Book Description
The two short novels in this volume follow the adventures of two unlikely heroes-delinquent pícaros living by their wits among corrupt priests and prostitutes, beggars and idle gentlemen, thieves, tricksters, and murderers. Lazarillo de Tormes (1554), published anonymously, provided a literary model for Cervantes' Don Quixote and describes the ingenious ruses employed by a boy from Salamanca to outwit a succession of disreputable masters. Francisco de Quevedo's The Swindler (1626) is a comic yet brutal and sordid account of a servant who wants to become a gentleman but ends up a cardsharp and common criminal.

About the Author
Francisco de Quevedo (1580-1645) was a distinguished and prolific writer of prose and poetry but chose a political career. Towards the end of his life he was imprisoned in a monastery as a result of his writing. The Author of Lazarillo de Tormes, who published the novel anonymously, is thought to come from sixteenth-century Erasmian or New Christian circles. Michael Alpert, Professor Emeritus of Modern and Contemporary History of Spain at the University of Westminster, has published several books and articles on Spanish history.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

These Spanish picaresque novels focus on the adventures of two unlikely heroes - delinquent picaros living by their wits among corrupt priests and prostitutes, beggars and idle gentlemen, thieves, tricksters and murderers. The tales are sharply critical of the Church and the conventions of nobility, and contain grotesquely exaggerated depictions of the criminal underworld. Lazarillo de Tormes (1554), published anonymously, provided a literary model for Cervantes in Don Quixote and describes the ingenious ruses employed by a boy from Salamanca to outwit a succession of disreputable masters. Francisco de Quevedo's The Swindler (1626) is a comic, yet brutal and sordid account of a servant who wants to become a gentleman but ends up as a cardsharp and a common criminal.