FANTASTIC ELEMENTS WITHIN THE PICARESQUE GENRE: LAZARILLO DE TORMES (1555)

Lazarillo de Tormes, published in 1554, is the anonymous Spanish work with which the genre of the Picaresque novel began. It arose as a reaction to the novels of chivalry that were so appealing to the readers of that time. In a picaresque work we find a kind of anti-hero in comparison with the near perfect figures of the novels of chivalry, such as Amadís in Amadís de Gaula. This anti-hero is no longer the son of kings but a poor man who in order to survive must make constant use of his wit to obtain food, clothing and shelter. The most common way to do so is by serving a master, who will most likely take advantage of him. Lázaro, the protagonist and narrator of Lazarillo de Tormes, lives this kind of life. He describes the hunger, pain and suffering of his adventures, and ends up serving nine masters before the novel is over. However, his story does not end there. Another anonymous author decided to get a hold of this pícaro and put him through some quite amazing and fantastic adventures in his continuation of this work. This Segunda parte, published in 1555, has been the point of much discussion among Spanish Golden Age critics who often have banished the work from the picaresque realm because of its fantastic elements.

It is my purpose to show how both picaresque and fantastic elements can indeed co-exist in the same work without it having to be denied the status of belonging to the picaresque genre. While it is true that in the original work almost all of Lázaro’s adventures are quite realistic, this by no means implies that every single work to follow must possess the exact same characteristics as its mold. If this were true, we would find hundreds of simple replicas, instead of original works throughout Spanish picaresque novels. Therefore, it was only to be expected that the author of the Segunda parte would place his Lázaro in very different types of adventures if his readers were to be entertained. What seems to have bothered critics most, however, is the fact that Lázaro suffers a physical metamorphosis and is turned into a tuna fish who lives in the ocean for about four years before regaining his human form. He loses his human body, but he keeps the typical wit and intelligence of the pícaro. It is during his stay in the ocean that many of his adventures occur and Lázaro grows spiritually to such a point that he becomes one of the tuna king’s favorite subjects. In other words, his fortune reaches a very high point, a point that probably he would never have reached in the world of men. In the next few paragraphs, I will: (1) show how this work possesses the characteristics needed to classify it as picaresque, (2) refute the objections others have given to deny it such status, and (3) elaborate on the fantastic elements of the work.

The critic Claudio Guillén in his article “Toward a Definition of the Picaresque” has established clearly that no picaresque novel has all of the characteristics that make up the genre, and elaborates the following criteria:

It may be useful to distinguish between the following: first, the picaresque genre; second, a group of novels that deserve to be called picaresque in the strict sense—usually in agreement with the original Spanish pattern; third, another group of novels which may be considered picaresque in a broader sense of the term only; and finally, a picaresque myth which is an essential situation or significant structure derived from the novels themselves. (71)

Guillén continues: “A genre is a model that . . . has stable features, but it also changes . . . with the writer, the nation, and the period” (72-73). Besides, Guillén makes clear that the pícaro cannot be studied independently nor separated from the rest of the work in which he appears:

The picaresque is based on a situation, or rather, a chain of situations. Its hero is involved from the start in a “tangle.” This tangle is an economic and social predicament of the most immediate and pressing nature . . . the entanglement . . . leads to further situations or “adventures.” Our hero becomes a pícaro through the lessons he draws from his adventures. (77)

He also explains that, generally, the pícaro is an orphan, and that through his harsh experiences with life he pro-gressively hardens internally and externally. In this manner he alienates himself from society, and he moves horizontally through time, but also vertically in his sur-rounding society (although not always towards the top).

Guillén agrees that in order for a novel to be considered picaresque it must have certain characteristics, such as the narration in first person or the alienation from society. With his study we can be sure that the term picaresque may still be applied to novels that do not necessarily follow exactly the pattern initiated by Lazarillo de Tormes. “A genre is a model—a convenient model to boot: an invitation to the actual writing of a work, on the basis of certain principles of composition” (72).

