El Periquillo Sarniento

Jos Joaqun Fernndez de Lizardi

Mxico, 1816
About the autor: Fernandez de Lizardi was born 1776 in Mexico, child of a criolla and
a man of Mexican heritage. Various studies. Marries 1805, first literary work
published 1808, a poem in honor of Fernando VII. 1812, aparece EL Pensador
Mexicano given Cdizs declaration of freedom of the press. First 3 tomes of EPS
were published in newspapers, 4th and 5th tomes were prohibited by the censors and
not published until after Lizardis death (1827; 1831). During this time he was also
working on Don Catrn de Fachenda. Noches tristes y da alegre (1818) is an
imitation of Cadalsos Noches lgubres. After independence, was a federalist (in jail
because of political positions). At end of his life, was names editor of La Gaceta del
Gobierno.
CHARACTERS
Pedro Sarmiento, el Periquillo Sarniento
Parents of P
Pelayo
Januario
Don Antonio
Doctor Purgante
Juan Largo
Chanfaina
Ppilo
Aguilucho
Margarita
Colonel.
PLOT SUMMARY
Begins in typical picaresque style. Postrado en una cama muchos meses
hace, batallando con los medicos y enfermedades, y esperando con resignacion el
dia en que, cumplido el orden de la divina Providencia, hayais de cerrar mis ojos,
queridos hijos mios, he pensado dejaros escritos los nada raros sucesos de mi vida,
para que os sepias guarder y precaver de muchos de los peligros que amenazan, y
aun lastiman al hombre en el discurso de sus das. Sets up narrative frame,
didactic function of the novel. Pedro was a spoiled child, which is attributed to his
nodriza and his parents (Dad loved his Mom too much to stop her from
malcriandolo).
They send Pedro to school. The teacher, however, is a hombre de bien that
doesnt really care about teaching or have an inclination to it. Example, he reads

and writes well but doesnt explain the punctuation nor do it well. Explains where
his nickname comes from (Periquillo for the bright colors of his clothing, Sarniento
from his last name, Sarmiento, and sarna when he was itchy). A priest closes
Periquillos school and his father sends him to a different one (more cruel teacher),
though another priest and Ps mother convince father to change schools again. He
has the luck of an excellent maestro and in 2 years has acquired necessary
knowledge.
Mother wants P to keep studying, father wants P to become an apprentice.
Mom wins, P studies but without really learning anything. Hes very proud of himself
(and full of himself) when he receives his bachiller. [comic use of bachilleramiento,
bachillerearon, bachillereadas, bachilleras]. Dad then pushes him to decide what to
do with his life to keep studying, to be an artist, etc. 8 days to decide, P doesnt
think about it until the last minute and consults with his friend Martin Pelayo (an
idiota) who tells him to be a priest for all the wrong reasons. P tells his father, who is
OK with it. (P just wants money, hates the idea of having to work for it). Goes for
theology (Dad has decent rationales). At school hes compadre with Pelayo whos all
about the malas andanzas. Dad realizes this when he goes to talk to the professor
and is ashamed of Ps bad habits (doesnt study, has mala junta, disruptive, no
discipline). Parents argue, father decides P needs an oficio. P asks for a few days to
consider options (like soldado) and goes to talk to Pelayo, who suggests becoming a
monk.
P goes to the Franciscan monastery and is accepted. Mother is thrilled. P
hates it. While in the monastery Dad dies, Mom is left alone and without money. P
fakes sickness to leave the monastery. He goes home and convinces his mother to
let him have a party, the beginning of the end for them, Ps amigos are terrible
guests, made a mess, spend the money. Mom tries to keep P from making things
worse but doesnt succeed. They leave the house, keep having to move because
they have no money. P sucks, Mom dies, he even tries to avoid the funeral. The
servant leaves. Hes got nothing.
P asks his relatives for help but no one bites. He meets up with Januario and
they get a life going with robbing, small tricks, etc (gambling). They do OK, but in
the end they get beat up when they try to play a payo. P recovers in the hospital
and sees terrible conditions there. Januario comes to see him, when he leaves the
hospital J offers a robbery job but P refuses, however gets caught up in it and sent
to jail. Jail is unpleasant. His family rejects him yet again. He gets sick. An escribano
sees his handwriting and is impressed, offers him work. Cosme Casalla / Chanfaina
does very illegal things. Theres a lio amoroso and P runs away.
He meets up with a nice guy who helps him out and with his knowledge of
Latin, takes him on as an apprentice in a pharmacy that has a racket going with a
particular doctor (after he runs away from the barber for getting involved with the
barbers wife). However, P messes up and its blamed on the pharmacist, so he

