The Life of Lazarillo of Tormes

About this book

Lázaro, a poor boy born beside the river Tormes near Salamanca, tells how he survived by serving a string of masters, each worse than the last: a cruel blind beggar who teaches him cunning by knocking his head against a stone bull, a miserly priest who nearly starves him while he steals bread from a locked chest, and a proud but penniless squire whom his own servant must feed. He ends up, by his own account, a respectable town crier, married to a woman whose ties to an archpriest he prefers not to question.

Context and significance

Published anonymously in 1554, probably because of its satire of the clergy, Lazarillo de Tormes created the picaresque novel, the story of a rogue who lives by his wits, and influenced Don Quixote and countless later books. This translation by Robert S. Rudder also includes the continuation written by Juan de Luna in 1620.

About the author