Collected 18th Century Literature: Book Review
I'll say this about 18th century literature- not a lot of new material in that category. You might get a new Oxford Classics edition every decade or so for one or more of these titles, but the 18th century is too far back to play the "forgotten classic"- if people don't remember it already, they ain't gonna.
Not this Tom Jones
PORTRAIT OF HENRY FIELDING
Published 9/24/08
The History of Tom Jones
A Foundling by Henry Fielding
originally published 1749
It's been said that Tom Jones could be considered the first novel. I've read the same thing about Moll Flanders, so I don't take such statements very seriously- but the fact is, Tom Jones is one of the first novels. More like two novels- at 7 to 9 hundred pages long, Jones is an epic slog through English society circa 1750.
Whenever you read 18th century literature you need to ask yourself, "Is there some narrative form that this copies of which I am presently unaware?" In the case of Tom Jones, the answer is, "Yes." and that form is Picaresque. The basic idea of picaresque as applied to the novel is "Hero walks around and sees different types of people." Picaresque maintains a fascination with the grotesque and the odd ball- think of Hunter Thompson's characterizations of Vegas Tourists in "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas" for a modern analogue.
People often conflate the 18th century with the later Victorian period, but I can assure you that the 18th century was a far bawdier place. Indeed, the early novels: this one, Moll Flanders- Joseph Andrews, all share ribald plot points- both Flanders and Jones have plot points involving explicit allegations of parent/child incest. In Jones, the entire plot revolves around his desire to marry Sophia. That doesn't stop him from banging multiple chicks along the way.
The length of the novel means that Fielding has ample opportunity for human observation, dialect and moral teachings. You simply can't read 18th century British literature without discussing the morality issues. Although it is presently regarded highly for it's historical value, a debate over the artisitic merit is long standing:
Few novels, indeed, have aroused such stark and abiding evaluative disagreements as 'Tom Jones'. From the first, what some readers hailed as a refreshingly broad-spirited tolerance was denounced by others, like Richardson, as moral coarseness and special pleading. Coleridge's admiration for the book's plot (shared by Smollett and Thackeray) as one of the three most perfect in literature ... was the reverse of Dr Johnson's or Frank Kermode's dismissal of it as clockwork. The chatty asides and prefatory discourses which charmed Empson were so disliked by Somerset Maugham that his own edition of 'Tom Jones' simply left the latter out.
(DOREEN ROBERTS, INTRODUCTION TO WORDSWORTH CLASSIC EDITION)
I def. like the "lack of fussiness" that Jones brings to his description. I do agree with Maugham's decision to omit the chatty "prefatory discourses"- I almost never understood what he was talking about.
I very much noticed Fielding's classical education at work. This is a time period when culture fields were establishing new archetypes, independent of Roman/Greece and Renaissance examples but Tom Jones is attached to those traditions more thoroughly then Robinson Crusoe, which exists largely outside of classical reference points and allusions.
Ultimately, the development of the novel as a literary form is all about plot development, and it is for the excellent development here that Jones secures his place in the canon. In the words of Roberts, again:
the main unity-promoting device is the use nearly of all the secondary characters to advance an ethos and illustrate a scheme of moral taxonomy. Fielding's moral vision operates for example between the moral polarities of appearance and reality, action (what one sees) and motive (what one deduces), reasoned principle and instinct, prudence and impulsiveness, and suspicion and trust.
It's the link between the morality lessons and plot points that make a modern novel.
This is one of those books that people should take some time to read solely for it's historical significance, since it truly is a touchstone in the development of the novel as a distinct literary form. Released in 1740, it created a tidal wave of what we would now characterize as "media attention" and "popularity." Pamela was the right book at the right time and this confluence of time/place/text adds importance to the book itself.
The author, Samuel Richardson, was a commoner, without the aristocratic background of his rival, Henry Fielding or contemporary Tobias Smolett:
UNLIKE his great contemporary and rival, Henry
Fielding, Samuel Richardson could boast of no connection, however remote, with an aristocratichouse. He himself has informed us that he came
of a family " of middling note," in the county of Surrey, from which we may conjecture that his ancestors were small landed gentry or respectable yeomen.
(Samuel Richardson
By Clara Linklater Thomson)
Thomson's biography mentions that in the 1740's, people were still a tad fuzzy on the concept of a fictional story, "Richardson was at once overwhelmed with letters from eager readers who longed to know
whether the story was true." (Thomson, Samuel Richardson) It is against this back drop that you need to consider the development of the english novel as a real step forward in terms of the cultural sophistication of the readers. You can literally see the human mind moving away from the simplicity of the middle ages (and its literary forms.)
I think it's fair to say that the contribution of Pamela, in a nut shell, is the depth of psychological complexity of the characters. That is what the novel is all about: adding psychological depth to the depiction of character.
And so it is that the reader finds himself/herself relating to these characters, written three hundred plus years ago. Pamela tells the story of Pamela Edwards, a serving girl of 16. Her mistress dies and his son takes over the estate. The son has a thing for Pamela, so after she rejects a couple clumsy advances, he does what any 18th century nobleman would do: Has her kidnapped and imprisoned at his remote estate.
Now, anyone reading the above will understand that the activities depicted aren't in any way contemporary, but the depiction of character is. What we are witnessing in Pamela is the birth of literary consciousness of self and identity. It's interesting to read about but at the same time at 500 pages Pamela turns into a slog at time. You can see where it is an EARLY version of the novel as literary form- sine there is a resolution/climax half way through the book, followed by 200 pages of material that would no doubt not reach print these days.
I don't know if you saw the movie "Quills" starring Geoffrey Rush. That movie is a good example of how Hollywood misunderstands the appeal of classic literature. Hollywood movies, especially the "classy"/"art house" films, would rather dress people up in period costume and have them flounce about. That misses the point- these were popular entertainments in their day (I'm talking about 18th century classics), in fact, almost every single "classic" of 18th century British, French or German literature was a "hit" with what they would call the young adult demographic. In fact, 18th and 19th century literature commonly wrote books ABOUT the people who were reading novels (Northanger Abbey for one, Man of Sentiment for two.) It's a level of self-awareness that the 18th century doesn't commonly get credit for, and it's a fact that should give any post-modern loving 21st century undergraduate a distinct pause.
This is an argument in defense of the relevance of 18th century literature. I would argue that the techniques pioneered largely by British novelists in the 18th century are still applicable to today's audience for works of popular culture. Likewise, the postures first adopted by critics of industrial capitalism in the 18th century (Romanticism, etc.) continue to bear cultural fruit.
This point is especially clear while reading the Marquis de Sade's seminal work of torture porn, 120 Days of Sodom. 120 Days of Sodom is "about" four Libertines who wall themselves inside a remote Chateau in rural France and basically go sex crazy for four months. The main characters espouse enough pseudo-enlightenment justifications of their behavior to qualify this as a satire but it's really the combination of graphic sex and violence that steals the show. Combining sex and violence isn't something that Hollywood created in the 1950s- it goes way, way, way back. In his own inestimable way, De Sade is linking the fascination with sex, violence and depravity with the rise of 18th century "pure reason." By rejecting the one true god we are inexorably led into the depths of hellish debauchery,
The narrative structure of this book is basically a coat hanger to link graphic descriptions of sex, violence, and sexual violence. 120 Days of Sodom is not for the faint of heart- it makes almost 100% of contemporary pornography look like a Disney movie by comparison. Literally fifty pages are devoted to the fetish of poop eating. Yikes.
Book Review
Evelina (1778)
by Frances Burney
Evelina (Wikipedia)
Evelina (Google Books)
Evelina (Amazon)
Evelina was the first novel by 18th century British novelist, Frances Burney. Evelina was her first novel, initially published in 1778 when she was 26. I imagine Burney the author as an 18th century equivalent of a pop star. You can’t write about Evelina without commenting on what a success the book was. The mere fact of Evelina’s endurance, in print, for over 200 years speaks to that success. The more 18th century literature I read, the more I find myself drawn to the marketplace for that literature. I wonder whether, ultimately, there is anything particularly interesting about 18th century novels other then their relationship with the readers.
Burney is most well known to contemporary readers as a direct, immediate influence on the work of Jane Austen. I don’t think it’s an exaggeration to call Jane Austen the most successful novelist of all time. Does anyone else come close?
However, Burney was the one of the first woman to score a hit number one novel. And she did it at 26. Eliza Haywood preceded her, but Haywood hasn’t endured in the same way. That is a significant feminist achievement. It happened long before western attitudes towards gender equality softened. Prior to Burney, plenty of novels had been written ABOUT young women, but none had been written BY them. An easy example is Clarissa-era Samuel Richardson. Burney was influenced by Richardson, but she wrote with a distinctly feminine point of view, and I think it was this distinct authorial voice that let to her success in the literary marketplace of London in the late 18th century.
Evelina tells the story of the young girl raised in the country who comes to London to be introduced to society (and find a husband, of course.) Evelina is the unacknowledged daughter of a wealthy lord, a fact which plays a small part in the plot until it takes center stage in the last act. Evelina experiences trial and tribulations in London society before settling down in a last chapter double wedding. Is there any more satisfying ending to an 18th century novel (or Elizabethan drama) then a double wedding? You can resolve any plot by staging a double wedding at the end of the story.
Burney’s writing doesn’t go particularly deep, but her description of the social environments of 18th century London were very much front and center. Her narration of social space is something that I think carries through right on through to today. For example, I would hypothesize that the primary market for the initial edition were young, middle class/upper class women living both inside and outside London. Perhaps a small portion were familiar with the environments of the pleasure gardens and “assemblies” of the fashionable set in late 18th century London, but I would wager most were not. They were readers who wanted to know more about these places.
Burney was the daughter of a man who was known as a “musicologist” although when you read about him he sounds like an early forerunner of a Hollywood producer type. Burney grew up in these environments observing from the perspective of a person who was paid to perform at and design these environments for consumption. The extent to which Burney is able to successfully describe the complex bustle of an 18th century London pleasure garden from the perspective of a young woman was a key to her success. While Evelina resembles a fore-runner of a Jane Austen marriage conflict book, Burney herself did not content herself to stop with a single plot. Her later works Cecilia and Camila more resemble the work of Charles Dickens, with Burney focusing closely on class relationship and the effect of the market economy on human relationships.
The market success of the young woman perspective has, in the past, been meditated by layers of male control. Burney, for example, followed up Evelina with a play that was to be her career achievement. However, her father, who worked in theater, flatly told her that such a thing would be impossible and the play was never staged. Burney wrote a novel so she could write a play, but she was forbidden from writing a play by her father because she was a woman. Think about that for a moment.
Published 2/11
The Pleasures of the Imagination:
English Culture in the 18th Century
by John Brewer
p. 1997
Farar Straus Giroux
It's simply a fact that English Culture in the 18th century created our modern ideas about Art and Artists. The 18th century is the time in which the idea of "high art" developed, the time when the modern traditions of literature, art and theater were established, and, most importantly, the time in which wide swathes of people in England gained the time and money to indulgence their fondness for "leisure."
Recognizing the 18th century as an important time in the development of modern art is one thing, understanding the role it actually played is quite another. Critical perspectives on the 18th century are often shaped by later developments distorting the vision of the critic- most especially the Romantic inspired cult of Artist as genius, and 19th century Marxism. Brewer's The Pleasures of the Imagination serves as a stern, contemporary refutation of many mushy headed ideas about the development of Art in Modern society.
Brewer's method is to survey 18th century developments in the Arts, in England and tie them to pre-existing and developing institutions in order to demonstrate what came before the explosion in Artistic activity during the 18th century. The main sections of Pleasures deal with the rise of the novel, the development of 18th century painting, and the arts of "public performance": theater, opera and concert music. After his survey of artisitic development in the 18th century, Brewer turns to the relationship between the center and it's periphery (London and the other area of England) in order to show the way in which "city culture" developed outside of the city.
Perhaps the theme from Pleasures that would be most astonishing to readers of this blog (or perhaps not astonishing at all) is the manner in which, in all art forms, the AUDIENCE preceded the ARTIST. Take the novel- a 18th century English invention if ever there was one. Literature existed in 17th century England, but the novel did not. What happened? Well, at the end of the 17th century in London, there were people who made their living printing and selling books- let's call them "booksellers"- there were also people who made their living writing- let's call them "hacks." During the first part of the 18th century, there was explosive growth in the population of London itself, and a corresponding rise in demand for printed matter: sermons, almanacs, information about public affairs, poetry.
The early novel writers were ALREADY involved in the world of literature. For example, Brewers uses Samuel Richardson, who might well, along with Daniel DeFoe might be considered the "inventor" of the novel. Richardson was a succesful printer, who wrote his first novel at the age of 50. The result, Pamela, was a work that Richardson knew there was an audience for- he knew because he made books for them. Likewise, DeFoe was what you would call a "hack" and his early novel's were sensational in the vein of the criminal biographies and adventure narratives that people were already buying.
Thus the novel, at it's very inception, was perceived as something that people should want to buy, and the audience for the novel already existed- they were just buying other forms of literature. Once the value in the novel as a new form of literature was perceived by writers, they wasted no time establishing a secondary body of literature that we call "criticism." Most of this criticism happened among writers themselves, with an uneasy and unclear relationship to the larger, buying, "public." This pattern of development- happening early in the 18th century- was to occur again and again through the 18th, 19th and 20th century.
Certainly, painting offers an even broader, more distinct example of Audience preceding Artist. At the beginning of the 18th century, painting was something that, for Englishmen, happened in Italy, two hundred years ago. Contemporary English painters were of little regard, and they were certainly not the peoe ple who decided what painting was worthwhile. This task- the task of discrimination and of what we call "taste" was the province of the "connessiour" and later, the "collector." Beginning in the 18th century, more and more wealthy English gentleman (and fewer ladies) took the Grand Tour, where they travelled to Italy with the express purpose of cultivating their artistic tastes.
They returned to England, and acting like the powerful players in Society they actually were, went about disseminating their views about Painting in private and in public. This took the form of clubs, journals and partnerships with the government to share their taste with the population. All of this activity only gradually let to domestic painting being recognized as "worthy" on a level with the Renaissance masters, and even by the end of the 18th century, it was a battle that was far from over. 18th century painting is an example of an at times artist-less Audience and it provides a neat counter example to the more common pattern of working artists developing a new artisitc genre for an existing Audience.
Finally, Brewer comes to the "performing" arts- Theater, Opera and Concert Music. Here, the argument of Audience preceding Artist is easy to make, simply based on the manner in which these forms were slaves to Audience opinion (even, when in the case of Opera, the audience was an audience of one: The King of England.) Indeed, the great successes of 18th century theater and concert music were men (Garrick and Handel) who created works of art that had huge secondary associations among the wider population. Garrick was the man who created the "cult" of Shakespeare, Handel the man who created the music for 18th century church going Britons.
In all areas, the idea of the detached Aritst, living apart from society in some sort of self-imposed isolation is showng to be a false ideas propogated by romantic theorists of the 18th and 19th century. False then, false now- without the Audience, Artists don't exist.
Book Review: The Female Quixote by Charlotte Lennox (5/10/10)
The Female Quixote
by Charlotte Lennox
originally published 1752
this edition Pandora Press 1986
The fact to note about this book is the date it was originally published: 1752. That's early. More then fifty years before Jane Austen picked up a pen, Charlotte Lennox wrote "The Female Quixote or the Adventures of Arabella." Like Don Quixote, Arabella is a main character who believes everything she reads. Raised in isolation by her widower father, Arabella has learned the plots of medieval romances by heart, and paired that with complete ignorance about the "modern" world (1750s).
Let me ensure you, laborious hi-jinks ensue. As I've commented before here on numerous occasions, the most surprising fact about the history of the novel is how the novel was basically "post modern" in the very beginning- as early as Don Quixote. Don Quixote, the story of a man who was too wrapped up in chivalric tales for his own good, invented the novel by inventing the reader of the novel.
