Picaresque traditions in novels by Tobias Smollett

Miguel de Cervantes, Alain-René Lesage and Henry Fielding. These are the most important authors whose picaresque novels were explicitly and implicitly referenced by Scottish author Tobias Smollett. Nevertheless, the style of his novels of roguery is unique. In searching for intertextual references, we get to know a writer who addressed the political and social situation in 18th-century Britain in his novels, worked as a translator and had to face the critical voices of his contemporaries. The result is a detailed comparative study of the different approaches to established predecessor novels and the individual writing style of Scottish author Tobias Smollett.