Francisco de Quevedo: Life, Works, and Literary Style
Francisco de Quevedo: Life, Works, and Style
Francisco de Quevedo spent his life in Aragon and faced challenges with the Society of Jesus due to his writing. He was a prominent intellectual whose prose aimed to provide moral instruction.
Quevedo’s Masterpiece: El Criticón
El Criticón, published in three parts (1651, 1653, 1657), anticipates the philosophical novel of the eighteenth century. The work follows two characters on a pilgrimage, learning to mistrust appearances in their quest for wisdom and virtue.
Quevedo’s thinking was pessimistic, reflecting the Baroque era. He believed the world is misleading, and humanity is weak and malicious. Therefore, we must strive to master ourselves rather than be mastered by external forces. He was an influential figure throughout Europe.
Study and Anthology
Quevedo: Prose-Writer
Life and Personality
Francisco de Quevedo y Villegas was born in Madrid in 1580, belonging to a family of gentry. He studied at the Universities of Alcalá and Valladolid. He dedicated himself to politics and diplomacy, faced imprisonment, and died in Villanueva de los Infantes in 1645.
Quevedo aspired to the highest nobility. He was a contradictory and introverted man with a pessimistic view of the world and a constant reflection on death.
Prose Work
A fundamental feature of Quevedo’s work is his variety of genres, including poems, a play, twelve starters, and prose works. His prose is difficult to classify, encompassing philosophical, political, satirical, moral, and humorous content.
A significant portion of his work is political, targeting figures like the Count-Duke of Olivares, Jews, and Catalan separatism. His festive works, which enjoyed wide circulation, are particularly interesting for their parodies of authors and literary ideas, such as those of Góngora. His most prominent ascetic work is The Cradle and the Grave.
Quevedo’s most important prose works are satirical and moral in character. His Dreams are five stories that satirize various types and professions with moral intent. All the Time is considered the masterpiece of his didactic prose.
El Buscón: A Picaresque Novel
El Buscón tells the life of a hustler named Don Pablos. First printed in 1626 but written earlier, it achieved great success as a picaresque novel.
Quevedo used Lazarillo de Tormes and Guzmán de Alfarache as models, but with modifications. He adopted the overall structure, the epistolary form, the protagonist’s vile origins, the desire for social mobility, and hunger as a motive for action. However, he surpassed both in linguistic ingenuity.
Pablos’s life is presented in episodes that are not always linked, forming scenes or pictures. The character does not evolve; he remains consistent throughout. The author uses the characters’ traits for humorous effect, and the work aims to draw attention to the language.
Quevedo satirizes the desire for social advancement. The hero, born to a thief and a witch, is always punished when attempting to change his social status. The author reveals a conservative mentality, suggesting that one should remain in their original social status.
Style
Quevedo’s style emphasizes linguistic acuity and a tendency toward exaggeration. He was a literary genius who incorporated a long tradition of oral language use in court environments. The Castilian language, in his hands, becomes an inexhaustible source of verbal invention.
To counter his pessimism, Quevedo employs laughter and sarcasm. He presents his characters without compassion, even with ruthlessness, subjecting them to dehumanization. He avoids the disgusting and macabre but finds pleasure in it.
Quevedo’s work is explained by the proliferation of madmen, dwarfs, jesters, and other characters that populate the Court.
Literature of the 16th Century: Prose and Theater
Historical Transformation of Literary Genres: Prose and Drama
Prose
The development of Castilian prose continued, although some works were still written in Latin. There are two types of didactic prose and narrative prose. A clear separation exists between the two, although teaching can have a narrative character and vice versa.