What is the Spanish book Lazarillo de Tormes about?
Lazarillo de Tormes is printed
Se imprime el Lazarillo de Tormes
1554. In 1554 four printers, in Burgos, Alcalá de Henares, Medina del Campo and Antwerp, issued a short anonymous book: the life of Lázaro, a boy from the river…
Draft: not yet checked against its sources.
Where: Spain, Castile, Salamanca
What happened
In 1554 four printers, in Burgos, Alcalá de Henares, Medina del Campo and Antwerp, issued a short anonymous book: the life of Lázaro, a boy from the river Tormes at Salamanca who serves a blind beggar, a miserly priest and a penniless squire and learns to survive by his wits. All four editions seem to copy a lost earlier one. Nobody knows who wrote it. The Lazarillo was banned by the Inquisition's Index in 1559 and reappeared cut in 1573, but it had already created a new kind of book, the picaresque novel, told in the first person by a rogue from the bottom of society. Its plain, ironic Castilian is still read in every Spanish school.
Say it
Nadie sabe quién escribió el Lazarillo de Tormes.
Nobody knows who wrote Lazarillo de Tormes.
Why it matters
It founded the picaresque, which runs through Cervantes and Quevedo to the modern novel, and 'lazarillo' became the Spanish word for a guide, as in 'perro lazarillo', a guide dog.
Read about it
Connected
- The Siglo de Oro (c. 1492–1681)
- Don Quixote is published (January 1605)
- Don Quixote is published (January 1605)
Sources
- Reseña: Lazarillo de Tormes (edición crítica) — Lemir, Universitat de València