leaves and after some time vagabundeando he goes to work with Doctor Purgante.
Purgante is pretty funny with his extravagant language. P stays there several
months working, and then takes his money, some books and the mule and heads
out to the countryside to be a doctor. He manages to pass for awhile, everyone
respects him (even though he has no idea what he is doing and dresses ridiculously)
until the wife of the governor dies (of the indios) and he is run out of town, and
heads back to Mxico without anything besides what he is wearing.
Back in the city, P joins up with a gang of (fake) beggars and decides to pass
for blind in order to ask for money. A man offers to give him money when he is at his
home, and there reveals that its obvious that P isnt blind and offers him a job as
scribe with a friend (outside of Mexico, Tixtla). P rats out the rest of the beggars,
who are arrested and sent to prison.
Meanwhile P goes to Tixtla with the subdelegado and works as his scribe. The
subdelegado is all about making money and not much else, so P starts writing the
documents and things are going well (P participates in the exploitation (financial) of
Tixtla). However, some indios wrote to the Real Audiencia and accused the
subdelegado, so he had to up and go to Mexico to defend himself. It goes badly, and
P escapes though without any of his savings, and goes to Puebla. (in unedited bit,
goes to Manila as assistant to a coronel, his court ordered punishment is for 8 years.
Things go well, coronel dies, P returns to Acapulco (naufragio utopian isla, arrives
with his last amo, un tipo chino?).)
P stays the night in Matamoros and during the day runs into one of the guys
he met in prison. They chat, it turns out they hunt people (highwaymen?) and
Januario is in on it too. However they have a run in with more armed people
(police?) and most people are killed, P is shot and injured, which prompts some
reflection on his part. He joins up with some travelers, says he wants to avoid
thieves. Januario was ajusticiado, P sees his cadaver. Swears to make up for all the
wrongs hes done. Goes to pray, sees Pelayo. He confesses with him, Pelayo sets
him up with a new amo and a store in San Agustin de las Cuevas. P comes to
mexico once a month, avoids his old acquaintances. Hires Andres (from the medico
escapade) to work for him. Has the opportunity (after 4 years) to help out this guy
he knew in jail, falls in love with the daughter. Agree to marry. Everyone is happy,
the amo is a good guy. Kids are born, grandparents die. Amo does something good
leaves all of his assets to P. P doesnt let that change his good self, he lives humbly
and helping those who helped him in the past, with wife and kids. On his deathbed
(in Mexico), he talks about his friend Lizardi, sons godfather, a man with faults but
who is aware of them, tanto noes hemos amado que puedo decir que soy uno
mismo con el Pensador y l conmigo.
Closes with the notas del Pensador openly in Lizardis voice. He tells us of
Periquillos funeral (died 1813). Poems are read. 3 years after the deal Pensador
asks for the notebooks where Periquillo wrote his life story. Closes La obrita tendra

muchos defectos, pero estos no quitaran el merito que en si tienen las maximas
morales que incluye, porque la verdad es verdad digala quien la diga y digala en el
estilo que quisiere.

