Background
Francisco de Quevedo was born on September 14, 1580, in Madrid, to an aristocratic family and orphaned very young.
(A classic picaresque novel, Francisco de Quevedo's "The S...)
A classic picaresque novel, Francisco de Quevedo's "The Spanish Sharper" chronicles the adventures of Don Pablos, a buscón or swindler, who aims in life to learn virtue and to become a caballero, or gentleman, both of which he fails miserably at. The work is a notable piece of satire that criticizes not only Spanish society but the protagonist Pablos himself. His ambition to elevate his status to that of a gentleman is, in Quevedo's opinion, unobtainable; as such aspirations from the lower classes would only destabilize the social order. Written around 1604 and first published in Spanish as "El Buscón" in 1626, "The Spanish Sharper" stands as one of the earliest and premier examples of the popular genre of Spanish literature known as the picaresque novel.
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(The unlikely heroes of the Spanish picaresque novels make...)
The unlikely heroes of the Spanish picaresque novels make their way - by whatever means they can - through a colourful and seamy underworld populated by unsavoury beggars, corrupt priests, eccentrics, whores and criminals. Both Lazarillo de Tormesand Pablos the swindler are determined to attain the trappings of the gentleman, but have little time for the gentlemanly ideals of religion, justice, honour and nobility.
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(Presents the turbulent early-seventeenth-century Spanish ...)
Presents the turbulent early-seventeenth-century Spanish literary figure's cynical portrayal of a society in moral and political decline
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(Hardback edition with 146 pages. From Introduction. Sir R...)
Hardback edition with 146 pages. From Introduction. Sir Rodger L'Estrange, one of the best prose stylists of the Restoration, led an adventurous and not altogether prosperous life as a political adventurer, Tory pamphleteer and professional writer. "A man of excellent parts" , according to John Evelyn, "abating some affections", though a consistent Royalist and Protestant he was never entirely trusted by his own side and distrusted by the other.
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(This book was originally published prior to 1923, and rep...)
This book was originally published prior to 1923, and represents a reproduction of an important historical work, maintaining the same format as the original work. While some publishers have opted to apply OCR (optical character recognition) technology to the process, we believe this leads to sub-optimal results (frequent typographical errors, strange characters and confusing formatting) and does not adequately preserve the historical character of the original artifact. We believe this work is culturally important in its original archival form. While we strive to adequately clean and digitally enhance the original work, there are occasionally instances where imperfections such as blurred or missing pages, poor pictures or errant marks may have been introduced due to either the quality of the original work or the scanning process itself. Despite these occasional imperfections, we have brought it back into print as part of our ongoing global book preservation commitment, providing customers with access to the best possible historical reprints. We appreciate your understanding of these occasional imperfections, and sincerely hope you enjoy seeing the book in a format as close as possible to that intended by the original publisher.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B009IKHRUY/?tag=2022091-20
(This book was originally published prior to 1923, and rep...)
This book was originally published prior to 1923, and represents a reproduction of an important historical work, maintaining the same format as the original work. While some publishers have opted to apply OCR (optical character recognition) technology to the process, we believe this leads to sub-optimal results (frequent typographical errors, strange characters and confusing formatting) and does not adequately preserve the historical character of the original artifact. We believe this work is culturally important in its original archival form. While we strive to adequately clean and digitally enhance the original work, there are occasionally instances where imperfections such as blurred or missing pages, poor pictures or errant marks may have been introduced due to either the quality of the original work or the scanning process itself. Despite these occasional imperfections, we have brought it back into print as part of our ongoing global book preservation commitment, providing customers with access to the best possible historical reprints. We appreciate your understanding of these occasional imperfections, and sincerely hope you enjoy seeing the book in a format as close as possible to that intended by the original publisher.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00AMM6WQ2/?tag=2022091-20
(This Preface is merely for fashion-sake, to fill a space,...)
This Preface is merely for fashion-sake, to fill a space, and please the stationer, who says tis neither usual nor handsome, to leap immediately from the title-page to the matter. So that, in short, a Preface ye have, together with the reason of it, both under one: but as to the ordinary mode and pretence of prefaces, the translator desires to be excused. For he makes a conscience of a lie, and it were a damned one, to tell ye, that he has published this, either to gratify the importunity of friends, or to oblige the public, or for any other reason of a p. vihundred, that are commonly given in excuse of scribbling. Not but that he loves his friends, as well as any man, and has taken their opinion along with him. Nor, but that he loves the public too (as many a man does a coy mistress that has made his heart ache.) But to pass from what had no effect upon him in this publication, to that which overruled him in it. It was pure spite. For he has had hard measure among the physicians, the lawyers, the women, etc. And Dom Francisco de Quevedo, in English, revenges him upon all his enemies. For it is a satire, that taxes corruption of manners, in all sorts and degrees of people, without reflecting upon particular states or persons. It is full of sharpness and morality; and has found so good entertainment in the world, that it wanted only English of being baptized into all Christian languages.
