The Ends of the Road: Rethinking the Borders of the Picaresque (ACLA 2025)

Organizer: Emily Mulvihill

The picaresque has largely fallen out of vogue in literary studies. Nevertheless, the genre has long shaped the study of many of the world’s major literary traditions. So, what happens if we rethink both our use of the picaresque within literary study and what might count as picaresque?


This panel proposes three broad categories for exploring the borders and limits of the genre. These categories are geographic, thematic, and temporal.


We might begin with an examination of underrepresented geographies of literary study. What do postcolonial, decolonial, transnational, or other theoretical frameworks add to our discussion of the genre? What are examples of East Asian, Caribbean, or Pacific forms of the genre? Additionally, what happens when we focus on the under-studied spaces within more traditional iterations of the genre?


What new topics or themes might re-animate conversation of this genre? What if we rethink notions of travel in the genre? While the picaresque is largely defined by travel, even in classic narratives like José Joaquín Fernández de Lizardi’s The Mangy Parrot, the pícaro protagonist spends time in prison and other carceral spaces. How might expanding the idea of non-movement (or other unconventional topics) in the picaresque allow for a broader discussion of underrepresented literatures?


Lastly, how do newer iterations of the genre reshape our thinking about it? For example, could a television show with the premise of a college dropout masquerading as a Harvard-trained lawyer, as in the legal drama Suits be an example of a contemporary picaresque? Or, if Huckleberry Finn has traditionally been read as picaresque, is Percival Everett’s retelling in James picaresque as well?


This seminar is not interested in classifying a new set of narratives under the category “picaresque.” It is, however, interested in exploring the limits of the genre and what those limits say about the function and literary production of the picaresque. Projects that examine the narrative and theoretical “ends” of the picaresque from any tradition or period are welcome.


Some additional questions that might guide this conversation are:


What does a comparative approach do for the study of this genre?


How do contemporary picaresque texts write or rewrite the genre?


How do terms that seem antithetical to the genre (such as stillness) inform these texts?


What do the narrative endings of these texts say about the genre as a whole?


What do the limits or borders of this genre say about the genre’s history, function, or possibilities?