The Life of Lazarillo de Tormes

Published anonymously in 1554, The Life of Lazarillo de Tormes and of His Fortunes and Adversities is generally held to be the first picaresque novella, and accrued considerable fame and notoriety. Its less-than-generous characterization of the priesthood saw the Inquisition place it on their list of banned books, although a couple of decades later an expurgated version was allowed. Even half a century later, Cervantes was still referencing the work in Don Quixote as something his readership would be assumed to be familiar with.

While the translator of this 1908 edition, Clements Markham, confidently explains in the introduction that this book was authored by Don Diego Hurtado de Mendoza, the authorship remains disputed to this day.

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