Based on the criteria in “Toward a Definition of the Picaresque,” there is no doubt that the Segunda parte deserves to be included within the genre of the picaresque novel. Among its picaresque characteristics, we can include the following: the main character survives by his wit; it is narrated in first person; there is social criticism; different levels of humor are present; the main character makes use of his memory to narrate his adventures in all the chapters of the work; the character does serve different masters; his fortune is variable; and, at the end, the character has not really achieved a true advancement in life. Among men he goes back to being without money, to having an unfaithful wife, and being under the service of his wife’s lover. There is the disappointment and disillusion typical of the picaresque novel.

However, the two physical metamorphoses that Lázaro suffers are the elements that seem to have bothered the critics most. Yet within the accepted picaresque tradition are some other novels that have this combination of picaresque and fantastic elements; such is the case of El coloquio de los perros by Miguel de Cervantes. The wide margin that Guillén creates certainly allows room for the Segunda parte.

Several critics have suggested that the Continuation should be excluded from the picaresque genre for various reasons. However, none of these reasons really have a solid basis. For example, one reason is that the Lázaro of the Segunda parte does not suffer from hunger. This is true; in the world of the tuna fish he does not suffer hunger. But, as the critic Jesús Cañedo has said in his article “Curriculum vitae de Lazarillo de Tormes,” hunger can be present or not. Its presence or absence is not sufficient grounds to determine whether a novel is picaresque or not (Cañedo 173). And even the original Lázaro does not suffer from hunger throughout the work. After he was abandoned by his third master, the squire, hunger stops playing an important role.

Another reason given to deny the Segunda parte picaresque status is that its Lázaro does not serve several masters. Though this Lázaro only serves four masters vs. the nine masters of the original Lazarillo, we must also remember that other famous pícaros such as Guzmán of Guzmán de Alfarache and Pablos of El Buscón do not serve masters throughout the entire novels. As a matter of fact, Pablos only serves one master, but no respectable critic would ever dare to say that Pablos is not a true pícaro just because he only serves one master.

A third reason has to do with humor. Some critics seem to think that this Continuation does not have any humor. However a study done by Richard E. Zwez has an entire chapter in his Hacia la revalorización de la segunda parte del Lazarillo (1555) dealing with the humor that forms part of this novel. While Lázaro lives among the tuna fish, he has to pretend constantly to be one of them. He has to act, live, eat, etc., just like them and the author takes great advantage of this situation. The levels of humor vary, of course, from a simple smile to outbursts of laughter, but it is present throughout the work. Even when Lázaro suffers his second metamorphosis and goes back to the world of men, the humor does not cease.

So these reasons: hunger, few masters, or lack of humor, really do not stand on solid ground. It is my contention that the critics have rejected this work of 1555 because it includes fantastic elements and situations. These three excuses cannot be enough to say that this Lázaro is not a pícaro just because he spends four years in a fantastic situation. There is no doubt that it is indeed a picaresque novel that has fantastic elements.

These fantastic elements are not a weakness; on the contrary, they contribute to the interest and humor of the work. At least four major elements fall within the terrain of the fantastic: (1) the metamorphosis of Lázaro into a tuna fish, (2) the way Lázaro trains other tuna to fight with swords, (3) Lázaro’s change from a tuna back into a man, and (4) his desire to establish a tuna-like university in Toledo upon his return to the world of men.

Before Lázaro’s first metamorphosis occurs, he is on board a ship that is about to sink. Thinking that his life will soon end, he spends his remaining time drinking as much wine as he can. When he finally plunges into the ocean, he discovers, much to his amazement, that his body is so full of wine that no water can enter it. Using his sword, he fights his way to an underwater cave to escape the attacking fish and begs God to save his life. All of a sudden he realizes that he has been turned into a tuna fish in answer to his prayers.

