英国文学系列4/4：十八世纪文学
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PART FOUR
EIGHTEENTH CENTURY
LITERATURE(十八世纪英国文学)
[内容提要]
十八世纪是一个理性的时代，以理性和大众教育为关键词的启蒙运动蓬勃发展。启蒙运动在文学上表现为新古典主义，其代表人物为诗人蒲柏和词典编撰家约翰逊。十八世纪英国文学的盛事是小说的兴起，以笛福、菲尔丁、斯威夫特为代表的现实主义小说独领风骚。此外，理查孙的书信体小说也赢得了广泛的赞誉。感伤主义代表作家斯特恩的作品系意识流小说的先驱，晦涩难懂，令人望而却步，但由于其对现代派作品的影响巨大，所以在文学史上也不得不提。除了感伤主义小说之外，感伤主义诗歌也留下《墓园挽歌》等千古传颂的佳作。十八世纪末，浪漫主义诗歌兴起，其代表人物为布莱克和彭斯。十八世纪的戏剧门庭冷落，谢里丹成为该时期惟一的重要剧作家。
[学习要点]
启蒙运动；新古典主义；小说的兴起；《鲁宾孙漂流记》主要人物性格分析；笛福小说特点；《格列佛游记》的讽刺艺术；菲尔丁小说艺术分析；《汤姆-琼斯》对港台复仇剧的影响；感伤主义文学；布莱克诗歌特点；彭斯诗歌成就。
GENERAL INTRODUCTION
The Enlightenment Movement
The eighteenth century Europe has
witnessed one of the greatest events in human civilization---the
Enlightenment. The Enlightenment Movement was a progressive
intellectual movement that flourished in France and
swept though the whole Western Europe at that time.
Its purpose was to enlighten the whole world with the light of
modern philosophical and artistic ideas. The enlighteners
celebrated reason of rationality, equality and science. They also
advocated universal education
The Enlightenment movement has exerted
far-reaching influence on the Eighteenth century English
literature.
Neoclassicism
In
the field of literature, the Enlightenment brought about a revival
of interest in the old classical works. This tendency is known as
neoclassicism. According to the neoclassicists, all forms of
literature were to be modeled after the classical works of ancient
Greek and Roman writers and those of the contemporary French ones.
They believed that the artistic ideals should be order, logic,
restrained emotion and accuracy, and that literature should be
judged in terms of its service to humanity. Neoclassicists had some
fixed laws and rules for almost every genre of
literature.
Alexander Pope is the representative poet of
neoclassical school. Samuel Johnson, the writer of the first
English dictionary, also follows the neoclassical
tradition.
The Rise of the Novel
The summit of eighteenth century English
literature is novel. England produces three greatest
novelists: Daniel Defoe, father of modern novel and the author of
Robinson Crusoe; Jonathan Swift, the greatest English
satirist and the author of Gulliver’s Travels; and
Henry Fielding, the author of Tom
Jones.
Sentimentalism
In
the first half of the 18th century, Pope was the leader of English
poetry and the heroic couplet the fashion of poetry. By the middle
of the century, however, sentimentalism gradually made its
appearance. Sentimentalism came into being as the result of a
bitter discontent among the enlightened people with social reality.
The representatives of sentimentalism continued to struggle against
feudalism, but they sensed at the same time the contradictions in
the process of capitalist development. Dissatisfied with reason,
which classicists appealed to, sentimentalists appealed to
sentiment, 'to the human heart.' Sentimentalism turned to the
countryside for its material, and so is in striking contrast to
classicism, which had confined itself to the clubs and
drawing-rooms, and to the social and political life of
London.
Sentimentalism also finds its voice in English
fiction (Richardson; Goldsmith; Sterne).
REALISTIC FICTION
Daniel Defoe (
1660-1731)
Defoe’s major
works
Defoe is chiefly
remembered for his novels His most famous novels include:
Robinson Crusoe; Captain Singleton,
Moll Flanders and Colonel
Jacque.
Besides his novels, he
has produced a famous poem Hymn to Pillory and
some notable pamphlets such as The True-born Englishmen
and The Shortest Way with the
Dissenters.
Comments on
Defoe
1.