The formula of Don Quixote tilting at the windmills is a formula that reveals the strength of the novel itself. Writing about a protagonist obsessed with reading books is like writing about the reader him or herself, who is also, hopefully, obsessed by books. Thus the self referential (or "post modern") self aware domain of what we commonly assume to be the 20th and 21st century thought is pushed back in time, among certain populations, to the 1700s.
How humbling for those who make a living peddling ironic rebuttals of popular culture products in the present day, to realize that they are traversing in modes of thought that would have been familiar, and probably derided, to writers in the 1700s. Novels are unique among artistic products in their overt dialog with the audience. Symphonies, poetry and paintings to not talk back to the audience. Thus, by reading a novel you can tell more about the corresponding audience then by reading poetry or listening to music from the same era.
Rob Roy? Rob Roy! (3/26/11)
Rob Roy
by Sir Walter Scott
p. 1817
Oxford World's Classics Edition
p. 2008
Introduction and Notes by Ian Duncan
A couple years ago I started reading through the books listed in 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die. It's a cheesy project, made more cheesy by the fact that the title of the book is wantonly deceptive: "1001 Books" should say "1001 Novels" since the Novel is the only type of book recommended. My biggest problem is maintaining a steady supply of books to read, and my thought was that this would be "crap insurance" i.e. prevent me from descending into a pathetic diet of genre fiction. It was rewarding when I was reading through the 18th century: the novel was just rounding into shape, and the English language was non-standardized to the point where each book was a different linguistic adventure.
However, at about this time last year I paused on the threshold of the 19th century- in front of me lay the more familiar terrain of Austen and the Bronte sisters, and I was far from eager to dive into this terra cognita. A couple months ago, I made a feint towards forward progress by reading Peter Ackroyd's excellent and epic Charles Dickens biography, but it wasn't until I was reading about narrative themes in 19th century popular song that I decided on the first book I would read from the 19th century list: Sir Walter Scott's Rob Roy.
First of all, Rob Roy was a hit- "The first edition, published on 31 December 1817, sold out it's huge print run of 10,000 copies within two weeks; two more editions were printed by the end of 1818." Second of all, Rob Roy started a fashion for the Scottish highlands that moved outside of the world of the novel and square into "popular culture" inspiring songs, plays and tourism. So I thought it would be interesting if I could read Rob Roy and understand the "why" of Rob Roy being such a huge hit.
And I'm reporting back: It's quite clear, after reading Rob Roy, why it was a hit. First of all, in the 15 plus years since the end of the 18th century, the English language became standardized to the point where non dialect speaking characters are easily comprehensible. Second of all, Scott draws upon already popular themes- the earlier parts of Rob Roy read like an outtake from an 18th century Gothic novel. Third, Roy is developing a newer novelistic genre- the historical novel, that was a la mode at the time of publication.
Reading Rob Roy was almost- almost- like reading a well written genre novel today: the characters did expected things in unexpected ways, and the scenery along the way was beautiful. Again and again I asked myself why this would be considered a "classic" rather then an 1817 version of "popular fiction" and for that, I have no answer. I am baffled by the discourse of Literature as practiced in the American academy. What a pointless, useless, waste of time, money, energy and human intelligence. Does one really need to read a book on uses of Gothic themes in Austen and Scott when those themes are perfectly clear in the source books themselves?
It's clear to me that the 19th century presents familiar terrain to the modern reader- this makes it a less interesting exploration for me, but truth be told I can't wait to dig into Ivanhoe next month.
Book Review: Melmoth the Wanderer & The Death of Gothic Lit (3/31/11)
BOOK REVIEW
Melmoth the Wanderer
by Charles Maturin
Oxford's World's Classics Edition
1998 edition
Edited with Notes by Douglas Grant
With an Introduction by Chris Baldick
The fact to understand going in to Melmoth the Wanderer is that it is the "last" of the classic literature Gothic novels. Published in 1820, Melmoth appeared against a back drop where,
"Gothic fiction had flourished in England since the early 1790s led by Ann Radcliffe and Matthew 'Monk' Lewis after the model had been established by Horace Walpole in the The Castle of Otranto (1764), but by the time Melmoth was written, the genre could be seen to be declining in impact.... Part of Maturin's achievement in Melmoth the Wanderer was to breath some belated vitality into what seemed an exhausted convention."
In other words, he revived an uncool style of novel. The way I read it, Melmoth was the Marilyn Manson to Matt Lewis's Alice Cooper: A situation where the later Artist was inspired by the former and sought to "out do" the earlier Artists in a way that would draw the attention of audiences.
Unlike many of the other 19th century authors who "made it" into the Canon- Sir Walter Scott and Charles Dickens to name a couple- Maturin was a financial failure and not all of his books were "hits." Contrast this to the situation that Walter Scott faced: ALL OF HIS BOOKS WERE HITS. Some explanation for this can be found in their relative positions within the relevant intellectual groups: Scott was right in the middle of a centrally located group and Maturin was an obscure church official in Ireland.
To the modern reader, Maturin is ahead of his time in terms of the poetics of terror fiction, but the clunky narrative format: A story, within a story, within a story bracketed by a ten page wrap up (this is a 450 page book, mind you.); leaves the modern reader cold. The modern reader is left with plenty of time to look at the proverbial wall paper and furnishings of an ornately decorated but empty room.
I'm not trying to obscure the essentially psychological appeal that Gothic fiction had to readers in the 19th century, "Gothic fiction's distinctive animating principle is a psychological interest in states of trepidation, dread, panic, revulsion, claustrophobia and paranoia." Melmoth really f***** nails it.
The most off-putting /interesting aspect of Melmoth to the modern reader is the narrative structure of the novel. It is..confused- with multiple layers of stories and story tellers linking Melmoth the Wanderer to Melmoth the contemporary narrator(his descendant). It's interesting to see how often that experimentation with form in 19th century literature prefigure many of the debates contained in "post modern" discourses about literature. Melmoth the Wanderer is clearly a Faustian inspired demon visitor trying to obtain souls in a hugely talky, nineteenth century way- there are literally a hundred pages of Melmoth lecturing someone or another about the evils of modern life in language reminiscent of French philosphes and German romantics.
For me, the take away was the million and one ways Maturin comes up with to describe a character being scared of something. The characters often reminded me of Shaggy and Scooby-Doo in the old Hanna- Barbera cartoons where Shaggy yells "Zoinks." and they run away. Indeed, many of the narrative conventions in Scooby-Do seem to be a faint echo of the well established conventions of Gothic Literature.
It goes without saying that the Gothic is still with us. I think it should also go without saying that is you are an Artist seeking to communicate with a Gothic loving audience, you'd best be aware of ALL of the "circles of resonance" that can connect a specific Artwork to an audience concerned with that style. That means going back to the BEGINNING and familiarizing yourself with EVERYTHING that proceeded your Artwork so that you have an explicit understanding of the implicit understandings of a particular Audience (Goths, for example.) The role of the artist is NOT to make the implicit understandings explicit among the Audience, but rather to evoke those understanding to maximum effect using their superior education and training.
BOOK REVIEW: A Sentimental Journey and Other Writings by Laurence Sterne (4/23/11)
A Sentimental Journey and Other Writings
by Laurence Sterne
Oxford World's Classic Edition
p. 2003
Sterne is best known for his Rabelaisian tour-de-force Tristam Shandy, a novel which I had the "pleasure" to struggle through for the best part of a year back in 2008. Shandy is a sprawling, discursive comic masterpiece which has more in common with novels of the 20th century then those which followed it in the 19th. But Sterne also wrote another, minor, classic, A Sentimental Journey. First published in 1768, six months before the author's death, A Sentimental Journey was one of the first "novels of sentiment and sensibility" a genre which rose and fell by the turn of the 19th century, but one which would have a decisive impact on the Brontean/Austen wave of fiction which would define the 19th century.
Sterne's A Sentimental Journey was published three years before Henry MacKenzie's The Man of Feeling. Man of Feeling was in instant hit, selling out within two months and being reprinted six time in the following decade. Both novels echo the on-going debate in 18th century about the impact of modernity on the nature of man. As G.J. Barker-Benfield persuasively argued in his book, The Culture of Sensibility, "popular novels written by men in the 1760s and 1770s were preoccupied with the meanings of sensibility for manhood...and the ambiguity we now tend to read into the novels of Laurence Stern or Mackenzie reflects this contemporary ambivalence."
Regardless of how one interprets the underlying debate OR the role of the "novels of sentiment" in the 18th century, it's clear that these tales had an audience. Of course, in light of the rise of female novelists in the 19th century, I am left wondering who was buying all the copies of MacKenzie's The Man of Feeling. Was it men, interested in getting a fix on their identity in a rapidly changing world? Or was it largely women, interested in men who were depicted behaving in a traditionally "feminine" manner?
Sterne's Sentimental Journey is a clear way-station on the way to MacKenzie's mincing, sobbing Man of Feeling. Unlike MacKenzie, Sterne is a comic genius, and his book is filled with episodes of satire and wit that are sorely missing in Man of Feeling. There is also an element of bawdiness in A Sentimental Journey that is so clearly an element of Sterne's Rabelaisian style- something lacking in MacKenzie, let alone the oft humorless novels of sentiment that were published after the turn of the century. Blame the Victorians, or don't, it matters little.
However it's clear to me that the "Sentimental Man" was a cultural trend with all the complexity and force of later trends like Rock and roll, and it's interesting because it was one of the FIRST such modern trends whose influence was reflected in a contemporary art form that was ITSELF just rounding into form (the novel.) For that reason it's worth thinking about, because by learning about people then, we can learn about ourselves now.
In conclusion I'd just like to note that like the last classic novel I read (Castle Rackrent), A Sentimental Journey clocks in at around one hundred pages- so be warned- not a great value in that regard.
The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner (book review) (6/2/11)
The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner
Gargantua and Pantagruel by Francois Rabelais (7/5/11)
Gargantua and Pantagruel:
The five books
by Francois Rabelais
translation by Jacques Le Clerq
One of the foundational principles of this blog is that you can compare different types of work of art: paintings can be compared to novels can be compared to symphonies. All works of Art have an Artist and an Audience. Some art forms have a longer history then others, especially where the attribution of specific works of art to specific artists is concerned.
A benefit to looking at an art form with a longer history is simply that you have more examples of Artists, works of art and the reception of art by Audiences. For me, the early history of the novel fascinates because the history goes back so looonngggg. Take Gargantua and Pantagruel, originally published in the 16th century by Francois Rabelais. Generally considered to be a forerunner of the Novel, Gargantua and Pantagruel is actually a five volume series about the father and son pair of giants: Gargantua is the father and Pantagruel is the son.
Confusingly, the first volume Rabelais wrote is actually sequenced second in most modern editions. The second volume written, the story of the father Giant, Gargantua is presented as the first volume. It's somewhat analogous to the way the Star Wars movies were made. The first and second volume were received with much acclaim and approbation- this being the 16th century, Rabelais was accused of heresy, had to flee France in fear for his life.
Each volume is about 150 pages long, but the first two volumes are clearly superior to the last three. Only the first two volumes: Pantagruel and Gargantua really, really stand the test of time. The third volume is basically a philosophical discourse a la Plato about the merits of marriage, and volumes four and five are a loose parody/homage to Homer's Odyssey.
What's most surprising about Rabelais is simply how DIRTY the jokes are. Rabelais def. puts Sade in context. All five volumes contain enough shit jokes and sex references to make an 80s era Andrew Dice Clay blush in shame.
Unfortunately for Rabelais' contemporary prospects as a popular, widely read author, the 16th century rears its hard-to-understand in page after page of references to scholastic method, ancient authority, latin metaphors and paragraphs of lists, lists, lists. And although the entire five volumes runs something like 750 pages in length, a modern reader can get the drift by reading the second/first volume: Gargantua. It's in this volume that you get the best bawdiness, the best satire of scholastic teaching methods, and a story line that most resembles the modern novel (specifically, something like Gulliver's Travels.)
CULTURE & SOCIETY 1780-1950 BY RAYMOND WILLIAMS (7/20/11)
BOOK REVIEW
CULTURE & SOCIETY: 1780-1950
by Raymond Williams
Columbia University Press
p. 1958
I bought this book off Amazon.com almost one year ago to the day. I paid 25 bucks for this book, and it came in terrible condition- it is literally falling apart on my desk. I've been actively trying to finish Culture & Society for at least six months- like actively trying to read it- but it is just so boring and turgid. However, Williams also has profound things to say about artists and artistic criticism.
I would have to say that this is the single most profound book I've read in the area of Literary/Artistic Criticism slash aesthetics. Williams is generally labelled a "Marxist" in the U.S., but if so he's a cultural Marxist. Culture and Society was published in 1958 to considerable acclaim. In it, Williams traces the history of the concept of "culture" in English artistic and literary criticism. The table of Contents for Culture and Society is like a road-map for understanding the subject in its entirety:
NINETEENTH CENTURY TRADITION
2. The Romantic Artist
4. Thomas Carlyle
6. J.H. Newman and Matthew Arnold
7. Art and Society: A.W. Pugin, John Ruskin, William Morris
TWENTIETH CENTURY TRADITION
1. D.H. Lawrence
2. R.H. Tawney
3. T.S. Eliot
4. Two Literary Critics: I.A. Richard, F.R. Leavis
5. Marxism and Culture
6. George Orwell
Conclusion
Do you know what that list is? That is the exact recipe of influence for contemporary hipsters whether they are actually aware of it OR NOT. In fact, I would go so far as to say that most contemporary Indie Artists, of whatever genre/discipline, don't know the difference between Thomas Carlyle and Matthew Arnold, but the beauty of Williams argument in Culture & Society is that this DOESN'T MATTER. Culture does not require "active" appreciation to be "good." Culture is what people like, there can be no question of elevating the taste of a "literate minority" above the tastes of the "masses."
In fact, critiques which postulate, "The concept of a cultivated minority, set over against a 'decreated' mass... lead to... damaging arrogance and skepticism." (italics added.) Further: "The concept of a wholly organic and satisfying past to be set against a disintegrated and dissatisfying present, tends in its neglect of history to a denial of real social experience."
Both of these concepts: the "cultivated minority" and the "wholly organic and satisfying past" are ENDEMIC to the mind set of contemporary Artists who are striving/struggling to bridge the gap from AMATEUR (poor & unsuccessful) to PROFESSIONAL. That most of them are ignorant of the terms themselves and their genesis speaks more to individual under education then the irrelevance of the concepts themselves. Kind of like the rules of physics, you don't have to be conscious of how they work to have them effect your life.
FRANCES BURNEY HAD HITS FOR DAYS (1/17/12)
BOOK REVIEW
Camilla
by Frances Burney
Oxford's World Classics Edition p. 2009
Originally Published 1796
Frances Burney had hits for days. As I've observed here, Artist biography's tend to fall into hagiographic or psychological modes of analysis. Rare is the Artist biography to address the market conditions that shaped Artist output in any significant way. Certainly, as one proceeds back through time, this fact becomes more, rather then less true.
Burney was one of the novel's first hit makers. (!) She is most known today for her direct, proximate influence on Jane Austen. (@) Camilla was her last (of 3) novels. Her break out was Evelina (BOOK REVIEW) and then she followed it up with Cecilia (BOOK REVIEW). Both Cecilia and Camilla are 900 pages long, and that is A LOT of what you need to know about both the strengths and weaknesses for Burney as a novelist, but someone who inspired excellent Art, rather then one who created great Art for herself. I venture that only as a fan- the truth is that she had hits for days, and she was the first really popular female novelist and that counts for a lot.