CRITICISM
Vogeley, Lizardi and the Birth of the Novel in Spanish America. PQ7297 .F37 Z96
2001
Compton, Mexican Picaresque Narratives. PQ7207 .P53 C7 1997
Introduccin, edicin Ctedra (Carmen Ruiz Barrionuevo)
- ideologa de Lizardi esta marcada por el siglo XVIII y son claros sus nextos
con los ilustrados europeos, franceses y espaoles. (15)
- Hay que tener en cuenta que Fernandez de Lizardi fue antes que nada un
periodista, un divulgador convencido y comprometido que se vio obligado a
defender sus puntos de vista mediante otros medios de expresin, a utilizar
sus dotes narrativas en la novela, al fallarle sus instrumentos naturales: la
hoja periodica y el folleto. Pero su insistencia reiterada en la novela prueba
que advirti en seguida que este medio era incluso mas efectivo por su
capacidad de conviccin, para su labor reformadora (17)
- Su estilo, de excesiva llaneza sin duda, esta siempre alentado por la verdad
de la idea que abriga, y empapado en muchas ocasiones e una fina ironia. Su
labor era de moralista y educador, y el periodismo le servia para sus fines; lo
entenda como un valor social, de defensa del ciudadano frente al abuso de
los gobiernos; su misin era la de difundir ideas de libertad, pero tambin el
servir al lector como medio de instruccin. (22)
- JR Spell THe Theatre in New Spain in the Early Eighteenth Century Hispanic
Review 15 (1947): 137-164. The Theatre in Mexico City, 1805-1806
Hispanic Review 1 (1933): 55-61. Goic La novella hispanoamericana
colonial en Madrigal Historia de la Literatura Hispanoamericana I. Epoca
Colonial, Madrid, Catedra 1982: 369-406.
- la obra del mexicano se rnaiza en una tradicin picaresca que tiene en
cuenta para afirmarla o negarla, asi como se demuestra el conocimiento de la
obra de Cervantes tambin hay que contar con otras obras americanas en
las que se aprovechan motivos y elementos picarescos. (38) for example,
1636s El carnero, 1773s Lazarillo de ciegos caminantes.
- Salvador Bueno (1972) that the novel responds to una necesidad bsica de
los americanos: plantear el balance de la colonizacin espaola, enfrentar sus
dolencias, equivocaciones y quiebras, sopesar todo el cuerpo social de sus
pases para, de esa manera, afirmar la necesidad de la independencia. (401)
- el episodio mas curiosos, culminacin y resumen de su critica social, es el
del mundo utpico de la isla de Saucheof (cap. VI, VII y VIII del tomo IV).
Lizardi emprende su anlisis con la consideracin e los ejes fundamentales
que regian el mundo colonial contando con la ventaja de presentar una doble
perspectiva: la de un mexicano como Periquillo y la de un ciudadano oriental,
utilizando el contraste de perspectivas entre naturales y extranjeros, que

contaba con antecedentes varios en dilogos y obras de ficcin ene l siglo

precedente. Asi se pone de relieve que el tema de la nobleza heredada
resulta insolito en la isla de Saucheof, pues solo se adquiere con esfuerzo y
servicio personal (52)
Salomon, Noel. La critica del sistema colonial de la Nueva Espaa en El Periquillo
Sarniento.
-

JJ Fernandez de Lizardi bien puede ser considerado como un vocero de la

clase media que, en trminos generales, encuadr el movimiento de
Independencia. (168)
Aunque la critica lizardiana de la sociedad colonial puede parecer a veces
prudente y cauta (tal prudencia se explica claramente por el hecho de que el
autor tenia que contar con censuras y represin) y a pesar de que viene
formulada en el lenguaje utopista e idealista de los ilustrados formados por
el pensamiento filosfico del siglo XVIII, contribuyo objetivamente a la toma
de conciencia nacional del pueblo mexicano en un momento decisivo de su
historia. (169)
LA critica de la nobleza por Jj Fernandez de Lizardi no se presenta solo en
la forma de una reivindicacin de plena ciudadania para el pueblo
mexicano. Nuestro autor las emprende tambin con las races econmicas de
dicha clase al censurar mas particularmente a los terratenientes. Anunciando
con esto la campana de los liberales contra las formas de la propiedad feudal,
critica la institutcion que mantena y fortificaba la propiedad privilegiada: el
mayorazgo. (173)
Sobre un fondo de miseris los funcionarios malos, los terratenientes crueles,
los letrados corrompidos, los eclesisticos escandalosos, en una palabra toda
una fauna de privilegiados del sistema colonial, ostentan su lujo, su fanidad
e incapacidad. La sociedad asi desrita muestra los sntomas hsitoricos de un
fin cercano. (178)

Moraa, Mabel. El Periquillo sarniento y la ciudad letrada.