Before long, Lázaro is able to mingle with the tuna that were besieging his cave. He discovers that he can use his sword with his mouth to defend himself, and the tuna king is so impressed that Lázaro soon becomes one of his favorite subjects. Befriended by a tuna captain, our pícaro offers to teach the captain and his squad how to fight with swords. They scavenge swords from the ocean bottom, and soon Lázaro and his tuna soldiers have conquered other ocean residents, he has turned a captive octopus into his personal valet, and his fighting group has expanded the domain of the tuna king. Lázaro’s life in the ocean continues to prosper until his second metamorphosis takes place.

Lázaro is entrusted to accompany thousands of tuna females to their egg-laying grounds, but he gets caught in a fisherman’s net with hundreds of other tuna (including his tuna wife). When the fishermen try to pull his sword out of his mouth, their jerking causes the next fantastic event: a man’s arm comes out of the tuna’s mouth, followed by his face and part of his upper torso. Able to speak again as a man, Lázaro successfully begs the fishermen to spare his tuna wife and return her to the ocean. He is then taken to the regional duke and duchess to be shown off as an oddity. After seven days as half-man/half-tuna, he is able to convince them to finish pulling him from his tuna body because that half is starting to rot. In this way, his second physical meta-morphosis is made complete.

Back in the world of men, Lázaro again has to struggle to survive from day to day. He comes up with the idea of starting a university in Toledo to teach the tuna language, but it never materializes. Lázaro’s economic fortune has once again fallen; he is no longer the prosperous and respected subject of the tuna king. Spiritually, however, he has grown tremendously and is now a better man because of the fantastic events he experienced as a tuna.

Yet these fantastic elements do not eliminate the picaresque characteristics of structure and character. The same situation occurs in the case of El coloquio de los perros, a novel that Gonzalo Sobejano presents as picaresque, even if it also has fantastic elements, such as the fact that a dog can narrate his adventures with previous masters. Sobejano defends the situation of the dog, Berganza, by saying that the novel must be considered as picaresque because the dog fills many of the aspects that this type of novel requires to fit the genre. For example, Berganza speaks in first person; he serves nine masters; he narrates his story from the time he was a puppy until he is grown up; there is a certain sleaziness surrounding the life of his parents; he makes use of his memory to narrate the episodes; he takes and leaves masters; his fortune varies; and at the end he finds himself in a kind of dishonorable situation. Sobejano has established that just because a novel presents certain fantastic elements is no reason to eliminate it from the field of the picaresque. This is especially true when the work includes so many of the characteristics of the genre in question (40).

Finally, we can conclude, that with all the works mentioned in this paper we can stand on solid ground and firmly state that the Segunda parte is indeed a picaresque novel, both by characterization and structure, which has fantastic elements that make it very appealing and entertaining. Both this novel and Cervantes’ El coloquio de los perros, are perfect examples that the picaresque can most definitely coexist with the fantastic, and they should not be eliminated from picaresque studies because of the fantastic elements that form parts of them.

Works Cited

Alemán, Mateo. Guzmán de Alfarache. México: Porrúa, 1985.

Anónimo. Lazarillo de Tormes. Madrid: Taurus, 1964.

___. Segunda parte de Lazarillo de Tormes y de sus fortunas y adversidades. Biblioteca de Autores Españoles. Vol. 3. Madrid: Rivadeneyra, 1858: 91-109.

Cañedo, Jesús. “ ‘Curriculum vitae’ de Lazarillo de Tormes.” Revista de Filología Española 49 (1966): 126-180.

Cervantes Saavedra, Miguel de. El casamiento engañoso y el coloquio de los perros. Novelas Ejemplares. México: Porrúa, 1983.

Guillén, Claudio. Literature as System. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1971.

Quevedo, Francisco de. Vida del Buscón Don Pablos. México: Porrúa, 1980.

Sobejano, Gonzalo. “El coloquio de los perros en la picaresca y otros apuntes.” Hispanic Review 43 (1975): 25-41.

Zwez, Richard E. Hacia la revalorización de la Segunda Parte del Lazarillo. Valencia: Albatrós, 1970.