Her biographical details are interesting and relevant, even if they don't tell the whole story. She was the daughter of Charles Burney- who is himself a pivotal figure in the history of Music. She got married at 42 and had a kid at 43... in 1793. Burney wrote Camilla, her last novel, to secure the position of her family after her child was born. She did not right another novel afterwards.
If Evelina represents the "first record" of Burney's Artistic career, Cecilia represents the perfection of her form, and then Camilla is a re-iteration of that success, in the same way that successful movies bear sequels. Burney wrote Camilla with her existing Audience in mind, and the Audience responded predictably(favorably). In a very real sense, Cecilia and Camilla are basically the same character: A young woman on the border of wealth and poverty, needing to secure a husband and very enmeshed in the well-being of her extended family.
Both novels clearly belong to a mixed 18th century/19th century tradition. Compare Evelina, which is an epistolary novel- and thus clearly a work from the 18th century- with Cecilia/Camilla, which both feature a more modern narrative technique while keeping the lengthy, plot-heavy form of the 18th century novel. The endless machination of plot that characterize Burney's later two novels clearly catered to the mode of publishing for the Novel at the time she was writing.
The Publishers then (late 18th century) wanted books to come out in multi-volume editions. In the case of Camilla, the form consisted of five volumes- i.e. separate books published in sequence. Each Volume had two "Books," and then there enumerated Chapters within each book.
Broadly speaking, Cecilia dealt with a young woman who could only inherit on a specified condition, and Camilla dealt with a young woman who everyone thought to be a heiress, but was not. The function of the inheritance in both novels is as an instrument for literary alienation of the main characters. It is fair to say that both plots are entirely driven by complications related to inheritance and marriage.
One completely insane note from the perspective of the modern reader is that literally none of the main characters are older then 18. This is a book avowedly about very young women getting married to much older men who were often behaving in a manner that would land them in prison for the rest of their lives in "modern times."
Burneys characters are emphatically of the 18th century, particularly her feckless, spend-thrift men. Whether they were modeled on her father or people she met as the daughter of a Court Musician in late 18th century British society, they are well observed, and represent an enduring contribution to the encyclopedia of literary depiction.
The 18th century definitely had an edge of danger in England that the Victorian period somewhat evened out, but the men in her books are almost to a man literally sociopaths. I believe that this likely appealed to her immediate Audience, and perhaps prevented her from gaining the kind of acclaim that she deserved. Personally, I think her male characters are fascinating, the 18th century of American Psycho's Patrick Bateman.
I would submit that female Audience members still respond to this kind of male character. I suspect that the Lifetime Network movie catalog is chock a fill with them, as are Romance novels and other kind of art forms with a primarily female Audience. To talk of the Authors enduring success here is to talk of the depiction of social space and character: Burney excelled at doing both, and it was something that her followers amplified with great success. Clearly, they did not amplify the practice of writing two 900 page plus novels with 50 odd characters each- other Authors did that, but not her female succesors.
NOTES
! Burney was the one of the first woman to score a hit number one novel. And she did it at 26. Back in 2010, I observed of her first novel, Evelina, "You can’t write about Evelina without commenting on what a success the book was. The mere fact of Evelina’s endurance, in print, for over 200 years speaks to that success. The more 18th century literature I read, the more I find myself drawn to the market place for that literature. I wonder whether, ultimately, there is anything particularly interesting about 18th century novels other then their relationship with the readers."
@ Jane Austen may be the most successful novelist of all time. Certainly, when you add in the Bronte sisters, you have an Artistic tradition being developed along aesthetically advanced and market savvy lines. If a reader is interested in the larger pan-Artistic field of "Asethetics," the woman novelists of the late 18th and early 19th century are a worthwhile territory in which to pan for inspirational and thematic gold.
THE EXPEDITION OF HUMPHREY CLINKER BY TOBIAS GEORGE SMOLLETT (1/30/12)
BOOK REVIEW
The Expedition of Humphrey Clinker
by Tobias George Smollett
Introduction by Robert Gorham Davis
Published by Hold, Rineheart and Winston
this edition 1967
originally published 1771
I can honestly say that I've read every major novel of the 18th century, and several of the minor ones. It's been whatever the opposite of a "wild ride" is- every other great 18th century novel is 500 pages long, they are written in a style of English that is almost as foreign as a novel written in a different language entirely and the novels of the 18th century lack many of the characteristics of what the modern reader considers to be integral to a novel. Oh- and you know what was popular in 18th century Novels? The epistolary novel. That's a novel composed entirely of LETTERS.
Sooo... In terms of "what's left" of the 18th century canon of literature I'm down to minor works of English authors and almost all of the books written by French guys. Tobias Smollett was Scottish born- who worked from about 1750 to 1770. Smollett is the primary go-to guy for the picaresque novel. Picaresque novels have more then the average amount of appeal to the modern reader because they deal with roguish adventures- much in the same way that people will watch a COPS episode on basic cable.
The Expedition of Humphrey Clinker is both a picaresque AND an epistolary novel, which is why it took me this long to get around to it. ALSO- not as cheap as you would think- turns out the minor classics often cost more then the major hits because they aren't as popular with modern readers. Like other picaresque novels, The Expedition of Humphrey Clinker, is basically a tour of different places, with lots of adventures and what today we would call "travelogue."
The narrative is split between three people- the rich old guy who is paying for everything, his... nephew? And a quasi-illiterate servant woman. The plot, such at is revolves around a couple of marriages and a false arrest (of the title character, Henry Clinker, who is a servant of the rich old guy.) I believe there are many reasons why this book is a minor classic: It's interesting that Smollett has multiple narrative perspectives, but it basically boils down to two white guys basically talking about the same thing over and over again for 400 pages- not really necessary.
There's about 100 pages of Scottish travelogue- wouldn't you know that Smollett was Scottish? He was! It makes for fun reading, but it's hardly "great novel" material. Characters in picaresque novels do not learn lessons, nor is there a concern with depicting events "realistically" what IS there: PLOT TWISTS, FUNNY CHARACTERS AND DETAILED SCENERY.
Ok, so maybe Smollett isn't the biggest 18th century novelist out there, but his books are still widely available in print 250 years ish after he wrote. That is an impressive accomplishment, and in my opinion, it's worth the time to see what kind of art stands up to 250 years of scrutiny. Classic art, that's what.
The Mirror and the Lamp: Romantic Theory and the Critical Tradition (2/3/12)
BOOK REVIEW
The Mirror and the Lamp: Romantic Theory and the Critical Tradition
by M.H. Abrams
p. 1953
Oxford University Press
I'd wager that most of my artistic type friends would gladly cop to being called "Romantics." After all, you kind of have to be Romantic to get involved seriously with Art. But what does it mean to be a "Romantic?" Romanticism, after all, is nothing if not slippery, conceptually speaking. To understand the Romantic tradition you need to go back to the 18th century.
The main players are the English poets Wordsworth and Coleridge. They weren't just poets, they were critics, and it's fair to say that in terms of the conceptual development of Romanticism, understanding it requires firmly grasping three main points:
1) The state of pre-Romantic (i.e. 17th and 18th century) neo-Classic aesthetic theory.
2) Developments in German aesthetic theory in the mid 18th century.
3) The transmission of those developments into English critical theory, as adapted by Wordsworth and few other people who were writing in scholarly/popular journals in London in the mid 18th century.
First off, it's easy to forget how important an art form poetry was back in the 18th century. Before the novel, literature was either poetry or epic poetry, more or less. Thus, when people wrote about literature before the mid 18th century "rise of the novel" they wrote about poetry and prose.
The main metaphor that Abrams uses to describe the "neo-classical" orientation of criticism before the rise of Romanticism is "ART AS MIRROR." In the neo-classic orientation, Art reflected reality, and therefore Art was "like a mirror" in that it reflected the real. This metaphor was "neo-classic" in that it derived from Plato's theories about Art. In the words of Abrams:
The perspective afforded by more recent criticism enables us to discriminate certain tendencies common to many of those theorists between the sixteenth and eighteenth centuries who looked upon art as imitation, and more or less like a mirror. For better or worse, the analogy helped focus interest on the subject matter of a work and its models in reality, to the comparative neglect of the shaping influence of artistic conventions, the inherent requirements of the single work of art, and the individuality of the author.
Romanticism evolved as a criticism of that metaphor, more or less. Where the neo-classicists saw ART AS A MIRROR, the nascent Romantic movement of the 18th century saw ART AS A LAMP- as something that came from within and shed light on the world. The essential shift that occurred was to re-focus critical attention on the Artist, and away from the Audience- as was the case in neo-classical aesthetic theory, where the question was always whether a specific work of Art had satisfied the "rules" that produced pleasure in the audience.
This shift towards the irrelevance of the audience and the central role of the Artist had the effect of creating different strands of Romantic theory that maintain adherents up until today. Specifically though, it turned criticism towards a consideration of the relationship between the Artist and his work- with some writers finding explanation for the work in biographical detail, and others claiming that the work was the Artist. The search created canons of artistic criticism that are still important, Romantic critics then began to judge not just the work but the Artist, and correspondingly disregarded the Artist.
This critical orientation has so convincingly triumphed that the focus on the Artist to the exclusion of the Audience has no competition- all critics are Romantic critics. Neo-classicism is a relic of the past, but my perspective is that this is a mistake, since neo-classic aesthetic theory is concerned with Artist/Audience relationships, what better way to consider the impact of the internet on Art and Artists.
FRANCES BURNEY: THE LIFE IN THE WORKS (2/7/12)
Book Review
FRANCE BURNEY: THE LIFE IN THE WORKS
Margaret Anne Doody
p. 1988
I like writing about 18th century literature because it's a legitimate cultural subject, and it's pretty much impossible to offend anyone with your opinion. Five years of blogging about music and literature have taught me that the easiest thing to do with a blog is offend someone with your opinion.
The stand out figure in my recent audit of 18th century British literature was Frances Burney. She is an appealing Author/Artist for several reasons:
1. EARLY WOMAN AUTHOR.
2. Daughter of well know 18th century musician/author Charles Burney.
3. HAD PLENTY OF HITS: Evelina, Cecilia, Camilla.
Burney published Evelina, her first book, in 1778- she was 26. It was a hit, though the combination of Burney's status as a single woman and the nascent state of the development of the market for literature combined to deprive her of financial rewards that would have equaled her critical success.
Evelina was published anonymously, but that only lasted until the critics made their positive statements and the initial press of 2500 copies sold out. An important biographical fact of Frances Burney's life was her relationships with her "Daddies"(her words, not mine)- her actual father Charles Burney- court musician and author of the path breaking History of Music- and her "Uncle"- Samuel Crisp. It is Crisp whom Burney most often referred to as "Daddy" in her correspondence. Burney and Crisp played a crucial role in her career- a role best illustrated after the success of Evelina, when Frances decided to write a play.
The play (never produced) was called The Witlings, and it was essentially a satire on modern life. Doody wrote this book before Seinfeld aired, but the over all tenor of the play would have to be described as Seinfeldian since it is essentially a "play about nothing."
Even after reading an entire chapter on the subject, it's still unclear to me why Crisp and Burney pere conspired to suppress The Witlings. The common take on this circumstances is that Burney/Crisp thought it was too "unladylike" for Frances to be writing plays, but if that was the case, they didn't put it like that. Rather they told her that the play was terrible, and too imitative of antecedent plays, and that she would, essentially, ruin her literary reputation as a result of its performance.
By the time The Witlings had been suppressed it was 1781, and she was pressured to write a follow up- a book which became Cecilia. Burney wrote Cecilia for an existing Audience, one that anticipated the release. Cecilia was published in summer of 1782- either 30 or close to it- was the "age of spinster" in late 18th century London.
In December of 1782, Burney met Owen Cambridge, a minister from a good family. They spent the next couple years in a halting court ship that resulted in no proposal. OUCH. After the Cambridge fiasco, Burney secured a job- via her father- as a lady in waiting to the Queen of England. She took her position in July of 1786- having wasted a full four years with Owen Cambridge. She was not excited to take the gig- it involved being "on call" day and night, and spending many an hour standing around and doing nothing at all.
Ironically, it was her journals during this period of servitude that proved to be Burney's most enduring work before her late 20th century revival at the hands of feminist inspired literary scholars. She had a front seat to what we now of as "THE MADNESS OF KING GEORGE"- she was right there, and taking notes the whole time. She managed to escape the clutches of the Queen, essentially by feigning severe illness, and was released with a 100 guinea a year life pension in 1791.
She was now 39, unmarried, childless. So what does she do? She goes out and lands an exiled French military man and has a kid. Boom. Then to secure her lively hood she writes Camilia: Also a hit. BOOM. Eventually she ends up in France with her husband and her child, and never writes another hit, but lives up until 1840. She was... 88? When she died.
There must be some interest in Burney- since Cambridge University just republished this book. I find Burney interesting because of her unique perspective on 18th century social practices and her status as an early successful Author/Artist. What's interesting is she was simultaneously an outsider (a young woman) and an insider (daughter of Charles Burney, court musician.)
The Interesting Narrative of The Life of Olaudah Equiano (3/5/12)
The Interesting Narrative of The Life of Olaudah Equiano
by Olaudah Equiano
p. 1789
this edition read on ipad ebooks program 2012
This is one of/the first accounts of the horror of the slave trade in the 18th century. Olaudah Equiano was a real guy- and African born or African American born guy from the mid 18th century. This book supposedly tells his life story- from his beginnings as a kidnap victim in Africa, to his life as a slave in the New World and Europe, to being freed by his owner and his adventures. According to the Wikipedia article on the author, there is some doubt as to whether parts of the book- particularly the details of his kidnapping from Africa- actually happened- many think Equiano is from the U.S., and I suppose that's why I learned about it in a source that is devoted to listing Novels, rather then biographies
I suppose the issues about authorial identity are rather besides the point- considering that this was a book published in 1789, the smooth writing style is commendable. Also worth the effort are the horrid scenes that accompanied the slave trade in the 18th century- as Schopenhauer wrote, anyone familiar with the details of the slave trade in the Americas in the 18th century can never be shocked at man's inhumanity to man.
This is the first book I've read on an electronic reading device- in this case the IPAD my wife owns. The Interesting Narrative by Olaudah Equiano is a good eread candidate- it costs more than a penny on Amazon, is available in a free ebook version- in every format, I would imagine. Also, it's short- many of the 18th century classics I've downloaded on the IPAD run to 500-600 pages in the Ebook program.
I did find that I read faster- some of that is page size, but part of that is also that the IPAD is easier to read then a book- most definitely - something I would not say about performing a similar task at a desk top computer or lap top.
However, there is little question to me that my Ebook interest is limited to free titles. It is hard for me to imagine paying five bucks or more for a book and not receiving hard copy, i.e. a book.
The Memoirs of Martinus Scriberlus by Alexander Pope et. al. (3/21/12)
 |
| Alexander Pope |
BOOK REVIEW
The Memoirs of Martinus Scriberlus
by Alexander Pope
Oxford University Free Edition
originally published 1741
Here's a good example of a book I would have never read without an Ipad or similar reader device. It's on the original 2006 List of 1001 Books to Read but it's hardly long enough (100 pages) or "novel-y" enough to warrant non-specialist attention. The sheer lack of novels on the date of publication makes it notable, The Memoirs of Matinus Scriberlus is also of note because it was also the product of a group of writer/Artists, the Scriblerus Club, who were critical in creating the the "modern" market for literature. Like other groups in different places and times, these guys operated in cliques- with Scriblerus Club facing off against the Samuel Johnson inspired "The Club" in the early to mid 18th century London literary scene.
I would counsel that all casual readers steer clear- stick to Gargantua and Pantagruel and Tristam Shandy for the same themes developed in a more classically novelistic fashion, i.e. with plot, characters and scenery.
On the other hand it was published really super early- 1740s was just after "the novel" was invented, so there aren't a lot of similar books outside of the two mentioned above. And it's free, and only 100 pages.