Defoe is chiefly remembered for his
novels. The central idea of his novels is that man is good by
nature but may succumb to an evil environment. The writer wants to
make it clear that various crimes and vices result from social
evils.
2.
Defoe’s novels take the form of memoirs or
pretended historical narratives. They are chiefly told in the first
person’s point of view.
Robinson Crusoe: The
Story
Robinson Crusoe is based upon the experiences of Alexander Selkirk,
who had been marooned in the island of Juan
Fernandez off the coast of Chile and who had
had lived there in solitude for five years. On his return to
England in 1709, Selkirk’s experiences became known,
and Steele published an account of them in the Englishman, without,
however, attracting any wide attention. That Defoe used Selkirk’s
story is practically certain; but with his usual duplicity he
claimed to have written Robinson Crusoe
in 1708, a year before Selkirk’s return.
However that may be, the story itself is real enough to have come
straight from a sailor’s logbook.
The events depicted in the story date back to the
middle of the 17th century and originate in the
family of an old, disabled English gentleman, Mr. Crusoe. He
designs his son, Robinson, for the law, but the young man has
firmly set his mind on becoming a sailor. One day, Robinson, who is
now nineteen years old, disregards his parents’ advice and sets out
to sea.
While on board Robinson lives through a bad
fright during a storm and is almost ready to return home but the
call of the sea is too strong to be stilled. In London Robinson is
persuaded by an old captain to embark on a ship bound for
Guinea with a cargo of various merchandise. On the
way Robinson is captured by a Turkish rover and sold into slavery.
After many perils and adventures he escapes to Brazil, where
he becomes a sugar planter. He prospers and thinks of making a
permanent stay in that country, but some planters, aware of his
former transactions in Africa, beguile him into another
voyage to that continent for the purpose of bartering cheap
trinkets for gold and procuring slaves.
A
frightful storm changes the course of the ship and she is wrecked
off the coast of an uninhabited island. Of all ship’s crew Robinson
alone escapes to the shore after strenuous
efforts.
For fear of wild animals he spends he spends the
night in a high tree. In the morning Robinson sees the wrecked ship
lying close to the shore. He swims to it at ebb –tide to find no
living creature on board, except a dog and two
cats.
Robinson builds a raft and pilots between tides
from ship to shore the store of necessities that consists of bread,
rice, barley, corn, planks, lead and gunpowder, an axe and two
saws.
Then Robinson sets up a durable tent for his
habitation and storage of goods.
In
time Robinson plants barley and seed corn; and harvests fine crops
in the coming years.
He
spends many months of hard toil in shaping a stone mortar for
grinding grain. He strives for days and days to make earthenware
pots. It takes Robinson over five months to fell a huge tree and
fashion it into a boat in which he plans to escape from the heavy
boat and launch it.
Robinson’s will power in bettering his living
conditions is amazing: strong winds, rains, and earthquakes do not
stop him from attaining his once set resolutions and plans. He
explores the island, hunts, makes clothes from the hides of the
killed animals, gathers grapes and dries them into raisin,
domesticates wild goats, smokes and salts meat.
Grown wise with experience, Robinson builds a
smaller and lighter boat which he succeed in launching into the sea
through a narrow half-mile canal, dug by him in the course of two
years.
But Robinson is compelled to abandon his dream to
circumnavigate in to a powerful current and carried away far out to
sea. Through inhuman efforts Robinson brings the boat to shore,
never to set sail on it again.
Many years goes by ... One day Robinson sees the
imprint of a man's naked foot on the sand. He learns that a certain
part of the island is occasionally visited by cannibals who come
there to celebrate their victories over their enemies and to devour
their captives. Robinson witnesses one such celebration and manages
to save one of the victims. This man, whom
Robinson names Friday to Commemorate the day of his rescue, proves
to be clever young savage and becomes Robinson's true and faithful
companion.
With Friday's help Robinson builds another boat
and is about to leave the island, when a group of cannibals with
three prisoners land again for their traditional
feast.
Robinson and Friday kill the savages and release
tile captives, one of whom happens to be Friday's father, and the
other is a Spaniard from a wrecked ship. The latter relates to
Robinson that his comrades, seventeen in number live on a
neighboring island. Robinson decides to offer them hospitality and
dispatches Friday's father and the Spaniard in a boat for the
survivors. Meanwhile an English ship drops anchor off the island.
