976.

History

The first written documentation on viticulture in the region dates from the 12th century, though it is generally believed that vines were introduced by the ancient Romans as in other regions of the Iberian peninsula. Wine production took off in the 1940s due to the setting up of numerous cooperatives in the region. Viticulture is the economic mainstay of many of the municipalities that form part of the DO.

Climate

The climate is continental (long hot summers and cold winters) and ranges from extremes of -15°C in winter to 45°C in summer. Drought is also common due to the micro-climate of La Mancha which prevents moisture bearing winds from crossing it; mean annual rainfall is about 300 to 400 mm. On the other hand, the vines are exposed to about 3000 hours of sunlight per annum.