Novel
The Grifter
El Buscón
Francisco de Quevedo · 1626
Opening lines
Yo, señora, soy de Segovia. Mi padre se llamó Clemente Pablo, natural del mismo pueblo; Dios le tenga en el cielo.
I, madam, am from Segovia. My father was called Clemente Pablo, a native of the same town; God keep him in heaven.
Translation by Erostrate
Text quoted from gutenberg.org
Synopsis
Pablos, son of a thieving barber and of a mother said to be a witch, grows up in Segovia and dreams of rising above his birth. Having entered the service of a schoolmate, don Diego Coronel, a boy of good family, he shares hunger with him under a miserly master, the licentiate Cabra, then follows him as a valet to the University of Alcalá, where the students bully him and where he learns to deceive. Informed that his father has been executed, he takes the road to Segovia to collect his inheritance and meets along the way a series of extravagant characters.
Context
The novel first circulated in manuscript copies, some of which survive, and the date of its composition remains debated: around 1603-1604 according to Fernando Lázaro Carreter, 1605 according to Francisco Rico, around 1620 according to Américo Castro. It appeared in 1626 in Zaragoza, without the author's consent, who never acknowledged having written it, and was reprinted as early as 1627 in Valencia and Barcelona. Its full title presents it as the history of the Buscón, called don Pablos, example of vagabonds and mirror of swindlers.
Who it is for
A short novel, written in the first person and divided into three books, whose language plays constantly on words.
Prizes and reception
Translated into French as early as 1633, under the title L'Avanturier Buscon, and retranslated since, up to Aline Schulman's version published by Fayard in 2010.