"The Medieval Background Of ""lazarillo De Tormes"" And The Picaresque"

The dissertation seeks to develop a non-cataclysmic view of the origins of Lazarillo de Tormes, to see the novel in the context of its literary antecedents and not, as it has often been viewed, against the background of the 17th century picaresque novel which followed it. The true problem we perceive in arriving at an understanding of the novel's origins is that of evolving a critical model which permits scholars to give proper value to various "obras prepicarescas" neither rejecting them in toto when they seem to differ in minor aspects from Lazarillo, nor assigning too much importance to individual examples. Such a model must explain a maximum number of the features of Lazarillo as text and offer the eventual possibility of understanding the novel as an individual artistic creation. To us the best model is one which perceives Lazarillo as a branch from a centuries-old literary tradition. In applying such a model we specifically rule out the use of the term "literary source" and at the same time reject contemporary social, economic and historical factors as major forces in the creation of the work.

Name thesis:degree_name

Ph.D.

Level thesis:degree_level

Dissertation

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Spanish

Grantor

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Year dc:date

2014

Author dc:creator

• Dagenais, John Clair

• Literature, Romance

Identifier

(UMI)AAI8209560

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/70964