The Picaresque Novel

The Picaresque Novel (Spanish: "picaresca," from "pícaro," for "rogue" or "rascal") is a genre of prose fiction which depicts the adventures of a roguish hero/heroine of low social class who lives by his or her wits in a corrupt society. Picaresque novels typically adopt a realistic style, with elements of comedy and satire. It is also known as COMEDIES OF MANNER.

Origin: 

This style of novel originated in 16th-century Spain and flourished throughout Europe in the 17th and 18th centuries. It continues to influence modern literature. There are some precedents to the picaresque genre, such as the maqamat – a hustler in 10th century Arabic literature; however, the first modern picaresque is Lazarillo de Tormes.

The picaresque as a generic category originated in Spanish literature of the 16th and early 17th centuries. Then it spread out of Spain, beginning with Germany in 1669, then England with Moll Flanders (1722), several Charles Dickens novels & Huckleberry Finn in the US.

Style:   

It was written in realistic manner with elements of comedy and satire, episodic.It follows the adventures of a rogue character, who rambles along, relating the shady details of his everyday experiences in autobiographical form.The picaro's tales come across with humor, although tragedy of circumstances usually travels with the storytelling. Although a rascal, the hero can be quite likable in the realism he portrays.The picaresque narrative a pseudo-autobiographical style.

Hero: 

A PICARO (Spanish for “rogue”) is a person who does not have money, power or prestige & lives by his wits as he encounters various powerful eccentrics in his episodic adventures. A picaro lives by his wits, often on the margins of society because of social class or familial disgrace. He is appealing despite the deceits or misadventures he engages in, perhaps because of inherent charm, and sometimes because of his underdog’s disregard for the social conventions that limit him.As a picaro is a trickster, however, readers cannot entirely trust his account, particularly because the events of the story take place in years past. This combination makes the story episodic, rather than tightly structured, and the looseness of the story may result in loose ends not resolved.

    Like: DON QUIXOTE, HUCKLEBERRY FINN and PICKWICK PAPERS.

The chief features of a Picaresque novel are:

1. Usually written in first person as an autobiographical account.
2. No certain plot, disconnected episodes.

3. Social setting - immense variety of incidents & character.

4.  A low social class hero, a trickster - not concerned with moral issues.

5.  Little character development of the hero.

6.  Narrated with plainness of language or realism.

        7.  Realistic picture of contemporary society - satirizing various faults of character, the corruption of           society.

Major SPANISH Examples:

Anonymous, La vida de Lazarillo de Tormes(1554)

Mateo Aleman, Guzman de Afarache(1599-1604)

Francisco Lopez de Ubeda, La Picara Justina(1605)

Vicente Espinel, Marcos de Obregon(1618)

Francisco de Quevedo, Historia de la Vida del Buscon Don Publos;(1626)

Anonymous, Estebanillo Gonzalez(1646)

SOME PICARESQUE NOVELS

Lazarillo de Tormes (1554),The Unfortunate Traveller (1594),Don Quixote (1605),Gil Blas(1715),

Moll Flanders(1722)

Joseph Andrews(1742)

Candide (1759)

The Adventures of Roderick Random(1748)

The PICARESQUE element in Lazarillo de Tormes:
Vocabulary used by characters are poor but colloquial & amusing, without any connotation of erudition nor intellectualism.It is written in a ‘circular’ structure ( chapter wise).Lazarillo is a round character.Poor lazarillo narrates his experience with variety of masters & has  to use his wits to obtain food.

The PICARESQUE element in DON QUIXOTE :

Don Quixote is a simple, poor man who assumes himself as a knight. Sancho Panza belongs to  low  social status. His character undergoes maturation  from madness to reality.Hero wanders undertaking knightly adventures meeting  various people.It is Episodic ,written in chapters.

The PICARESQUE element in Moll Flanders: 

Moll Flanders is the pseudonym of the heroine of this novel: since she is wanted by the law, she does not wish to reveal her true identity.

Moll’s life was of continued Variety for “Threescore(60) Years, besides her Childhood, was Twelve Year a Whore, Five times a Wife, Twelve Year a Thief, Eight Year a Transported Felon in Virginia, at last grew Rich”.It is written in an autobiographical style. It is intended to moralize but showing a woman’s struggle for survival .Moll undertakes scandalous sexual & criminal adventures.

INFLUENCE OF PICARESQUE NOVEL:

 It then spread all over Europe, exerting a particularly important influence toward the end of the 17th and above all during the 18th century in Germany, France, and England. The development of the realistic novel owes much to such works, which were written to deflate romantic or idealized fictional forms.

Some science fiction and fantasy books also show a clear picaresque influence for example:

The Dying Earth series of Jack Vance,

 Harry Harrison's The Stainless Steel Rat series, 

James H. Schmitz's The Witches of Karres,

 And L. Sprague de Camp's Novarian series.

                 

 In 20th and 21st centuries we see Rudyard Kipling's Kim (1901) combined the influence of the picaresque novel with the modern spy novel. Pío Baroja's novel Zalacain the Adventurer (1909), used this format in the context of the Carlist Wars. The illustrated book The Magic Pudding (1918), by Australian author Norman Lindsay, an example of the picaresque adapted for children's literature.

You can find picaresque prose among many authors, including Henry Fielding (Joseph Andrews), Francois Voltaire (Candide), Lord Byron (Don Juan), and J.D. Salinger (Catcher in the Rye). Thomas Nash is credited with writing the first picaresque novel in English (1594):  The Unfortunate Traveller.

Many features of the original Spanish picaresque pattern and of its picaro-rogue hero correspond to trends in modern fiction and to the concept of the modern limited hero or antihero. The episodic, open-ended plot is an appropriate device for the modern writer, who knows “only broken images” for presenting the fragmented reality of a disorderly, chaotic universe.

The picaro is not unlike the modern alienated individual, born into a world turned upside down. Many critics, therefore, consider the picaresque mode to be one of the most characteristic in twentieth century fiction, while others speak of a picaresque renaissance.

                                                      -Anwesha, Meghna, Aheli (2nd year Honours, Batch: 2016-17)