Francisco de Quevedo
1580–1645
Biography
Francisco Gómez de Quevedo y Villegas came from the Spanish nobility and was also a politician and a writer of the Golden Age. He was born in Madrid in 1580 and died at Villanueva de los Infantes in 1645. He became a knight of the Order of Santiago, his public career took him to the court at Madrid and to Italy, and his life was marked by periods of royal favour and of disgrace. He spent several years in prison late in life.
He was one of the leading poets of the Spanish Baroque, and his long rivalry with Luis de Góngora shaped the literary debates of his time. His style, called conceptismo, prized sharp wit, compressed thought and sudden paradox, in contrast to the dense, ornate language that Góngora preferred. He also wrote satirical verse, moral and political prose, philosophical works and plays, and his satire reached into every level of society.
The book on this site is the Historia de la vida del Buscón, llamado Don Pablos, a picaresque novel first printed in 1626. It follows Pablos, a young rogue who leaves home to make his fortune and falls in with thieves, beggars and social climbers along the way. Its sharp satire of greed, hypocrisy and empty pretension places it in the line of Lazarillo de Tormes and Guzmán de Alfarache, and it remains one of the great works of Spanish prose fiction.
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Books
Historia de la vida del Buscón, llamado Don Pablos, ejemplo de vagabundos y espejo de tacaños
by Francisco de Quevedo
Pablos, the son of a barber and a witch, rises and falls through school, university, the streets of Madrid and the underworld, always trying to pass for a gentleman. Quevedo's picaresque novel is a savage comic satire of vanity, hunger and social climbing. This book uses the…
Summary written by Claude Sonnet 5.5.