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Francisco de Quevedo was born on September 14, 1580, in Madrid, to an aristocratic family and orphaned very young.
At the age of 16 he entered the University of Alcalá. He continued his studies for ten years, transferring halfway through his educational career to the University of Valladolid. He learned Latin, Greek, Hebrew, and several modern languages and became a classics scholar.
By the time he had graduated from college, Quevedo's earliest poems, published when he was still a student, had attracted the attention of Miguel de Cervantes and Lope de Vega, elder luminaries of Spanish literature who both wrote Quevedo letters of praise and encouraged him to pursue career as a poet. Although he was flattered, Quevedo was not interested in a literary life. For more than ten years, Quevedo would instead fruitlessly pursue a career in politics, dreaming of becoming a member of the Spanish nobility.
Much of Quevedo's life as a man of political intrigue circled around the Duke de Osuna, an influential nobleman who was the acting viceroy of Sicily and Naples. By 1613, after seven years of devoted service, Quevedo had effectively become Osuna's closest confidante. Osuna had political aspirations of his own and the duke dreamed of subverting the democratic government of Venice and seizing control of the city for himself. Although the Spanish crown had secretly encouraged the duke, when the conspiracy to take over Venice failed, the government of Spain did everything in its power to distance itself from the scandal. Osuna endured a spectacular fall from grace from which he never recovered. Quevedo, who had been Osuna's main operative in Venice, was disillusioned from politics and devoted the rest of his life to writing.
Quevedo the theologian produced about 15 books on theological and ascetic subjects, such as La cuna y la sepultura (1612; The Cradle and the Grave) and La providencia de Dios (1641; The Providence of God). Quevedo the critic and literary gadfly published La culta latiniparla (The Craze for Speaking Latin) and Aguja de navegar cultos (Compass for Navigating among Euphuistic Reefs), both aimed against Gongorism—the Spanish counterpart of euphuism.
Quevedo the satirist produced profoundly melancholy buffoonery and grotesque cosmic nonsense in Los sueños (1627; Dreams). He scourged doctors, tailors, judges, Genoese bankers, barbers, bores, poets, dramatists, and every age and sort of woman, spattering them with scatological humor. His books of political theory were products of many years of earnest thought and of his own political experience. Two of the most important are La political de Dios (1617-1626; The Politics of the Lord) and La vida de Marco Bruto (1632-1644; The Life of Marcus Brutus).
Quevedo the poet produced an enormous bulk of verse, much of it extremely witty and sarcastic—no few poems based on the subjects of metaphysical anguish, the brevity of beauty, the loss of love, inexorable time, and death. Quevedo the novelist is perhaps best known through his picaresque novel La vida del buscón (1626; Paul the Sharperor The Scavenger), in which he followed the usual episodic pattern of the picaresque novel, intermixing sardonic wit. In this novel he sought to entertain, to ridicule, and to hold up fraud and dishonesty to scorn, but he rarely moralized directly, as did other picaresque novelists of his time.
Late in his life, in 1641, Quevedo, still feeling the sting of Osuna's failure, attempted to vindicate the former duke. Quevedo prepared an anonymous poem that materialized under King Philip IV's napkin at breakfast, blasting the policies of Philip's all-powerful favorite, Gaspar de Guzmán y Pimentel, Count-Duke of Olivares. Quevedo's famous wit, however, was impossible to disguise, and this act landed the poet under house arrest that lasted until Olivares' fall in 1643. He died on September 8, 1645, his health having suffered significantly for the worse during his imprisonment.
(A classic picaresque novel, Francisco de Quevedo's "The S...)
(The unlikely heroes of the Spanish picaresque novels make...)
(This Preface is merely for fashion-sake, to fill a space,...)
(This book was originally published prior to 1923, and rep...)
(This book was originally published prior to 1923, and rep...)
(Presents the turbulent early-seventeenth-century Spanish ...)
(Hardback edition with 146 pages. From Introduction. Sir R...)