A MODEST PROPOSAL BY JONATHAN SWIFT (3/26/12)
BOOK REVIEW
A Modest Proposal
by Jonathan Swift
Originally Published 1729
Project Gutenberg Edition #1080
Published 2008
Read on Ipad Ebooks
Man I tell you the Ipad/Ebooks combo is DELIVERING LIKE FED EX on volume of books. A Modest Proposal is a super duper cheap entry onto the 1001 Books list- only 13 pages front-to-back it is not a novel at all, nor a book, but more like a pamphlet. Why not include Thomas Paine's Common Sense while you are at it? Swift was part of the early to mid 18th century circle that included Alexander Pope- they were part of the same club.
Swift was a consummate literary outsider- from Ireland of all places- he spent most of his time skulking around London trying to get a good gig in the Church. A Modest Proposal in an early example of 18th century Satire- with the Author "suggesting" that England solve it's Irish poverty problems by eating Irish children. In the sense that it is drawing attention to a social problem, A Modest Proposal prefigures the 19th century novel of social concern, but it itself is not a novel of social concern.
Still funny though. 13 pages long. Takes about 10 minutes to read- so short you could read it online in ten minutes.
The History of Rasselas Prince of Abissinia (3/30/12)
BOOK REVIEW
The History of Rasselas: Prince of Abissinia
by Samuel Johnson
p. 1759
Oxford World's Classic Edition 1998 version
Edited with an Introduction and Notes by J.P. Hardy
Samuel Johnson is one of the founding figures of modern English prose- specifically since he wrote the first English language dictionary in 1755. The Oxford English Dictionary wasn't completed for another 150 years, and during that time Johnson's dictionary was THE dictionary. He also dominated the London literary scene in the mid 18th century and wrote a variety of essays, poetry and this proto-novel, The History of Rasselas.
The obvious comparison to make is between Rasselas and Voltaire's Candide. Both take the form of the travels of a young man, accompanied by a teacher, travelling the world and seeing all the bad stuff that can happen to people.
I read this book a couple years back but didn't review it because it isn't really a Novel, it may be an important book that had a huge influence on later Novelists and the Audience when it was published, but its hardly a Novel. It's more like a philosophical inquiry attached to an episodic narrative.
THE MAN OF FEELING BY HENRY MACKENZIE (4/12/12)
Book Review
The Man of Feeling
by Henry MacKenzie
p. 1771
Oxford World's Classics Edition p. 2001
Edited by Brian Vickers
With an Introduction and Notes by Stephen Bending and Stephen Bygrave
I was working on the Bibliography for this blog when I noticed I'd never actually published a book review for The Man of Feeling by Henry MacKenzie, even though I bought it November in 2009 and must have read it in 2010. Although I never wrote a review, I referred to it at length during my review of Laurence Sterne's A Sentimental Journey, posted in April of last year. Back then, here is what I had to say:
Sterne's A Sentimental Journey was published three years before Henry MacKenzie's The Man of Feeling. Man of Feeling was in instant hit, selling out within two months and being reprinted six time in the following decade. Both novels echo the on-going debate in 18th century about the impact of modernity on the nature of man. As G.J. Barker-Benfield persuasively argued in his book, The Culture of Sensibility, "popular novels written by men in the 1760s and 1770s were preoccupied with the meanings of sensibility for manhood...and the ambiguity we now tend to read into the novels of Laurence Stern or Mackenzie reflects this contemporary ambivalence." Regardless of how one interprets the underlying debate OR the role of the "novels of sentiment" in the 18th century, it's clear that these tales had an audience. Of course, in light of the rise of female novelists in the 19th century, I am left wondering who was buying all the copies of MacKenzie's The Man of Feeling. Was it men, interested in getting a fix on their identity in a rapidly changing world? Or was it largely women, interested in men who were depicted behaving in a traditionally "feminine" manner? Sterne's Sentimental Journey is a clear way-station on the way to MacKenzie's mincing, sobbing Man of Feeling. Unlike MacKenzie, Sterne is a comic genius, and his book is filled with episodes of satire and wit that are sorely missing in Man of Feeling. There is also an element of bawdiness in A Sentimental Journey that is so clearly an element of Sterne's Rabelaisian style- something lacking in MacKenzie, let alone the oft humorless novels of sentiment that were published after the turn of the century. Blame the Victorians, or don't, it matters little. However it's clear to me that the "Sentimental Man" was a cultural trend with all the complexity and force of later trends like Rock and roll, and it's interesting because it was one of the FIRST such modern trends whose influence was reflected in a contemporary art form that was ITSELF just rounding into form (the novel.) For that reason it's worth thinking about, because by learning about people then, we can learn about ourselves now.
That's as true as it was then as it is now. Henry MacKenzie's The Man of Feeling has a antiquated feel to it, simply from the type of culture depicted- the culture of sentiment. Important as it is to understand that time period, it's not very appealing from a Modern perspective, except as a historical text. Perhaps that is why I didn't review it back in 2010.
RAMEAU'S NEPHEW BY DENIS DIDEROT (4/13/12)
BOOK REVIEW
Rameau's Nephew and First Satire
By Denis Diderot
Translation by Margaret Mauldon
With and Introduction and Notes By Nicholas Cronk
written 1760s-1770s
published in German Translation 1805
This Edition 2006
Oxford World's Classics
Of the 13 books from the "1700s" in the 2006 Edition of 1001 Books To Read Before You Die, seven of them are by French Authors. Specifically, Jean-Jacques Rousseau (4) and Denis Diderot (3).
Rameau's Nephew is the first of those seven to fall, because I already had a copy sitting on my shelf. Reading the introduction, I remembered why I had actually put this book down after starting- Rameau's Nephew ranks up there with Laurence Sterne's Tristram Shandy in inaccessibility to the modern reader. Tristram Shandy, at least, is in the form of a Novel, whereas Rameau's Nephew takes the form of a "philosophical dialogue" between "ME" (Diderot) and "HIM" (A "Grub Street Hack" living in mid 18th century Paris.)
Both books draw on the tradition of Rabelais' Gargantua and Pantagruel- a series of five books published in the 16th century by French writer Francois (accent omitted) Rabelais. Like Gargantua and Pantagruel, Rameau's Nephew is not, itself, a novel, but the style and content was absorbed by later Novelists. I mean that the two characters of Rameau's Nephew have a life to them that is lacking of other books written during the same time period, and more resemble the world-wise anti-heroes of Flaubert then the cardboard picar-esque character of your Peregrine Pickles or your Humphrey Clinkers.
Certainly not a work for a casual peruser of 18th century literature, Rameau's Nephew is best read in a critical edition, whether that be paperback or e reader- you can't just stumble through the 100 pages that comprise Rameau's Nephew and hope to "get" it- there needs to be some background with the underlying scene (specifically, the French philosophes of the Enlightenment.)
Roxana by Daniel Defoe (4/18/12)
BOOK REVIEW
Roxana
by Daniel Defoe
p. 1724
Everyman Edition
Edited by Robert Clark
p. 1998
I read this book three or four years ago, and I think I just didn't like it that much, so never wrote a review. I think I read it before I seriously thought I could actually read all of the books on the 1001 Books To Read Before You Die, 2006 edition, list.
Defoe has three books on the list: Robinson Crusoe (reviewed 2/11/08), published in 1719 arguably invented the Novel as an Art Form distinct in the larger field of "Literature." Moll Flanders (reviewed 2/10/08) and Roxana both cover the same territory: the life story of a woman who is a mistress/wife/whore in bawdy 18th century, pre-Victorian prudishness times.
Of the two, Moll Flanders came first, and Roxana was published two years later. Both were 'hits' although the primitive state of the marketplace for literary work in the 1720s probably limited the fortune that Daniel Defoe attained (if not the fame.)
It is strange to me that Roxana even made it onto the list, but it was written so early and Defoe just doesn't have anything other then these three novels to put on the list, so the 18th century section is thin enough with Roxana on the list.
If you are keeping track of my progress on "closing out" the 18th century section of the 2006 edition of 1001 One Books To Read Before You Die, here is an updated scorecard:
5) Confessions – Jean-Jacques Rousseau
6) Dangerous Liaisons – Pierre Choderlos de Laclos
7) Reveries of a Solitary Walker – Jean-Jacques Rousseau
8) The Nun – Denis Diderot
9) The Adventures of Caleb Williams – William Godwin
10) Justine – Marquis de Sade
OH SNAP IT'S THE BOTTOM TEN CLASSICS OF THE 18th CENTURY!!!
PEREGRINE PICKLE BY TOBIAS GEORGE SMOLLETT (4/19/12)
Peregrine Pickle
by Tobias George Smollett
p. 1751
p. standard revised edition 1758
Read on Amazon KINDLE
It is easy to tell you how Tobias Smollett's Peregrine Pickle made it into my personal "Bottom 10 of 18th Century Classic Novels."
First, I hated the other two Tobias Smollett books I read as part of the 18th century portion of the 1001 Books to Read Before You Die (1). I think it's important to note that I don't feel like I owe any special deference to the creators/editors of this list, but that a lot of the questions surrounding considerations on the 18th century portion are what we in the legal field call "A settled question of law."
Second, Peregrine Pickle is what you call a looongggg book. The Amazon Kindle product page says 748 pages but I swear it was over 1100 pages on my Kindle. 1100 Pages. He was using Roman Numerals for Chapter Numbering that I didn't even recognize. (Is C 100 or 50?) I just can't imagine many people read this book. It doesn't have an Oxford World Classic's edition, a Penguin Classics edition or even a Dover Thrift edition. In fact, before the Kindle/Ereader I probably never would have read Peregrine Pickle at all.
Third, like Roderick Random and Humphrey Clinker, Peregrine Pickle lacks what we Moderns call "character development." Maybe I'll just let Robert Gorham Davis explain, as he does in his introduction to the 1950 Rineheart edition of Humphrey Clinker:
In the strictest sense the picaresque novel is the biography or autobiography of a picaro, a rogue, a servant, a witty swindler, an antihero. In a broader sense it is the travel adventures of an unsettled young man, often of good birth, who has the moral characteristics of the picaro, the love of hoaxes and intrigues. Though there is usually some sort of success, change of heart or reconciliation at the end, the picaresque novel differs from the "growing up" novel introduced by romanticism- Wilhelm Meister, The Sentimental Education, Of Human Bondage,- in that there is no organic growth of the particular character through experience. The adventures are self-sufficient, require only type characters, and could happen in almost any sequence equally well.
So it's one thing to write a thousand page Harry Potter novel where every single reader desperately cares about "what happens" to the main character, quite another to sustain the interest of an Audience through scenery and slap-stick humor. It puts the Picaresque novel closer to genre films and "true crime" TV shows then other motifs in 18th century literature. The behavior in Peregrine Pickle can be quite shocking at times- certainly "pre-Victorian" in terms of the depiction of say, sexual mores.
In Peregrine Pickle, for example, the titular picaro spends about 200 page trying to bang this chick in a series of inns between Paris and Amsterdam. There are def. accusations of "rape" contained in Peregrine Pickle and "comic" behavior that quite obviously involves the kind of sexual assault that gets you locked up in state prison. It was a different time.
Unfortunately, Peregrine Pickle's brief interesting moments, whether they be the lead character trying to rape some chick or an interesting depiction of the emerging public sphere of the 18th century, are interspersed with hundreds of pages of non-hits, and even entire other books. For example, the Memoirs of a Lady of Quality take up 300 pages in the middle of Peregrine Pickle and basically are a whole other story told by a woman who has no relationship to Peregrine Pickle. This is how Smollett rolled, people, he was a working writer and got paid by the word.
It's hard to recommend Peregrine Pickle to anyone. After all, Roderick Random is written first, and Humphrey Clinker is supposed to be the best, which leaves Peregrine Pickle in a distant third place. And thus, Peregrine Pickle- number nine(?) on my bottom ten Literary Classics of the 18th century.
Note
(1) Roderick Random and Humphrey Clinker.
PAINTING HENRY FIELDING
BOOK REVIEW
Amelia
by Henry Fielding
published 1751
Read Public Domain Kindle Edition
Amelia is the last of the major PICARESQUE English Novels from the 18th century. It's not the last major novel of the 18th century I have left to read, that would belong to Samuel Richardson's Clarissa- all 1000 pages of it. However, it is an opportunity to make some observations about the Art form of the Picaresque Novel, and the important role it played in the development of modern literature.
The PICARO, as he was originally known, was a Spanish gentleman of uncertain birth who cheated and swindled his way through society in a classic "anti-hero" style. This character demanded a literary vehicle that was long on plot and low on character development. PICARO's by definition, do not learn from their mistakes, they simply escape the consequences for their actions by the manipulation of plot.
The two major examples of 18th century adaptations of the Picaresque format are Tobias Smollett and Henry Fielding. Tobias Smollett was the Author of three major, thoroughly amoral picaresque novels: Roderick Random, Peregrine Pickle and Humphrey Clinker. All three Novels featured heroes who behave abominably during the course of the Novel. Henry Fielding, around the same time as Smollett, also wrote three major Novels that made use of the Picaresque format: Joseph Andrews, Tom Jones and Amelia.
Comparing the two novelists is nothing new. In fact, you can find the Cambridge History of English and American Literature, Volume X: The Age of Johnson, Chapter II, section 27, "Final Comparison between the literary achievements and influence of Fielding and Smollett." (1)
Amelia, I think, is generally though to be the least of these six classic Novels. Perhaps because it was published late in Fielding's career. Perhaps that's because he tinkered with the format of the classic Picaresque. In Amelia, the young Picaro marries the virtuous Amelia and then spends the rest of the novel fighting off would-be corrupter of her virtue. As any student of the picaresque knows, the Picaro does not spend his nights and days fretting about his dear sweet wife. Would Don Juan do that? No.
At the same time it's hard not to feel that Fielding was moving in the realist direction that was to characterize Novels of the 19th century. Although I'm no specialist, the references to current events in the 1750s were recognizable as were the place location. Amelia is a work anchored to a specific time and place, which is less true of the other picaresque hits of the mid 18th century, which tend to move between "city" and "country."
By all accounts, the pacing and structure of all picaresque Novels are less then harmonious to the modern reader. They are a reminder of just how much development the form of the Novel has experienced in the last three hundred years. Surely the fact that it is possible for me to write this review 261 years after is sufficient testimony that Amelia continues to maintain it's status as a literary classic, and a hit, and therefore worth reviewing.
NOTE
(1) That conclusion is:
| The direct influence of Fielding is harder to estimate than that of Smollett... But the very completeness and individuality of Fielding’s work prevented his founding a school. The singleness of intellectual standpoint which governs all his novels makes him difficult of imitation; and he is no less different from those who have taken him as model than he is from Cervantes, whom he professed to follow. But this it is safe to say: that Fielding, a master of the philosophical study of character, founded the novel of character and raised it to a degree of merit which is not likely to be surpassed...The novel of character must always go to Fielding as its great exemplar. | 36 |
| Smollett’s novels have about them more of the quarry and less of the statue. He is richer in types than Fielding; and it needs only a mention of his naval scenes and characters to raise memories of a whole literature. The picaresque novel in general, which burst into activity soon after the publication of Roderick Random, was under heavy obligations to Smollett, and nowhere more so than in its first modern example, Pickwick. Dickens, indeed, who was a great reader of Smollett, was his most eminent disciple. In both, we find the observation of superficial oddities of speech and manner carried to the finest point; in both, we find these oddities and the episodes which display them more interesting than the main plot; in both, we find that, beneath those oddities, there is often a lack of real character. Although, at the present moment, the picaresque novel has fallen a little out of fashion, Smollett will continue to be read by those who are not too squeamish or too stay-at-home to find in him complete recreation. (BARTELBY) |
WILLIAM GODWIN
BOOK REVIEW
Caleb Williams
by William Godwin
Published in 1794
Read on an Amazon Kindle Ereader
Caleb Williams is a book that fell into the bottom ten 18th century entries on the 2006 edition of the 1001 Books To Read Before You Die List solely on cost grounds. Both the Penguin and Oxford Worlds Classics edition are more then 5 bucks, so over ten when you add in shipping. Most of the books remaining on the Bottom 10 are relatively "hard to get" and/or not free on the Kindle or in Google IBooks.