-

A travs de ellos se fundamenta el reconocimiento de la novela como

ejemplo de critica social en el Mexico de la pre-independencia, articulando las
estrategias discursivas del texto lizardiano al orden social que fuera
establecido con la ciudad barroca y puesto en crisis por el pensamiento
ilustrado. (113)
La valorizacin de la experiencia individual, reivindicada en la cultura
novohispana ya desde el Barroco, tiene en EL Periquillo sarniento un doble
sentido. Por un lado, produce al individuo como sujeto, es decir, lo promueve
desde el nivel empirico de sus alternativas personales hacia formas de
conciencia social que la novela concibe dentro de las formulas de un
nacionalismo integrador. En segundo lugar, la experiencia personal de Pedro
Sarmiento alegoriza el pasado histrico: Pedro es una figura paradigmtica;
su proceso de desventuras, cambios e integracin final metaforizan la
superacin de las formas de socializacin virreinal y la proyeccin hacia un
futuro de estabilizacin y productividad. (115)
A travs de la representacin de la totalidad institucional en la etapa final
del control imperial, el texto va planteando el problema central de los valores

comunitarios y de la regulacin colectiva como bases para la renovacin

social. (118)
A travs de sus protagonistas, que mas que remedar a los picaros
peninsulares representan sujetos y formas de conciencia social americanos,
los textos demuestran, por un lado, la posibilidad de la distancia critica con
respecto al poder, sobre todo en la medida en que ste se traduce en
autoridad y en practicas concretas de paticipacion social. Por otro lado,
apelan a la representacin de la marginalidad como dispositivo antihegemonico. (123)

Vogeley, Nancy. Defining the Colonial Reader: EL Periquillo Sarniento. PMLA

102:5 (1987): 784-800.
-

The Mexican version of the picaresque story, while retaining some of the
slapstick of some European forms, made a comic tradition serious. (785)
Notes that Islas Fray Gerundio enjoyed a large circulation in Mexico, as a
possible influence on Lizardi.
The reading public was diverse and difficult to write for style, for example
(Latinate vs. Mexican)
If it is true, as Azuela proclaims, that the colonial reader did not have the
refined taste of Azuelas model reader in the twentieth century and even
Lizardi acknowledged his readers ignorance it becomes critical to ask just
what this ignorance was and whether something in the colonial experience
fostered it. (788)
For Lizardi mastery of the written language meant overcoming an aspect of
colonial inferiority; it meant acquiring the body of knowledge behind the
erudite terms; and it also meant using language to help rather than harm
ones fellos. The critical skills that allow a reader to judge style, to perceive
falsity in language, were especially important in a society where a literate
minority bore the responsibility, as the Englightenment taught, for opening
up the lessons of a book culture to many uncivilized illiterates. (791)
A narrative as a life was not new in Nueva ESpana. Saints lives served as
a model for storytelling; thus in this Catholic society a life did not assume
the comic character an individuals perhaps eccentric history might have had
elsewhere. In addition, the Life of Diego de Torres y Villarroel with its
manifestly autobiographical story was widely known in the colony. (792)
Lizardis heavy reliance on the language of speech in the making of his
literary language results not only from his consciousness that peculiar
Mexican speech patterns underscore the Americanness of his picaresque tale
but also from his desire to enhance the visual experience of reading with
more familiar auditory resonances. (793)
Lizardi means to shatter his readers expectations that a literary work should
follow European models and have an elevated style removed from quotidian
concerns. (794)
Connects plain language and newspaper usage
El Periquillo Sarniento, which was meant to be read as a primer of how to
read, may have failed in its design to teach criticsm, to show literature
against itself, so as to subvert established norms. From suriving documents
pertaining to the novels initial reception, the literary historian learns that

Lizardis book offended many academic critics, probably among the colonys
elite. (795)
Spell, JR. The Historical and Social Background of El Periquillo Sarniento Hispanic
American Historical Review 36:4 (1956): 447-470.
-

work of propaganda (447)

Details the different places that Periquillo inhabits (complete with maps)

