This is a study the role of admiratio in the Quijote in connection with the reactions elicited by the knight and the creation of a parodic text capable of producing at once wonderment and laughter. The many instances of the use of admiratio are analyzed and classified into three categories: positive, negative, and ambivalent. This last one is then seen as the means to reconcile the marvelous and the verisimilar in the narrative, and is associated with the ambivalence in response characteristic of the grotesque mode.