I can tell you right now that the last book on the 18th century portion of 1001 Books To Read Before You Die is going to be Jean-Jacques Rousseau's Julie or; The New Heloise, his 700 + page epistolary novel. It costs more then 30 bucks on Amazon when you add in shipping, and there is only one current version. Julie costs twenty bucks on Kindle, which is ridiculous.
Other then that I've bought all the remaining titles on the "Bottom 10" : Denis Diderot's The Nun, Marquis De Sade's Justine, Confessions and Reveries of a Solitary Walker by Jean-Jacques Rousseau AND Dangerous Liasons by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos. Oh and Clarissa by Samuel Richardson, which, I shit you not, is over three thousand Kindle sized pages- in 10 volumes. Not stoked about reading that last one. Did I mention is Clarissa is not only 3000 pages on a Kindle BUT ALSO an epistolary Novel? That is three thousand pages... of letters.
Returning to Caleb Williams... Caleb Williams is a 'minor classic.' The Author, William Godwin is famous for his early anarchist leanings and his philosophical type writings surrounding that subject. But he also wrote Caleb Williams, which is hailed (incorrectly I would argue) as the "first mystery novel" on William Godwin's Wikipedia page. (1)
I thought the actual material written by the 1001 Books staff was insightful for Caleb Williams, comparing the narrative to something Kafka would write, and I think that is the proper reference point for a Modern reader- it's an example of the literature of paranoia/persecution- a huge 20th/21st century subject.
NOTE
(1) From the Wikipedia Entry:
Godwin is most famous for two books that he published within the space of a year: An Enquiry Concerning Political Justice, an attack on political institutions, and Things as They Are; or, The Adventures of Caleb Williams, which attacks aristocratic privilege, but also is the first mystery novel.
(WILLIAM GODWIN WIKIPEDIA PAGE)
The Adventures of Caleb Williams is not a "mystery novel." Continuing with the Wikipedia centered research method in this blog post, the Mystery Novel has two main categories:
Although normally associated with the crime genre, the term "mystery fiction" may in certain situations refer to a completely different genre, where the focus is on supernatural or thriller mystery (the solution doesn't have to be logical, and even no crime is involved). (WIKIPEDIA ENTRY FOR MYSTERY FICTION)
ANN RADCLIFFE
BOOK REVIEW
The Mysteries of Udolpho
by Ann Radcliffe
p. 1794
I read this book back in 2010 but didn't write a review back then because, back then... I WASN'T BEING AS THOROUGH. I thought now would be an appropriate time to slip it in because I just read ANOTHER book published in 1794, Caleb Williams by William Godwin, and reviewed it.
1794, 1794 what's so great about 1794? I would argue that is the first example of popular literary "taste" being expressed in a preference for dark themes and super natural influences. This trend undoubtedly reflected that the Audience for books like The Mysteries of Udolpho, Caleb Williams and The Monk were, in fact, superstitious and had an interest in religion inspired "matters of the soul."
The Mysteries of Udolpho was published in a set of four volumes. The Monk was published in a single volume, anonymously. I don't know how Caleb Williams was published, but I imagine it was a single volume. "A modern estimate of the average annual publication of new books, excluding pamphlets, suggests that an almost fourfold increase occurred during the century; annual output from 1666 to 1756 averaging less than 100, and that from 1792 to 1802, 372." (1)
What that tells you is that there was a rise in the corresponding Audience that was driving increased production of Books. It also tells you that the fact that two of the top 1000 books were both published in 1794 is something more then coincidence- it's the actual beginning of the second period identified where average book production was 372 a year. 1794 must have been a year where the publishing world was expanding and publishers were looking for additional titles to print, opening the door to new authors and different combinations of subject matter and format.
The Mysteries of Udolpho is like the arch-type for the late 18th century Gothic Novel: Abducted heroine, draft castles in mysterious locations, spirits, etc.
Perhaps the most enduring part of Udolpho besides its status as gothic novel par excellance is the depiction of geography: She accompanies him on a journey from their native Gascony, through the Pyrenees to the Mediterranean coast of Roussillon, over many mountainous landscapes. ROMANTIC LANDSCAPES.
NOTE
(1) Majorie Plant, The English Book Trade (London, 1939), p.445 cited in Ian Watt, The Rise of the Novel, p. 37 (1957)
 |
| Jack Black plays Gulliver in the terrible, terrible movie version of Gulliver's Travels |
BOOK REVIEW
Gulliver's Travels
by Jonathan Swift
Originally Published 1726
Amended 1735
I read this book back in 2008, but didn't review it. Jonathan Swift is better characterized as a "Pamphleter" or "Satirist," not a Novelist. The enduring popularity of Gulliver's Travels as, essentially, a children's story has been accompanied by a drastic editing of the original work. In the original work, Gulliver travels to several other locations besides the famous land of Lilliput.
In the book, after Lilliput he goes to Brobdingnag, a land of giants. Then, he goes to the flying Kingdom of Laputa, and Balnibarbi. Then he goes home, then he sales again and makes it to Houyhnhnms, which is a land of perfect horses. I'm just telling you what's in there.
An additional, or perhaps central irony is the transformation of Gulliver's Travels from a "too hot to publish" piece of political satire to a Jack Black starring Disney movie. It's hard to follow today, but Gulliver's Travels was thought to be "anti-whig" satire, and it's very publication was controversial.
Basically, what I'm trying to say is that Gulliver's Travels, terrible Jack Black movie's aside, is not a children's book, it is in fact a very sharp piece of early to mid 18th century political satire. Swift had an edge when he was alive.
 |
| The giant helmet from the Castle of Otranto |
The Castle of Otranto
by Hoarce Walpole
p. 1764
Dover Thrift Edition p. 2004
The Castle of Otranto is credited with being the first Gothic Novel. It's important to note just how late in the 18th century The Castle of Otranto was published: 1764 is well into the second half of the 18th century. My recent review of The Mysteries of Udolpho, published April 24th discussed the average number of books produced per year in England in the 18th century:
"A modern estimate of the average annual publication of new books, excluding pamphlets, suggests that an almost fourfold increase occurred during the century; annual output from 1666 to 1756 averaging less than 100, and that from 1792 to 1802, 372." (M. Plant, The English Book Trade, p. 37.)
If The Mysteries of Udolpho (published in 1794) stands on the far side of that rise in publication volume, The Castle of Otranto stands on the other side, when the average number of books published in an entire year was less than 100. What does that mean in terms of Audience reception of the respective works of Gothic Fiction? Most obviously it means that The Mysteries of Udolpho had a larger actual and potential Audience then The Castle of Otranto, and also that Audience members who enjoyed the latter work had most likely read the earlier work since it had been out for 30 plus years.
I remember distinctly that I read The Castle of Otranto book in 2008 and then re-read it in 2009. What I remember about The Castle of Otranto is the fact that it was a Dover Thrift Edition, the most despised of all "Classics" series. Also that the writing style is very "early 18th century" even though the book was published in mid-late 18th century. He could have been trying to evoke an earlier writing style.
There is an aspect of The Castle of Otranto that is "cheesy" or "popular" but I think that is more the result of the consequences of imitation rather then any integral weakness in the "Gothic style." Up until very recently, Gothic influences dominated the "Horror" category and we all know how popular Horror is in film and books. Music, too I suppose, whether it be horror core rap or Norwegian Death Metal.
My observation is that you always need a ghost clanking around in chains:
NOW THAT'S GOTHIC.
The Nun
by Denis Diderot
published in 1780
Penguin Classics edition published 1972
Translation and Notes by Leonard Tancock
I'm down to the BOTTOM FIVE of the 1700s portion of the 2006 edition of 1001 Books To Read Before You Die. That five includes this book, Confessions, Revories of a Solitary Walker and Julie or The New Heloise all by Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Justine by Marquis De Sade. I actually bought this edition of The Nun after learning that it would cost me just as much to buy the one cent physical copy used as the digital edition. If that's the case- meaning the digital copy is more then four books at a minimum- I'll go with a physical book.
Denis Diderot is one of the three main figures of the French Enlighenement, along with Voltaire and Rousseau. All three are represented on the 1001 Books To Read Before You Die list, but none of their books are what I would call "fun" unless you are a philosophy student, in which case their fiction is more fun than their philosophy. The Nun is stylisticly closed to being a modern Novel, in that it is the purported autobiography of a Nun. Compared to other Novels written around the same time, The Nun has a bracing pace and command of technique and art that surpasses his contemporaries. It's also more then a little bit naughty, since the second episode of The Nun concerns the attempted seduction of the titular Nun by the Mother Supieror of her convent.
Coming in at a brisk 180 pages, The Nun is an easy read and might well provide some sort of spark of inspiration in a modern reader- 18th century French Nuns? That shit is hot.
CLARISSA BY SAMUEL RICHARDSON (4/30/12)
 |
| Samuel Richardson |
BOOK REVIEW
Clarissa Harlowe; or the history of a young lady
comprehending the most important concerns of private life.
and particularly shewing, The Distresses that may attend the misconduct both of parents and children, in relation to marriage
by Samuel Richardson
Produced by Julie C. Sparks
Read on an Amazon Kindle
published 1748
This review contains spoilers but I'm just going to assume that everyone who reads this review has either already read Clarissa or never will, because Clarissa is the longest novel in the English language. When I say longest novel in the English language I mean nine volumes of 300 pages each in "KINDLE SIZE" pages. It took me approximately 2 hours to read each volume, so I spent 20 hours, more or less, reading Clarissa. I am positive that I never would have read Clarissa before the adoption of the Ereader- either Amazon Kindle or Apple Ebook. First of all, it doesn't come in an edition that contains less then four volumes. That makes Clarissa an unpopular classic for would-be publishers. Second of all Clarissa is an epistolary novel, which is the literary equivalent of a Dinosaur: Perhaps interesting for nerds to study and talk about, but non-existant in the present. Third, the subject matter and resolution of Clarissa: The courtship, seduction/rape and eventual death of the titular Clarissa are treated in such a fashion as to exclude Clarissa as an apporpriate book for school age children. Let's be honest: Children are the number one Audience target for literary classics because High School and above age children are FORCED to read classics. No ONE is reading Clarissa "for class." What teacher/class combination is going to take the time to read a 2000 page 18th century English novel?
I certainly question Clarissa's inclusion on the 2006 edition of the 1001 Books To Read Before You Die list. I especially question Clarissa's inclusion in the 2006 edition because that was before the widespread adoption of the Ebook/KINDLE electronic book format, so the editors are essentially saying, "Yes- track down the four volume set and read it." It's impractical to expect people to read Clarissa, simply because of it's extraordinary length. The enduring success of Clarissa tells me that it must have been, essentially the only hit to come out in 1748 and it basically obtained 100% of the potential market for a novel- because people bought this and just devoured it and passed it around. Like they literally had nothing else to read. It just shows you the amount of time the Audience in 1748 devoted to reading books.
If you are talking about comparable ways people spent their time on leisure activities today, someone would spend an equivalent amount of time playing World of Warcraft or Call of Duty, or perhaps "power-watching" Star Trek: The Next Generation on Netflix. It is important to recognize that the Epistolary novel technique is, by Richardson's own words in his Postscript; where he essentially engages his critics- a Realist technique. One of the main ways that the Novel as an Art Form differed from Literary predecessors was the accumulation of specific, verifiable detail in a way that over-lapped with similar developments in the field of Journalism. Thus it's fair to describe the Epistolary novel, as exemplified by Clarissa as a primitive but important step towards the realist technique that would dominate 19th century literature.
The only predecessor that Richardson has in terms of the Rise of the Novel is Defoe, and it was interesting to see how the characters inside Clarissa were aware of Defoe- but only Defoe- as an example of behavior fit for Novelization. A sort of self-awareness, if you would? The 18th century equivlaent of a television show actor "breaking" and directly addressing the camera. It's also interesting to see how the story is influenced by/shares common influences with, Defoe's Moll Flanders (published in 1722) and Roxana (in 1724) being the most obvious inspirations for Clarissa. Yet another interesting sub-category is the relationship of Clarissa to Samuel Richardson's earlier epistolary novel, Pamela. I'm not positive, but I believed in Pamela Richardson had alot of overlapping letters- describing the same events with no major differences. In Clarissa, these parts are elided or summarized by the unnamed narrator. Pamela, published in 1740, had a happy ending, Clarissa, on the other hand, is a tragedy through and through- instead of a marriage, the deaths of the two lovers, one by "heart break" the other in an duel with Clarissa's kinsman (in Italy, of course.)
There is so much and so little going on in Clarissa at the same time: so little in terms of character development or plot advancement, and so much in terms of secondary themes and depiction of social interaction that reading Clarissa is an exasperating experience, and it points to the fact that I, like, all other readers today, have more options then did Clarissa's Audience- this being a time when there around a 100 books a YEAR published in England.
 |
| The Marquis De Sade |
BOOK REVIEW
Justine, Or Good Conduct Well Chastened
by Marquis De Sade
published 1791
Read on Amazon Kindle
Let me tell you something, compared to the other book that Marquis De Sade placed on the 2006 edition of 1001 Books To Read Before You Die- 120 Days of Sodom- Justine is tame stuff indeed. To call Justine tame in comparison to the 120 Days of Sodom is not to say that it is tame by 18th century standards (or even by modern standards) - it's simply tame in comparison to the graphic sex and violence of 120 Days of Sodom.
 |
| Justine by Marquis De Sade was mad into a film with Klaus Kinski and Jack Palance |
Justine is basically De Sade's take on Samuel Richardson's Pamela. Pamela's subheading is "On good virtue being well rewarded." so De Sade is inverting that formula. In Pamela, the titular heroine holds out against the rapey Master of the house until he marries her. In Justine, the heroine tries to be good but is rewarded for her goodness with basically constant Rape and abuse. The most telling parts of Justine are when her abusers justify themselves with high flown philosophical ideas while doing things like raping her repeatedly. In that way, Justine can be read as a satire or parody of enlightenment ideology in a way that 120 Days of Sodom can not.
With Justine finished I'm down to the last four novels from the 1700s left in the 2006 edition of the 1001 Books To Read Before You Die book. As it turns out, I still have my copy of Jean-Jacques Rousseau's confessions that I must have read in high school, but I'm going to re-read it, because that's how I roll. It also looks like I need to write reviews of four more books that I read but never reviewed. But still, the end is near. So close, I can almost taste it.
Castle Rackrent by Maria Edgeworth (5/2/12)
MARIA EDGEWORTH
BOOK REVIEW
Castle Rackrent
by Maria Edgeworth
Originally published in 1800
Oxford World's Classics Series
published 1964, edited by George Watson
introduction, bibliography by Kathryn J. Kirkpatrick, 1995
this edition published in 2008.
Maria Edgeworth is either described as "the Irish Jane Austen" or "the lady Walter Scott," two comparisons that show you what a killer Maria Edgeworth was in the Novel writing game at the beginning of the 19th century. Edgeworth was the daughter of protestant Anglo landlord's who had been in Ireland since the beginning of the 17th century.
