4 - The Author Strikes Back: Alemán's Picaresque Revenge

Summary

Introduction

A century after the publication of Fernando de Rojas's extraordinarily influential Celestina, another novice Spanish writer changed the generic and formal course of Western Letters: Mateo Alemán. His success was at least as improbable as Rojas's and his impact nearly as overwhelming1 In 1598, Alemán's Part I of Guzmán de Alfarache singlehandedly revived and reinvented the picaresque novel. In 1604, Alemán's Part II of Guzmán singlehandedly revived and reinvented the sequel. The former fulfilled the forgotten promise of Lazarillo de Tormes (1554) and its continuation (1555) with the creation of a generative generic template. The latter fulfilled the Inquisition-suppressed promise of the continuations of Rojas and Silva with the first sequel by an originating author responding to a rival sequel: Juan Martí's 1602 continuation of Guzmán.

In each effort, Alemán expressed his doubts about continuation, and his debts to these previous continuators both directly in the front matter and allegorically in the narrative. He also established defenses against future unauthorized continuation. If Part I constructs these defenses, Part II responds both to their failure and to the surprising success this failure produced. The insult of Martí's Part II made Alemán's Part II not just better but possible. Above all, Guzmán's story is the story of this second and definitive part and the definitive rivalry that produced it.