Pawlowski, John. Periquillo and Catrin: Comparison and Contrast. Hispania

58:4 (1975): 830-842.
-

Periquillo is a distinct Mexican type, pelado, with the catrn display

cowardice, ahve a strong aversin to manual labor, and consider the ideal
state that of vivir sin trabajar; both are mediocre students and reject prudent
advice, although their consciences occasionally pique them for making such
decisions; both are subjected to various forms of humiliation and physical
abuse, become beggars, and serve for a brief time as alccahuetes; both are
given to overindulgence in food and drink and die of the same illness,
hidropesa. (830-1)
Talks about the importance of the Colonel in Manila to Periquillos repentance
and reform.
Long digressions of one kind of another are only partially to blame for the
Periquillos size. Equally at fault is the careless style used in this novel; Lizardi
here is wordy, repetitious and has the habit of inserting superfluous asides
into otherwise clean, well-written paragraphs. (839)

Bentez-Rojo, Antonio and Griswold, Susan. Jos Joaqun Fernndez de Lizardi and
the Emergence of the Spanish American Novel as National Project. The places of
history; regionalism revisited in Latin America (1999): 199-213
- With this lack of consensus in mind, I have decided to follow the majority
opinion and consider El periquillo sarniento the first Spanish American novel,
properly speaking. I think, however, that although earlier works manifest
uneven levels of Spanish Americanness and of narrativity, which may render
then inadequate as Spanish American novels, a mere inventory of them
suffices to suggest a significant body of more or less narrativized texts that
ought not be ignored. (201)
- Insofar as the Americas are concerned, the publication of El periquillo
sarniento marks the complex of conditions that preceded the first Spanish
American novels and short stories: a narrative tradition that focused on the
singularities of the New World; the introduction of the printing press; the
founding of educational and cultural institutions; the exercise of letters; the
focmation of the habit of reading among the middle and upper classes; the
impact of Englightenment ideas on colonial society; the development of a
criollo consciousness; the practice of a nationalist journalism; the elimination
of restrictions on the printing of works of fiction in the Spanish colonies; and
finally, although of no less importance, profound institutional crisis. (202)
- the illusion of accompanying Periquillo along the roads and through the
villages and towns of the viceroyalty helped awaken in the novels readers
the desire for nationness. (209)

Franco, Jean. La heterogeneidad peligrosa: EScritura y control social en visperas de

la independencia Mexicana. Hispamrica 12:34-5 (1983): 3-34.
- cuando Lizardi defiende el uso que hace en El Periquillo Sarniento del
lenguaje cotidiano ataca al oscuratismo que exclua a los autodidactas de
todo poder durante el periodo colonial, a la vez que introduce una serie de
normas que tildaban de anormales a los dialectos, a las lenguas indgenas, a
los solecismos y a todo discurso ambiguo (especialmente los juegos de
palabras), tanto en la escritura como en el habla. (8)
- Era el primer escritor latinoamericano en confesar que lo que le estimulaba
no era el deseo de la inmortalidad, sino el dinero. (15)
- Es probable que Lizardi escogiera la novela en parte porque buscaba una
forma mas efectiva que la exhortacin directa para la reforma de las
costumbres. La picaresca autobiografa, suyo modelo era la autobiografa el
satirista Diego Torres Billarroel, no solamente gozaba de gran popularidad en
Mexico, sino que abarcaba todos los subgneros racionales: el dialogo, el
proyecto, el sermn, la alegora, las fabulas utpicas y la satira. Al mismo
tiempo se prestaba a la interrupcin constante y a las digresiones
moralizantes. (18)
- Hay que recordar que Lizardi escribia en un momento de gran incertidumbre
en cuanto a la integracin de los indgenas y de las castas en la sociedad. El
temor a una revolucin de las castas subverta la nocion de la igualdad. Por
esta misma razn, Lizardi no poda proponer la igualdad de todas las razas
sin proponer al mismo tiempo mtodos de control y disciplina de la poblacin.
Y como la disciplina impuesta por la iglesia ya era anacrnica, no nos
sorprende el nfasis en el trabajo como disciplina, tica y mtodo practico
para asegurar la productividad de la sociedad. La igualdad jurdica y poltica
de la poblacin de Mexico no resolvia, naturalmente, las diferencias de clase
y de sexo. (20)
- Para Lizardi, la Utopia tenia que servir de modelo para el control social dada
la necesidad de mantener la disciplina entre las clases bajas. (30)
- la Utopia le permite a Lizardi abordar problemas para los cuales todava no
haba solucin social, y proponer reformas como la substitucin del ejercito
por una milicia ciudadana, todava irrealizables en el ambiente de la colonia.
(30)