The introduction written by Kathryn J. Kirkpatrick is a good argument for why you would buy this specific book rather then reading a public domain copy. Edgeworth is certainly not as popular as Jane Austen, a taste for Maria Edgeworth is a little "inside baseball," if you know what I mean. As Kirkpatrick puts it, "Innovative, prophetic and artistically masterful, the book both borrows from and originates a variety of literary genres and sub-genres without fitting neatly into any of them. This protean quality may account for the novel's ambiguous status in the literary canon as well as its pervasive influence. Combining the subtle wit of the French tale, the Gaelic cadences of Irish oral tradition, and Gothic intrigue over property and inheritance, Castle Rackrent has gathered a dazzling array of firsts- the first regional novel, the first socio-historical novel, the first Irish novel, the first Big House novel, the first saga novel."
I know that female novelists of the 18th and early 19th century aren't generally thought to be subversive or counter-cultural, but I really see the emergence of Jane Austen/female novelists as a seminal moment in world cultural history, akin to the invention of the piano or the use of perspective in Renaissance painting.
Edgeworth both precedes Austen and writes from the perspective of the literary outsider. Considering the future history of the "local" novel- i.e. eventually dominating serious literature in the 20th century, Castle Rackrent being the first "local" novel is important. Castle Rackrent is also less then a hundred pages, and when you compare her compact, descriptive prose to the sprawling digressive quality of a Frances Burney, the reader is much closer to "now" in Castle Rackrent vs Burney's Camilla: EVEN THOUGH THE TWO BOOKS WERE WRITTEN WITHIN FIVE YEARS OF ONE ANOTHER.
Edgeworth is on a different style planet then is Burney. The hey-day of the Victorian novel is imminent when Castle Rackrent was published. Castle Rackrent was, in fact, a direct influence of writers like Walter Scott and Jane Austen because not that many books were published back then- perhaps a little more then a hundred. The fact that Castle Rackrent was published at all, meant that it would be noticed by people "in the scene."
MARIA EDGEWORTH
Book Review
The Absentee
by Maria Edgeworth
p. 1812
Read on Amazon Kindle
I'm writing this review looking over my shoulder at the specter of Jane Austen. Maria Edgeworth's, The Absentee was published in 1812. Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility was published in 1811, and Austen had three other hits in the next five years (with two hits published after she died.) The fact is, every single novel that Austen completed is a major, major, world-wide hit, and it is hard not to look at influences and contemporary authors without seeing the shadow that Jane Austen casts over the development of the Novel as an art form. Austen def. counts as an Artist who "wasn't appreciated at the time." Whereas Edgeworth was quite notable in 1812 as a result of 1800's Castle Rackrent.
Thus, a critic/reader/audience member in 1812 or 1813 might have thought that Maria Edgeworth would be a writer "for the ages" and not have heard of Jane Austen. While Austen was reeling off hit after hit, and not having an immediate Audience for her work, Edgeworth was also continuing to write additional novels, but these have no where near the level of Audience as ALL of Austen's books.
At the same time, The Absentee was an enjoyable read for me, and I'm dreading each and every one of the six Jane Austen novel's I'm about to read, and that is because Jane Austen's books are all so familiar. Writing a review of a Jane Austen book is like writing an album review about a Beatles record: You can do it, but you won't be adding anything to the discussion.
Maria Edgeworth was the daughter of a Jean-Jacques Rousseau reading English Lord who had an estate in Ireland. Initially, Edgeworth wrote with/for her father, only gradually expanding into her own right as Author. It's clear that one of the main differences between Edgeworth and Austen is that Edgeworth was in innovator/radical, and Austen was a classicist- perfecting an already existing form. Edgeworth and Austen read each other, and they both read Frances Burney. Both purchased Burney's Camillia, published in 1796 by mail-order subscription.
Personally, I found The Absentee to much more enjoyable, though perhaps less advanced in structure, then Castle Rackrent. Although The Absentee takes aspects of the picaresque and marriage plot from various sources, the social concern expressed is entirely novel, and the pacing and language is far more sophisticated compared to that in Camillia. In The Absentee we begin to see expressed some of the most critical themes of the Victorian novel as exemplified by Austen, Dickens and their cohorts: social concern, and a heightened awareness of pacing and use of language- themes that continue to characterize the Novel as an art form.
Edgeworth is a good Author to have in your back pocket in case you run into any serious Jane Austen fans in your life.
DENIS DIDEROT
Book Review
Jacques The Fatalist
A New Translation by David Coward
Oxford World's Classics
written between 1762 and 1780
published in 1796
this translation published in 1999
Diderot, along with Voltaire and Rousseau, is considered to be one of the three main philosophes of the French Enlightenment. His cardinal achievement was his encyclopedia, the first of its kind in French. In addition to being one of the most well known popularizer of Enlightenment era ideals, he also wrote fiction on the side. Unfortunately, his fiction was "too radical" for the French public when he wrote it, and as a result there was a 20-30 year period when Diderot's novels were only read privately.
With the exception of Marquis De Sade, whose books were not published in uncensored fashion until the 20th century, Diderot is the only writer on the 1001 Books To Read Before You Die list who has these kinds of publication issues until you get into writers who wrote under oppressive 20th century regimes. Obviously, it's impossible for a work to gain an Audience if publication is forbidden.
According to the introduction in this edition, Jacques the Fatalist, which tells the story of a master and servant travelling together on the road, was directly inspired by Laurence Sterne's Tristram Shandy, but both Diderot and Sterne were likely inspired by the earlier bawdy work of French author Rabelais, who appears on the 1001 Books list with Gargantua and Pantagruel. All three works are characterized by digression and bawdiness, and all three anticipate the self-reflexivity of modern fiction.
Other then the historical significance, there isn't much to recommend Jacques to a modern reader.
BOOK REVIEW
The Confessions
by Jean-Jacques Rousseay
p. 1781 (completed in 1765)
Penguin Classics edition published 1953
Translation and Notes by J.M. Cohen
I've actually owned this particular edition of Jean-Jacques Rousseau's The Confessions since my fresh man year of high school. I know that because it's the most elaborately underlined book I own and bears notes in the margins that correspond to my high school hand writing. Of course, I have no memory of talking about this book, although I do, very much, remember other discussions, particularly talking about Homer's The Odyssey in Freshman English.
The Confessions is the second of five books on my "BOTTOM FIVE" books from the 1700s in the 2006 edition of 1001 Books To Read Before You Die. That's funny, because I've actually owned this book the entire time- and read half of it in high school. Shows my lack of enthusiasm for Rousseau, but after gritting my teeth and wading through all 500 plus pages, he's gained my grudging respect for his originality and over-all contribution to the Romantic movement in arts & literature, which he is justly credited with helping to invent.
Part of what makes The Confessions so very immortal is Rousseau's status as a "persecuted celebrity"- The Confessions often feels closer in spirit to a celebrity tell-all then a serious "auto-biography." Part of what distinguished Rousseau's body of work was his celebration of extreme emotions and his desire to cultivate, rather then repress, those emotions. Also, Rousseau brought a level of personal introspection to literature that had only been found in Confessional religious literature prior to the publication of The Confessions.
Despite his deep, deep desire to portray himself as a "lone wolf" in The Confessions- history tells up otherwise. He was very much buddy/buddy with Denis Diderot and the Encyclopedists of Paris before he entered his Greta Garbo phase. He rose to prominence by winning a national essay contest, and actually wrote The Confessions while he is in England, the guest of English philosopher David Hume.
The Confessions has such a protean quality that it is difficult to do the book justice in a Blog format. Suffice it to say that as an object of contemplation, The Confessions provides the reader hours of interest.
BOOK REVIEW
Reveries of The Solitary Walker
by Jean-Jacques Rousseau
p. 1780
Penguin Classics Edition
Translated and with an Introduction by Peter France
p. 1979
Both The Confessions and Reveries of The Solitary Walker were published posthumously. I can't imagine writing something like The Confessions and not getting to see it in print. Rousseau was plagued by health problems, in particular he had to use a catheter on a daily basis- makes me squeamish just writing the words.
Reveries of The Solitary Walker is like a coda for The Confessions, handling events- in an indirect fashion- that occurred after The Confessions concludes. Seems like kind of a dubious title to include on the 1001 Books To Read Before You Die list- and I frankly wonder whether it made the cut in the 2010 edition. CANT WAIT TO FIND OUT.
But basically Reveries is more "philosophical" in tone, whereas The Confessions is more biographical, so in Reveries you get a purer statement of Rousseau's philosophical believes, rather then his thoughts about what happened to him when he was a lad.
ONLY TWO BOOKS FROM THE 1700s LEFT AFTER THIS ONE: Julie or the New Heloise by Jean-Jacques Rousseau AND Dangerous Liasons.
Book Review
The Monastery
by Sir Walter Scott
p. 1820
Kindle Edition
After the "Rise" of the Novel during the 18th century, the popularity of the novel and size of the audience grew precipitously between 1811, the publication date for Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility, and continued apace for two decades, culminating in the reign of Charles Dickens. Austen and Scott wrote prior to Dickens. At the time, Scott was big deal, and Austen not so much. Austen wouldn't reach her "Modern" popularity until the end of the 19th century.
Discounting Austen, Sir Walter Scott was THE man- probably reaching his professional peak in Rob Roy, published in 1818, and then experiencing a slight decline in critical esteem (while maintaining and increasing the size of his Audience) through the 1820s. In 1820 he published both The Monastery AND Ivanhoe BOTH of which made the cut in the 2006 edition of 1001 Things To Read Before You Die.
I think it's been so long since Sir Walter Scott has been read by anyone outside of the specialist academic field of 19th century Literature that incumbent for a reviewer to argue that someone, anyone should read one or more of Scott's book.
In that regard, his status as an originator of historical fiction, and the resemblance between aspects of Scott's inestimable style and the history fun house of an Umberto Eco is probably the best bet. Um... he brought back Robin Hood(in Ivanhoe.)
But maybe the argument for Sir Walter Scott as his status as the originator of the first nostalgic artistic "scene" not based on Greece/Rome/The Classics. He evoked mid 18th century Scotland in the early 19th century and he was the first Novelist to make a specific place "cool." There are direct links between the worlds of Sir Walter Scott and the earliest available popular songs in America.
Is The Monastery the one book to read if you are only going to read one book by Sir Walter Scott? Probably not. I would stick with Ivanhoe- they were both published in the same year and Ivanhoe is clearly the bigger "hit." The Monastery also has a sequel, The Abbot, and I kind of feel compelled to read that book as well, even though I have no desire to do so.
Unlike Ivanhoe, The Monastery lays on the 1820's "GOTH WAVE" lather pretty thick. Starting with Mary Shelly's Frankenstein, published in 1818. Then there is Melmoth the Wanderer by Charles Maturin published in 1820., The Albigenses by the same author, in 1824, and then the Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner by James Hogg- also published in 1824. All of these books have what you would call "GOTH REVIVAL" themes.
Despite Scott maintaining the historic fiction subject matter, in The Monastery he moves even further away from his wheel-house, the Scottish scene of the 18th century, and into areas where he had less of a feel for the material. The characters in The Monastery- set in the 16th century- are, to put it charitably, leaden. Still writing Anonymously, though acknowledging his status as "the author of Waverley"(his first hit.)
It is inexplicable how The Monastery could make the list while Waverley, his first novel, and the novel that "invented" historical fiction, could be left off the list. I hope they made a change in the 2010 edition of 1001 Books To Read Before You Die.
|
| Samuel Richardson |
Book Review
Institutions of the English Novel
by Homer Obed Brown
University of Pennsylvania Press
p. 1997
I think most of what the reader needs to know about this book is encapsulated by the Index entry for Jacques Derrida:
Derrida, J., 4, 8, 41-42, 74, 138, 204n.5, 207n.12, n. 19, 208n.29.
Sure, many of those references are in the notes, but that should hardly count against Jacques Derrida- dude lives in the notes. There is an interesting book buried in 200 pages of discipline specific jargon, which is that the canonization process of the 18th century Novel: works by Authors like Samuel Richardson, Henry Fielding and Lawrence Sterne- didn't actually happen until the beginning of the 19th century. In other words, he's saying that there is a kind of pause button that is set on the canonization process- a delay if you will.
|
| Henry Fielding |
I think that one point is interesting enough to explore in detail, but the rest of this book is exactly the kind of book you would expect from an Author who would cite Jacques Derrida ten times in 200 page book.
In the style of Jacques Derrida use of paradox and counter-example, the heart of Brown's argument lies in the critical treatment of Daniel Defoe in the early 19th century, a time when other early Novelists of the 18th century were being canonized by critics like Sir Walter Scott. An example of true literary critic hermetic-ism, Institutions of the English Novel largely exists to criticize Ian Watt's The Rise of the Novel as being superficial and reductionist. Well excuse me for thinking that Daniel Defoe was canonized in the same time period as Henry Fielding and Samuel Richardson.
 |
| Daniel Defoe |
I think there is an interesting book that could be developed about of parts of Institutions of the English Novel, but most of this book is a struggle and carries a high level of lit crit jargon.
 |
| William Hogarth's The Rake's Progress: HE ENDS UP INSANE WITH SYPHILLIS! |
The First Bohemians: Life and Art in London's Golden Age
by Vic Gatrell
Penguin Publishing
October 3, 2013
(BUY IT)
I'd imagine there is a rather limited audience for popular history type books about 18th century London, but the fact that The First Bohemians: Life and Art in London's Golden Age is out on Allen Lane, an imprint of Penguin, speaks to Gatrell as both a prestige historian with cross-over potential and someone who writes history books that non-historians might care to read.
 |
| William Hogarth: The Harlot's Progress |
Here, the project seems to have been inspired for the increased availability of free digital versions of works by artists like Hogarth and Rowlandson, and indeed, The First Bohemians is as interesting for it's pictures and illustrations as it is for the text. Although I understand the choice that was made for the title by the publisher, this book could just as easily and accurately been titled, 'The Artistic Community in 18th Century Covent Garden.
Covent Garden is of course the still in existence, but hugely changed neighborhood that lies north of "the Strand" and east of Leicester Square in 2014 London. In the 18th century, this neighborhood was a dense melting pot, with a surfeit of bars, whores and artists. While the glorification of Bohemian type neighborhoods is common today, the Artists discussed in this volume have long awaited proper recognition. Perhaps their biggest crime was belonging to the relatively bawdy sensibility of the 18th century and therefore being out of touch with the more straight laced, refined sensibility of both the Victorian and Early Modern period.
The severely White and Male dominated nature of the culture of this period counted against the 18th century Covent Garden art scene in the later part of the 20th century, and perhaps even accounts for a relative lack of attention to these Artists even as other "low" forms of visual art, like packaging, advertising and comics have been elevated via academic discourse. To the extent that a book about a time and place (Covent Guardian in the 18th century,) the "main characters are the visual artists William Hogarth and Thomas Rowlandson. Of the two, Hogarth remains familiar as one of the main representatives of 18th century English culture (and a great deal easier to 'read' than 800 page novels) while Rowlandson has only recently been rediscovered.
Both Hogarth and Rowlandson gained their fortune creating original prints that were mass produced and sold at reasonable prices. They were a key component of 18th century culture, which had yet to become fully literate. Both were known for their realism and attention to detail, even as they gained stature as satirists of contemporary mores. Gatrell is careful to situate Hogarth and Rowlandson which was, again, very heavy on drinking to excess and whoring.
Certainly a must for anyone seeking a serious understanding of 18th century artistic culture in England- whether visual or written, and it's important to understand how the visual hugely influenced the written, and was referred to by the more remembered novels of the period.
Books and Their Readers in Eighteenth-Century England: New Essays
edited by Isabel Rivers
p. 2003
Leicester University Press
A Continuum imprint
Books and Their Readers in Eighteenth-Century England: New Essays should NOT be confused with the original Books and Their Reader in Eighteenth-Century England, published in 1982. This volume revisits the same area of inquiry with the benefit of two decades of additional research. This volume is a compilation of essays around the theme. There are chapters on The Book Trades, The English Bible and its Reader in the Eighteenth Century, Theological Books from The Naked Gospel to Nemesis of Faith, The History Market in Eighteenth-Century England, Biographical Dictionaries and their Uses from Bayle to Chalmers, Review Journals and the Reading Public, Literary Scholarship and the Life of Editing and OF COURSE, The Production and Consumption of the Eighteenth-Century Poetic Miscellany.
