Centenary Paper: Portraying la picaresca from the Fall of Franco (1975) to 2020: An Archival Approach

This succinct yet stimulating commentary provides an overview of the utilization of the term ‘picaresca’ in articles in a range of popular Spanish newspapers ( El País, ABC , La Vanguardia ) through the years stemming from the death of Spain’s dictatorship until the Covid-19 pandemic, providing an array of perspectives regarding the significance of ‘picaresca’ and the broader sinuosities it has lent itself to over time. Such an exploration reinforces how a lexical shift can occur to even the most quintessential of terms, and begs new and relevant questions of ‘la picaresca’ by viewing it through a temporal lens.