The Cambridge Companion to Henry FieldingClaude Rawson Now best known for three great novels - Tom Jones, Joseph Andrews and Amelia - Henry Fielding (1707–54) was one of the most controversial figures of his time. Prominent first as a playwright, then as a novelist and political journalist, and finally as a justice of peace, Fielding made a substantial contribution to eighteenth-century culture, and was hugely influential in the development of the novel as a form, both in Britain and more widely in Europe. This collection of specially-commissioned essays by leading scholars describes and analyses the many facets of Fielding's work in theatre, fiction, journalism and politics. In addition it assesses his unique contribution to the rise of the novel as the dominant literary form, the development of the law, and the political and literary culture of eighteenth-century Britain. Including a chronology and guide to further reading, this volume offers a comprehensive account of Fielding's life and work. |
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Page 6
... political or intellectual interests they chose , were assured ; if they indulged in literature it would be as amateur authors . But Fielding's own family and background was not unlike theirs , and a more realistic choice for a career ...
... political or intellectual interests they chose , were assured ; if they indulged in literature it would be as amateur authors . But Fielding's own family and background was not unlike theirs , and a more realistic choice for a career ...
Page 10
... politicians , and his hits at political corruption inevitably had Walpole in their sights . However , in 1731 The Grub - Street Opera , which was known to ridicule Walpole as Robin the butler , somehow never appeared : had the ...
... politicians , and his hits at political corruption inevitably had Walpole in their sights . However , in 1731 The Grub - Street Opera , which was known to ridicule Walpole as Robin the butler , somehow never appeared : had the ...
Page 11
... political journalism, chiefly the successful Opposition journal The Champion, which he managed and wrote for between 1739 and 1742, excoriating Walpole in this medium quite as keenly as he had in his dramas. In addition he undertook a ...
... political journalism, chiefly the successful Opposition journal The Champion, which he managed and wrote for between 1739 and 1742, excoriating Walpole in this medium quite as keenly as he had in his dramas. In addition he undertook a ...
Page 12
... political journalism on the other. Even more than the late 1720s, the mid-1740s were unstable times. After decades ... politics, and were conspicuously pro-government throughout. This position was now much easier for Fielding. Though he ...
... political journalism on the other. Even more than the late 1720s, the mid-1740s were unstable times. After decades ... politics, and were conspicuously pro-government throughout. This position was now much easier for Fielding. Though he ...
Page 13
... politics and journalism , and his many enemies leapt on these events with glee . The huge success of Tom Jones only roused further jealousies . The young Tobias Smollett , in Peregrine Pickle ( 1751 ) , distilled the torrent of ...
... politics and journalism , and his many enemies leapt on these events with glee . The huge success of Tom Jones only roused further jealousies . The young Tobias Smollett , in Peregrine Pickle ( 1751 ) , distilled the torrent of ...
Contents
17 | |
Section 2 | 38 |
Section 3 | 50 |
Section 4 | 65 |
Section 5 | 80 |
Section 6 | 94 |
Section 7 | 109 |
Section 8 | 122 |
Section 9 | 137 |
Section 10 | 153 |
Section 11 | 175 |
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Common terms and phrases
Adams Adams's Allworthy Amelia Atkinson Author's Farce authority Battestin Beggar's Opera Booby Booth career Champion chapter character Charke Charlotte Charlotte Charke Cibber Clarendon Press classical Claude Rawson Colley Cibber comedy comic Covent-Garden Journal crime Critical Defoe drama Drury Lane Dunciad early edition Eighteenth-Century Eliza Haywood Enquiry epic episode essays Fanny female fiction Fielding's Fielding's novels Goldgar Henry Fielding hero heroine History human ironic irony Jacobite Jonathan Wild Jones Joseph Andrews justice later letters literary London Love magistrate Miscellanies mock mock-heroic modern Moll moral narrative narrator Newgate Nose novelist Opera Oxford Pamela parody Paulson plays playwright political Pope Preface prose readers Richardson Ronald Paulson Samuel Richardson Sarah Fielding satire says scene Scriblerian Scriblerus seems sexual Shamela Slipslop social Sophia Squire stage story style theatre theatrical thief-taker Tom Jones Tom Thumb Tom's traditional Tragedy of Tragedies University Press virtue Walpole wife woman women writing wrote
Popular passages
Page 75 - Through the whole piece you may observe such a similitude of manners in high and low life, that it is difficult to determine whether (in the fashionable vices) the fine gentlemen imitate the gentlemen of the road, or the gentlemen of the road the fine gentlemen.
Page 187 - I can't say but that I think Fielding's evident liking and admiration for Mr. Jones, shows that the great humourist's moral sense was blunted by his life, and that here in Art and Ethics, there is a great error.
Page 87 - Prudence and circumspection are necessary even to the best of men. They are indeed, as it were, a guard to Virtue, without which she can never be safe. It is not enough that your designs, nay that your actions, are intrinsically good; you must take care they shall appear so. If your inside be never so beautiful, you must preserve a fair outside also.
Page 187 - Since the author of Tom Jones was buried, no writer of fiction among us has been permitted to depict to his utmost power a MAN.
Page 134 - I remember the most excellent of women, and tenderest of mothers, when, after a painful and dangerous delivery, she was told she had a daughter, answering; Good God! have I produced a creature who is to undergo what I have suffered! Some years afterwards, I heard the same woman, on the death of that very child, then one of the loveliest creatures ever seen, comforting herself with reflecting, that her child could never know what it was to feel such a loss as she then lamented.
Page 15 - His happy constitution (even when he had, with great pains, half demolished it) made him forget everything when he was before a venison pasty, or over a flask of champagne ; and I am persuaded he has known more happy moments than any prince upon earth.
Page 66 - To confess the truth, my narrative is rather of such actions which he might have performed, or would, or should have performed, than what he really did; and may, in reality, as well suit any other such great man, as the person himself whose name it bears.
Page 68 - Newgate as no other than human nature with its mask off, which some very shameless writers have done, a thought which no price should purchase me to entertain, I think we may be excused for suspecting, that the splendid palaces of the great are often no other than Newgate with the mask on.