If a reader is actually looking for a discussion of any of the above subjects, Books and Their Readers is a must. For a general reader, there isn't much there. Of the eight included essays, the only one with some general reader value is Review Journals and the Reading Public by Antonia Foster. This essay gives a succinct summary of the origins of literary criticism, and anyone who writes or reads literary criticism or any of its descendants would do well to take the half hour it takes to read this brief essay.
In Foster's telling, literary criticism was invented because of an upsurge in both titles available and readers. This development happened in England, in the mid 18th century, although Foster does reference a French journal from the 16th century that inspired the English writers. The origins of literary criticism are tied to publishers- several of the early critical journals were founded by publishers themselves.
The original justification for literary criticism was to provide a guide to the public as to whether they should spend their money or not on a particular book. When one considers the self-righteous path that criticism took into the 20th and 21st century, the financial/practical considerations which lay behind the origins of literary criticism are worth taking into account.
by Ian Duncan
p. 1992
Cambridge University Press
Modern romance and transformations of the novel has been parked in the depths of my Amazon Wish List since 2012 and I was like, "Fuck it, let's knock this puppy out." Get another label tag for Sir Walter Scott, Charles Dickens, 18th century literature, 19th century literature. That's five reasons to read this book. This title is not for the casual reader. I maybe grasped forty percent of the material. The author is well immersed in the critical literary theory of the 80s and 90s, with tons of references to French theorists.
The thesis tracks with that espoused by the Authors in The Invention of Tradition, which also discusses the role that Sir Walter Scott had in inventing the tradition of the Scottish highlands. Sir Walter Scott was a second generation Edinburgh attorney, and a member of the lesser Scotch/English nobility. He was not from or of the Scottish highland locale that he popularized. Scott was also well familiar with the literary genre of Romance.
If there is one single fact I've learned about the "Rise of the Novel" in the 18th and 19th century, it's that the closest literary antecedent was the Romance. The Romance was not a primarily English genre- with the leading exponents coming from France and Spain. Also, the beginning of the move from Romance to Novel was also from Spain, with Don Quixote being widely read in English translation shortly after publication.
Duncan argues that it was Scott who, by and large, performed this transformation. His work had a complex relationship with history and politics, and this relationship is only comprehensible if one understands Scott's relationship to his English audience. Duncan also discusses the relationship between Scott and Dickens, and argues that Dickens success was spurred by his careful attention to Scott and his wielding of Romance to other popular genres of literature.
For specialists only, and those with an interest in critical theory.
 |
| Michael Schmidt, author of The Novel - A Biography, an impressive achievement, published in April of 2014. |
Book Review:
The Novel - A Biography
by Michael Schmidt
April 14th, 2014 by The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press
(BUY IT)
1100 pages, with index and time line
Couple facts to know about The Novel - A Biography by Michael Schmidt are 1) This book is 1100 pages long. 2) This book is analogous to the 1001 Books Project, except it isn't a list, there are no pictures, and Schmidt draws his secondary material almost 100% from comments made by other Authors discussed in the book. 3) While the book isn't technically ordered chronologically, it does read that way, so that each chapter's main author/s are discussed sequentially, with later authors who were influenced by that writer grouped in the initial chapter.
The Novel - A Biography may seem like an unlikely subject for a book that is seemingly written for a "general" Audience, but the idea of it being a Biography is key. After a straight up list, a biography is the genus of non fiction most amenable to the general audience for non fiction subjects, whether it be history, science or some other discipline. Thus, calling this book a biography seems like a valid ploy as a marketing gimmick to engage a general readership with what is more of a history of the novel as an art form.
Schmidt's decision to restrict his secondary material to comments by other Authors discussed in The Novel - A Biography proves savvy on a number of levels. First, he excludes with one swipe of the hand a half century of unreadable critical theory. The inclusion of that material would have doubled the length and made The Novel - A Biography unapproachable. Second, comments by one author about a second author are a good way to transition between putatively unrelated subjects. Third, the reliance on a single category of secondary material binds the book together thematically, making a potentially unwieldy subject (and length)
The amount of insight a random reader will derive from The Novel - A Biography will be inevitably tied to the amount of the authors discussed that the reader has read, and their underlying interest in the novel as an art form. In my case, I score high on both axis-es, and came to see The Novel - A Biography as the second circle of a triangular venn diagram alongside 1001 Books to Read Before You Die and a third point to be determined. Unsurprisingly, there was a huge overlap between the works discussed in The Novel - A Biography and 1001 Books to Read Before You Die. The areas of disagreement are limited- less discussion of German, French, Scandinavian and Latin American authors, in The Novel - A Biography, and a heavier discussion of English and American authors.
Occasionally interesting discussions are interspersed with paragraphs that appear to be included in workmanlike fashion, and there are actual typographical errors and spelling variations of character names within a single sentence which made me question just how carefully this 1100 page book was put together. Although I borrowed The Novel - A Biography from the library, I will likely be adding it to my personal library once the price drops from current newish release level prices.
Tristram Shandy (1767) by Laurence Sterne (1/9/17)
Tristram Shandy (1767)
by Laurence Sterne
I first wrote about Tristram Shandy in an early 1001 Books Project review from 2008, where I discussed it in terms of the 2005 film, Tristram Shandy: A Cock and Bull Story. In retrospect, this was an error, first because nobody gives a fuck about Steve Coogan and Rob Bryden, the stars of that film. On the other hand, the importance of this book in mind as being one of the top 10 most important novels ever only increases with time. I've twice revisited the original review in an attempt to give this work a more fitting description on this blog.
The modern trend is to see Tristram Shandy as a forerunner of modernism and post-modernism in terms of use of non-linear plot development and self-referential characters. Describing Tristram Shandy in such a fashion diminishes its instant popularity upon time of publication and its enduring popularity a century or more before the rise of "modernism", let alone "post-modernism."
Perhaps the tone of the above two paragraphs suggests some of the rabbit holes that dog any interpretation of Tristram Shandy. I will say that although it took me six + months to actually finish it, this is one of those "classic" novels that can actually inform your understanding of contemporary life- not to mention literature, and as such it is worth the investment of time & energy.
Returning to this review some six years later, I feel compelled to include a summary of the story. I've included a summary from the website "Sparknotes" on the theory that it is a well written summary:
There are, nevertheless, two clearly discernible narrative lines in the book.
The second major plot consists of the fortunes of Tristram's Uncle Toby. Most of the details of this story are concentrated in the final third of the novel, although they are alluded to and developed in piecemeal fashion from the very beginning. Toby receives a wound to the groin while in the army, and it takes him four years to recover. When he is able to move around again, he retires to the country with the idea of constructing a scaled replica of the scene of the battle in which he was injured. He becomes obsessed with re-enacting those battles, as well as with the whole history and theory of fortification and defense. The Peace of Utrecht slows him down in these "hobby-horsical" activities, however, and it is during this lull that he falls under the spell of Widow Wadman. The novel ends with the long-promised account of their unfortunate affair. (Sparknotes)
The key to understanding Tristram Shandy's long term appeal is understanding the way author Laurence Sterne anticipates modernist technique, but the quality that makes it readable for a larger audience is the humor. The humor is centered in the Uncle Toby, a guy who probably had his junk shot off fighting Napoleon and after becomes obsessed with re-enactments of that same battle. I would say that the chances of any reader who doesn't "get" the humor of Uncle Toby is a long shot to finish reading Tristram Shandy.
 |
| Pierce Brosnan played Robinson Crusoe in the 1997 Australian-American film version of the 1719 novel by Daniel Defoe. |
Robinson Crusoe (1719)
by Daniel Defoe
As I sit here, revising this post which I wrote back in February/March 2008, I feel like at the time I read Robinson Crusoe- 2008- still the earliest stages of this project (in fact, perhaps before the project crystallized as a part of this blog), I did not appreciate it's significance in the history of the novel.
 |
| Cover of the Penguin Classics editions of Robinson Crusoe. One of the benefits of 18th century books is that they are all public demain and freely available on Kindle, Audio book, etc. |
Hard to believe that there was a time when Robinson Crusoe wasn't deeply embedded in the western psyche. As I sit here on my couch, it's easy to come up with a dozen contemporary reference points: Lost, that shitty Tom Hanks movie...um... well you get the idea. Two contemporary reference points. Like Moll Flanders, Defoe wrote Robinson Crusoe as a "biography", and like Flanders, people believed it. In fact, for many it is the character, not the author that people know and remember.
 |
| The set of illustrations done by N.C. Wyeth for his 1920 edition of Robinson Crusoe have become the standard set of illustrations for this book. Here, Crusoe is pictured in his island paradise. |
Regardless, Crusoe is an important precursor to the novel and after reading the book, its easy to see why. Defoe's protagonist is recognizable as a modern hero. Before I started Crusoe I had the vague idea that the book would start and end with him marooned on a desert island. Not so. Crusoe starts out as a young lad in the UK. He wants to go to sea, his dad tells him to stay home. He goes anyways. He hooks up with some Portuguese traders, gets captured by a Moorish pirate, escapes, is rescued off the coast of Africa, ends up in Brazil, starts a plantation, goes on an expedition to capture slaves(!) AND THEN he gets shipwrecked.
 |
| N.C. Wyeth's illustrations did much to anchor Crusoe as a 19th or 20th century bourgeois, reconstructing his bourgeois existence in exile. |
So. He's on the island, and he builds his own little world. The meat of the book alternates between his explaining his various innovations (builds a goat pen, farms some rice, builds a house) and making exhortations to god about his miserable fate/how lucky his is not to be dead.) This goes on for roughly 24 years(only 150 pages of text, tho.) Meanwhile I'm thinking, "Didn't he have a sidekick? Friday? Isn't Friday in this book?"
 |
| The relationship between Crusoe and Friday, shown here on an 1874 postcard, is the only part of the narrative that seems in any way dated, but he was in line with the spirit of his times. |
I think individualism is at the center of Robinson Crusoe. Crusoe's solitude is an early example of an internal, subjective narrative. We all live in Crusoe's world now, but it's easy to see why it was such a smash in 1719- it must have spoken deeply to the rise in individualism that coincided with with the rise of other aspects of modernity in the 18th century.
Moll Flanders (1722)
by Daniel DeFoe
Moll Flanders was first published in 1722. It was written by Daniel Defoe, three years after he had a huge success with Robinson Crusoe. Defoe didn't start writing fiction until his mid-50s- before then he was a journalist/rabble rouser/terrible business man (the chapters in Moll Flanders that describe the debtors prison of Newgate are written with such accuracy because Defoe himself spent time at Newgate).
 |
| Poster for the Kim Novak starring movie version. |
I tell ya'- Us Magazine and TMZ got nothing on ole' Moll Flanders. Moll is an orphan. She's taken in by a local town official. Both of the son's of the family fall in love with her, one takes her for his whore/mistress, the other one wants her to marry him. Then she gets married to her brother (unknowingly!). She moves to Virginia, moves back, falls for a banker, but marries a wealthy gentleman but it turns out he has no money, becomes a thief, gets caught and moves back to Virginia.
It's no wonder that this story has been made and remade time and time and time again into movies, tv mini series and made for tv movies. Time and time again I found myself thinking, "this was published in 1722?" It's no wonder the Puritans were disgusted with English culture and left for America!
Reading Moll Flanders rather put my conscience at ease about societies obsession with the tawdry details of "tabloid" culture. Apparently, it's been the same way since the very birth of the novel itself. Perez Hilton, TMZ, Jerry Springer & Moll Flanders. It just takes time for the appreciation to grow!
 |
| "Eastern" influences in 18th century popular culture influenced the literary output of that era, and embedded a strand of otherness in the emerging tradition of the ovel. |
Vathek: An Arabian Tale (1786)
by William Beckford
My initial take on Vathek, published back in 2010, wasn't even a take at all, just a block paragraph of the text with no added images or commentary
Carathis, Morakanabad, and two or three old vizirs, whose wisdom had hitherto withstood the attraction, wishing to prevent Vathek from exposing himself in the presence of his subjects, fell down in his way to impede the pursuit: but he, regardless of their obstruction, leaped over their heads, and went on as before. They then ordered the Muezins to call the people to prayers ; both for the sake of getting them out of the way, and of endeavoring, by their petitions, to avert the calamity: but neither of these expedients was a whit more successful. The sight of this fatal ball was alone sufficient to draw after it every beholder. The Muezins themselves, though they saw it but at a distance, hastened down from their minarets, and mixed with the crowd ; which continued to increase in so surprising a manner that scarce an inhabitant was left in Samarah except the aged; the sick, confined to their beds ; the infants at the breast, whose nurses could run more nimbly without them. Even Carathis, Morakanabad, and the rest, were all become of the party. The shrill screams of the females, who had broken from their apartments, and were unable to extricate themselves from the pressure of the crowd, together with those of the eunuchs jostling after them, and terrified lest their charge should escape from their sight; the execrations of husbands, urging forward and menacing each other ; kicks given and received ; stumblings and overthrows at every step ; in a word, the confusion that universally prevailed rendered Samarah like a city taken by storm, and devoted to absolute plunder. At last, the cursed Indian, who still preserved his rotundity of figure, after passing through all the streets and public places, and leaving them empty, rolled onwards to the plain of Catoul, and entered the valley at the foot of the mountain of the four fountains.
The longer I continue the 1001 Books project, the more convinced I become that the most interesting literary period is 18th century English literature, the place and time of the birth of the modern novel. Using the term "birth" is a hard opinion that the novel did not exist as an art form before the 18th century, and that after the 18th century, all novels would be created in the image of the 18th century English novel. It also means that examining the surrounding culture (English popular and literary culture in the 18th century) is more worthwhile than examining the surrounding culture of the 19th and 20th century novel, because the novel was created in the 18th century.
Vathek: An Arabian Tale is a typically eccentric non-novel of the 18th century that is a good illustration of one important strand of 18th century popular culture: The translation into English, for the first time, of A Thousand Nights and a Night, early in the 18th century. When Vathek: An Arabian Tale was published for the first time in 1786, the early elements for modern literary culture were in place: A network of reviewers located in different markets, a distribution network for new works and most importantly, an Audience. This Audience was well familiar with Arabian Tales by 1786, both as a work and a cultural category synonymous with the Middle East.
Vathek can be judged the best of a whole category of 18th century novel-narratives directly influenced by the Aesthetic of Arabian Nights, but ditches the format of fabelism for the more restrictive constraints of the novel. This "Arabian nights" strand of 18th century popular culture of which Vathek is a prime example, exists alongside the separate but related Aesthetic of Gothic, which also produced several notable 18th century early novels.
 |
| The Oxford World's Classics cover of the book containing A Tale of a Tub by Jonathan Swift was the best I could do for an image to accompany this post. |
Book Review:
A Tale of of a Tub (1704)
by Jonathan Swift
Jonathan Swift is a protean figure who sits astride the birth of the novel, not a novelist himself, but vital in shaping the parameters of what the novel could become. He's best know for his tales, Gulliver's Travels being best known, and for his satire, the cannibalism preaching Modest Proposal being most remembered in that category. A Tale of a Tub has elements of both veins of Swift's work.
