ITHACA, N.Y. -- In honor of the 500th "birthday" of the first publication of "Don Quixote," Cornell University's Department of Romance Studies is sponsoring an international colloquium, "Cervantes and the Frontiers of Fiction: A Celebration of 'Don Quixote' (1605-2005)," April 22-23 in the A.D. White House on the Cornell campus.

The conference opens Friday, April 22, at 10 a.m. and is followed by a keynote address shared by three speakers: novelists Ignacia Padilla of Mexico and Antonio Skarmeta of Chile, and Edith Grossman, who recently published a best-selling English Translation of "Don Quixote." The conference reconvenes Saturday, April 23, and closes with a roundtable among academics and writers. For a complete schedule, including speakers and topics, see the colloquium's Web site..

The colloquium is sponsored by the Department of Romance Studies, Office of the Provost, College of Arts and Sciences, Department of Near Eastern Studies, Program of Jewish Studies, Department of Comparative Literature, Society for the Humanities, Stephen H. Weiss Fellows Student Community Interaction Project, Latin American Studies Program, Institute for European Studies and University Lectures Committee, all of Cornell University.