It is so precise that Samuel Putnam, who published his own English translation of the novel in 1949, faults Ormsby for duplicating Cervantes' pronouns so closely that the meaning of the sentences sometimes becomes confusing.
In 1864, he published Autumn Rambles in North Africa, travel sketches from La Grande Kabylie and Tunis during 1863–4, originally contributed for the most part to Fraser, with illustrations by the author.
The contemporaneous translations by Alexander James Duffield (1881) and Henry Edward Watts (1888) have been virtually forgotten.
Ormsby not only translates the novel; he provides a long and informative introduction with a brief analysis of all the major English versions of "Don Quixote" up to then (except for the Duffield version), as well as explaining the conceptual choices that he himself made in translating the novel, in terms of affectation, for example, or using the simplest everyday language.
Ormsby refutes the widely accepted view that "Don Quixote" is a sad novel with allegorical meanings and a pessimistic philosophy, and states that because Cervantes himself declared it to be a satire against books of chivalry, it is primarily only that, although it does contain much observation on human character.
Ormsby also refutes, in addition, the commonly held view that Don Quixote is an innately noble person, stating that his nobility of character is an attitude that he assumes simply to imitate his knightly heroes.
[2] Even while referring to Don Quixote as a "great classic", Ormsby was far from an unquestioning admirer of Cervantes's work, at times criticizing the author's writing habits and linguistic style.
A revised version of Ormsby's translation, by Kenneth Douglas and Joseph Jones, with new introduction and notes, was published by W.W. Norton in 1981 (ISBN 0393090183).