Tale of a Tub is putatively a ham handed parable about a man with three sons, Peter, Martin & Jack. The man is god, his sons represent the Catholic Church, the Church of England and Protestants. Interspersed with the "story" chapters are numerous digressions, where the narrator- who is, in fact, supposed to come off as an idiot- makes numerous observations about the "culture of criticism" circa 1700 or so. You need to have some background in the era to appreciate quips about ancient vs. modern man or to chuckle out loud about the narrator's analysis of the history of criticism, but underneath the oblique references is some trenchant humor about the ease with which the newly empowered feel about venturing their (moronic) opinions about anything & everything.
The early 18th century bore many resemblances to our current situation, in terms of conditions being rife for the production of a new art form (the novel). Notably, the spread of the printing press to allow printing of cheap one sheets created a new market for shorter, popular works. Swift was a master of this format, and he was writing at a time when the novel itself did not exist. You can imagine Swift as a blogger or twitter personality of his day, working in a new media but frowned upon by his elders.
Like many of the 18th century works which preceded the codification of what was and was not a novel, A Tale of a Tub has an anarchic sensibility that is likely to remind modern readers of what we call "post-modern." In reality, 18th century fiction, like post-modernism, stood outside the tenets of 19th and 20th century "realism."
Joseph Andrews (1742)
by Henry Fielding
You can argue the point that Henry Fielding was the first novelist, properly speaking. Not a father of the novel but an actual novelist, making a living writing novels and selling copies of them to a general audience. The timing of each 18th century entry in the 1001 Books project is important because there are only 50ish titles to cover an entire century with three literature's (English, French and German) represented and many others left out entirely. It goes without saying that the 18th century is most dominated by English/British authors and that the invention of the novel as a modern art form happened exclusively in England in the mid 18th century, and Joseph Andrews is Exhibit "A" in the argument that the novel was fully developed in England in the mid 18th century. 1742. The year Joseph Andrews was published.
I don't know what to make of the repeated use of incest as a plot point in 18th century English lit. First Moll Flanders, and now Joseph Andrews- both use the prospect of brother/sister loving as a narrative device. I'm now four books into my survey of 18th century british literature and I have to say- I simply can't imagine what would possess a soul to pursue the study of literature beyond an undergraduate familiarity. Graduate school in literature? Becoming a professor of literature? I don't get it. My thought was that by starting this project I could generate interesting ideas for blog posts, but it's quite the opposite. I enjoy reading the novels, but it's a struggle to conceive of anything that would be interesting to anybody else.
Joseph Andrews was originally published in the 1740's. It was written by Fielding as a kind of literary response to Samuel Richardson's "Pamela", which was the "sentimental" tale of a servant girl who was wooed by her lascivious master, eventually convincing him to marry her. Upon publication, Pamela took fashionable London by storm- readers were shocked by the frank discussion of sexuality and edified by the "moral" triumph. Fielding responded, first by authoring a response to Pamela called "Shamela" in which a bawdy servant girl seduces her way to the top.
After the success of Shamela, Fielding wrote Joseph Andrews, which purports to be the tale of Pamela's brother. Pamela appears as a character in Joseph Andrews, now married to her aristo husband. In fact, Joseph Andrews has all the markings of something that could well be described as "post modern" and the fact that it was, in fact, written in 1740, is further proof- in my mind- of the proposition that to describe anything other then architecture as "post modern" is to brand yourself as a moron. Self awareness and reflexivity are not characteristic of post modernism, but rather characteristic of modernism itself. The fact is that writers in the 18th century were just as self aware as any "post modern" author, and Joseph Andrews is fair prove of that.
Fielding repeatedly breaks into digressions and tangents that make the reader conscious of the artificiality of the form of the novel. Joseph Andrews is filled with self consciousness, inside jokes, allusions to current events and jibes at contemporary society. The picture Fielding paints of British society circa 1740 makes it clear to me why so many people chose to emigrate. Fielding is at his sharpest when he mimics the pompous legal culture of 18th century Britain. Andrews and his traveling companions are repeatedly arrested under mistaken and/or dubious circumstances, only to be freed for equally mistaken or dubious reasons.
The story, such as it is, begins with Andrews being discharged from the service of the Lady Booby- she wants to get into his pants after her husband dies, he resists her. He starts on the road from London towards his home parish in the county. Along the way he falls in with Abraham Adams- a clergy man from his home town. Adams is the comic relief to Andrew's humorless leading man. The two travel from inn to inn before meeting up with Andrew's beloved- Fanny. The three of them continue home, begging for money, getting arrests for ridiculous "crimes" and listening to various people relate their life stories. The narrative is quite obviously meant to be a critique of english society of the time, particularly of the upper classes, who are constantly described as being venal, poorly educated buffoons. At one point, Adams is attacked by the hunting dogs of a country squire who delights in having his dogs attack men. At another, they are entertained by a different country squire who is known far and wide for making promises and disregarding them.
Upon their final arrival at their home town, Joseph and Fanny announce they are to be married. Lady Booby comes back from London and tries to thwart the marriage, and she is assisted by her nephew and Joseph's sister- Pamela- the character from the Samuel Richardson novel. Then of course, it's time for the incest twist, and all is resolved for the better. Joseph Andrews should be required reading for every pompous undergraduate who uses the phrase "post modern" in their intro to lit class in college. Might I suggest delivery via a well aimed throw at the back of the head?
1001 Books to Read Before You Die List (2008)
The 18th century is a big loser in the first revision of the 1001 Books list. Only two new titles were added that were published in the 18th century:
267. A Dream of Red Mansions – Cao Xueqin
268. Anton Reiser – Karl Philipp Moritz
267. The Monastery – Sir Walter Scott
268. Northanger Abbey – Jane Austen
Thus, for the first revision the break down of national literatures in the 18th century looks like this:
(F)The Nun – Denis Diderot (4/28/12)
(E)Camilla – Fanny Burney (1/17/12)
(E)The Monk – M.G. Lewis (3/13/10)
(G)Wilhelm Meister’s Apprenticeship – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (4/17/12)
(E)The Mysteries of Udolpho – Ann Radcliffe (04/24/12)
(E)The Interesting Narrative – Olaudah Equiano (3/05/12)
(E)The Adventures of Caleb Williams – William Godwin (4/21/12)
(E)Justine – Marquis de Sade (5/1/12)
(E)Vathek – William Beckford (1/21/10)
(F)The 120 Days of Sodom – Marquis de Sade (2/16/10)
(E)Cecilia – Fanny Burney (4/22/10) (DROP 2008)
(F)The Confessions – Jean-Jacques Rousseau (5/7/12)
(F)Dangerous Liaisons – Pierre Choderlos de Laclos (5/21/12)
(F)Reveries of a Solitary Walker – Jean-Jacques Rousseau (5/8/12)
(E)Evelina – Fanny Burney (3/28/10)
(G)The Sorrows of Young Werther – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (11/1/08).
(E)Humphrey Clinker – Tobias George Smollett (1/30/12)
(E)The Man of Feeling – Henry Mackenzie (4/12/12)
(E)A Sentimental Journey – Laurence Sterne (4/23/11)
(E)Tristram Shandy – Laurence Sterne (10/19/08)
(E)The Vicar of Wakefield – Oliver Goldsmith (9/25/08)
(E)The Castle of Otranto – Horace Walpole (04/26/12)
(F)Émile; or, On Education – Jean-Jacques Rousseau (4/14/12)
(F)Rameau’s Nephew – Denis Diderot (4/13/12)
(F)Julie; or, the New Eloise – Jean-Jacques Rousseau (*)
(E)Rasselas – Samuel Johnson (3/30/12)
(F)Candide – Voltaire (3/23/12)
(E)The Female Quixote – Charlotte Lennox (5/10/10)
(E)Amelia – Henry Fielding (4/20/12) (DROP 2008)
(E)Peregrine Pickle – Tobias George Smollett (4/19/12)
(E)Fanny Hill – John Cleland (05/10/12)
(E)Tom Jones – Henry Fielding (9/24/08)
(E)Roderick Random – Tobias George Smollett (10/05/08) (DROP 2008)
(E)Clarissa – Samuel Richardson (4/30/12)
(E)Pamela – Samuel Richardson (10/12/08)
(F)Jacques the Fatalist – Denis Diderot (05/4/12)
(E)Memoirs of Martinus Scriblerus – J. Arbuthnot, J. Gay, T. Parnell, A. Pope, J. Swift (3/21/12)
(E)Joseph Andrews – Henry Fielding (2/8/08)
(E)A Modest Proposal – Jonathan Swift (3/26/12) (DROP 2008)
(E)Gulliver’s Travels – Jonathan Swift (04/25/12)
(E)Roxana – Daniel Defoe (4/18/12) (DROP 2008)
(E)Moll Flanders – Daniel Defoe (2/10/08)
(E)Love in Excess – Eliza Haywood (11/1/08)
(E)Robinson Crusoe – Daniel Defoe (2/11/08)
(E)A Tale of a Tub – Jonathan Swift (2/12/08) (DROP 2008)
The 10 Hottest 18th Century Books (#9 May Shock You!)
| 120 Days of Sodom by the Marquis de Sade is a shocker! Def one of the hottest 10 books of the 18th century |
(1) Robinson Crusoe (1719) – Daniel Defoe (Reviewed 2/11/08)
(2) Gulliver’s Travels (1726)– Jonathan Swift (Reviewd 04/25/12)
(3) Tom Jones (1749)– Henry Fielding (Reviewed 9/24/08)
(4) Fanny Hill (1749)– John Cleland (Reviewed 05/10/12)
(5) Tristram Shandy (1759) – Laurence Sterne (Reviewed 10/19/08)
(6) The Castle of Otranto (1764) – Horace Walpole (Reviewed 04/26/12)
(7) The Sorrows of Young Werther (1774) – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (Reviewed 11/1/08).
(8) The Confessions (1782)– Jean-Jacques Rousseau (Reviewed 5/7/12)
(9) The 120 Days of Sodom (1785) – Marquis de Sade (Reviewed 2/16/10)
(10) The Interesting Narrative (1789) – Olaudah Equiano (Reviewed 3/05/12)
 |
| In Castaway, Tom Hanks played a modern day Robinson Crusoe, which continues to inspire movies and new books today. |
 |
| Jack Black is the most recent Hollywood actor to portray Gulliver from Gulliver's Travels, in the 2010 film. |
 |
| 18th century copies of Fanny Hill were often illustrated, here is a typical example of a man and woman having wheelbarrow style sex |
 |
| Steve Coogan made a movie of Tristam Shandy recently, but it didn't go over very well. |
 |
| Wednesday Addams represents a continuation of the gothic aesthetic that was vibrant when The Castle of Otranto was published. |
 |
| Like the gothic of The Castle of Otranto, the romanticism of The Sorrows of Young Werther descends in a pretty straight line to rock and roll bands like The Smiths and their tone and imagery. |
Julie, or the new Heloise (1761)
by Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Woooo- last 18th century book on the original 1001 Books list. Also, only one book from the pre-18th century section (Arabian Nights.) It's been just over a decade since I started this project- the first 18th century book from the 1001 Books list was Tom Jones- published on September 24th, 2008. Julie was last because it is an epistolary novel, 600 pages long, and written by Rousseau, who is not my favorite prose stylist.
I'm sure there is much to be gained from a careful reading of Julie but I was mostly concerned with actually finishing it. PS- SHE DIES AT THE END! In the first 1001 Books revision, the 18th century is a big loser- with I think, only one book added and several subtracted in favor of books written before the 18th century- mostly Japanese and Chinese books from the Western Middle Ages.
The epistolary (letter format) novel is an important historical step for the development of the novel, particularly as it relates to the thoughts and feelings of adolescent women seeking to navigate the complex currents of 18th century gender politics. The epistolary format, however, is boring as hell, and nothing ever happens- just people writing letters and describing thoughts, feelings and past events. Also, lengthy.
 |
| One hit wonder Matthew "Monk" Lewis |
The Monk (1796)
by Matthew Lewis
“Carry you to Matilda ?” he continued, repeating Ambrosio's words: “Wretch! you shall soon be with her! You well deserve a place near her, for hell boasts no miscreant more guilty than yourself. Hark, Ambrosio, while I unveil your crimes! You have shed the blood of two innocents ; Antonia and Elvira perished by your hand. That Antonia whom you violated, was your sister! That Elvira whom you murdered, gave you birth! Tremble, abandoned hypocrite! inhuman parricide! incestuous ravisher! tremble at the extent of your offences! And you it was who thought yourself proof against temptation, absolved from human frailties, and free from error and vice! Is pride then a virtue? Is inhumanity no fault? Know, vain man! that I long have marked you for my prey - pg. 401Ambrosio is The Monk of the book, The Monk by Matthew Lewis, an early example of a pop culture phenomenon that left the author forever knowns as "Monk" Lewis. In the parlance of today, The Monk is Gothic AF and waaaayyy racier than what a reader might expect from books published in the 19th century.
The paragraph above is from the very end of the book, when Ambrosio who has albeit unknowingly, abducted, raped and murdered his sister and murdered his mother, finally relents and sells his soul to the devil in exchange for escaping his execution at the hands of the Inquisition. Before the denouement, The Monk is a wild and oft incoherent ride, apparently written by Lewis in a weekend, as was often the style in the period before "writer of novels" was an actual profession. The setting is Madrid, Ambrosio is a hot shot monk/priest- under a strict vow of celibacy, who falls for Matilda, a woman and/or devil in human form (Lewis is unclear on the subject, and apparently changed his mind halfway through writing). They embark on a passionate affair- Matilda is, by the way, disguised as a male monk so she can get close to Ambrosio.
Amrbosio soon tires of the affair, and sets his sights on Elvira, a winsome young teen who begs Ambrosio to come to her house and give spiritual advice to her troubled mother. Ambrosio becomes sexually obssessed with Elvira, tossing Matilda aside. Matilda, seeking to regain Ambrosio's favor, gives him a potion that will allow him to defile Elvira in her sleep. It goes badly, he murders Elvira's mom, kidnaps Elvira and then rapes her. The whole story is utterly insane, and it would probably be racy even if it came out today.
Original book review from 2010:
The Monk (1796)
by Matthew Lewis
The Monk is a useful place to end a discussion of 18th century literature. It was the last major gothic novel. Lewis was a one hit wonder, and his story of instant celebrity is recognizable to anyone who watches American Idol. Lewis had the benefit of having studied in Germany in his youth, at a time before many of the great contemporary German novels had been translated into English. Lewis was haunted by claims of plagiarism throughout his life, though to a contemporary reader the relationship between the Monk and a book like Doctor Faustus resembles more one of influencer/influenced than plagiarism.
According to the introductory essay, Lewis wrote Monk with the idea that he would be creating the 18th century equivalent of a "smash hit." Lewis was smart, sophisticated, from a good family. He was not an unconventional type. The Monk was controversial in a way that presages the response of authorities to literature during the Victorian period. There was a loud outcry about the 'blasphemous" nature of "The Monk," and Marquis de Sade was a huge fan. None the less, Lewis didn't suffer any kind of censure, after writing "The Monk" he went on serve in Parliament.
I thought that the Monk retained its... raciness. I was somewhat shocked by the explicit um... passion... of the titular character. Perhaps 50 pages of gripping prose is sheathed in 300 pages of confusing digression and lengthy verse. At times, Lewis' writing has the ostenacious genre-combining flavor of Thomas Pynchon, who is well known for his song lyrics. The Monk, like so many other 18th century novels, displays such an awareness of self and artifice that it leads you to question any distinction between "modern" and "post-modern" in the novel. Perhaps the more appropriate distinction when one considers the whole 300+ year history of the novel is "realism" vs. "non-realism." I, for one, am I on the non realism side.
It's surprising that this has not been turned into a Merchant and Ivory type movie production. Especially with the recent penchant for vampire themes and Hollywood's enduring fascination with Jane Austen narratives, you would think that this text would have been adapted.
 |
| Cover of Anton Reiser by Karl Philpp Moritz, Penguin Classics edition |
Instagram
No comments:
Post a Comment