Its crew is in mutiny and the rebels put ashore the captain and his
officers. Robinson interferes and helps the captain to recover his
ship.
Graceful for his assistance the captain takes
Robinson and Friday to England. The ringleaders of the
mutiny are left on the island with sufficient food and ammunition.
Later on, they are joined by the Spaniards and a colony is
formed.
Wishing to see the island he has spent so many
years on, Robinson Crusoe paid a visit to it. During an attack from
the Indians his faithful Friday was killed.
The success of Robinson Crusoe induced the author
to continue the story of his hero's adventures. The second part of
the book is almost as exciting as the first one. Old as he was,
Robinson Crusoe's spirit of adventure was far from being tamed. He
started on a new hazardous expedition, visiting China,
Siberia and other distant countries. He returned home
via Archangel.
During his travels he had to overcome innumerable
obstacles, and often exposed his life to danger. But to the very
end he remained courageous, persevering and cheerful. The third and
last part of the book is filled with religious and moralistic
discourse.
Brief Analysis of
Robinson Crusoe
1.
Robinson is a grand hero in westerners’
eyes. He survived in the deserted island and led a meaningful
life.
2.
Robinson is a colonist, as can be seen
from his selling the boy who helped save his life at the beginning
of the novel.
3.
Robinson is a capitalist, as can be seen from his disposal
of the gold coins he happens to find on the wrecked
ship.
4.
Robinson is a man chauvinist, as can be seen from his
comment on women.
5.
Robinson Crusoe is the first important English novel in the
picaresque tradition. It is also the fundamental work in English
island literature.
Jonathan Swift
(1667--1745)
Swift’s major
works
His major stories
include: The Battle of the Books,
A Tale of a Tub, and Gulliver’s
Travels. His most famous essay is A Modest
Proposal. He is also a productive poet.
Comments on
Swift
1.
Swift is one of the realist writers. His
realism is quite different from Defoe's. Defoe's stories are based
upon the reality of human life, while all of Swift's plots come
from imagination.
2.
His satire is marked by outward gravity
and an apparent earnestness. This makes his satire all the more
powerful. He not only criticizes the evils of the English
bourgeoisie but those of other bourgeois countries. Women’s
ignorance also serves as a target of his satire, as can be seen
from his short poem The Furniture of a Woman’s
Mind. The poem reads,
A
Set of Phrases learnt by Rote;
A
Passion for a Scarlet-Coat;
When at a play to laugh, or
cry,
Yet cannot tell the Reason
why:
Never to hold her Tongue a
minute;
While all she prates has nothing in
it.
Whole Hours can with a Coxcomb
sit,
And take his Nonsense all for
Wit:
Her learning mounts to read a
Song,
But, half the Words pronouncing
wrong;
Has every Repartee in Store,
She spoke ten Thousand Times
before.
Can ready Compliments supply
On
all occasions, cut and dry.
Such Hatred to a Parson’s
Gown,
The Sight will put her in a
Swown.
For conversation well
endured;
She calls it witty to be
rude;
And, placing Raillery in
Railing,
Will tell aloud your greatest
Failing;
Nor makes a Scruple to expose
Your bandy Legs, or crooked
Nose.
Can, at her morning tea, run
over
The scandal of the day
before.
Improving hourly in her
skill,
To cheat and wrangle at
Quadrille.
3.
Swift
expresses democratic ideas in his works. This exerts strong
influence on later writers, such as Sheridan, Fielding, Byron and
even Bernard Shaw.
4.
Swift
is one of the greatest masters of English prose. His language is
simple, clear and vigorous. He said, 'proper words in proper place,
makes the true definition of a style'. There are no ornaments in
his writings. In simple, direct and precise prose, Swift is almost
unsurpassed in English literature.
DETAILED STUDY OF HIS
MASTERPIECE
Gulliver’s
Travels
The book contains four
parts, each of them deals with one particular voyage of the hero
and his extraordinary adventures on some remote
island.
In the first part,
Gulliver goes to sea as a ship's surgeon. In a big storm the ship
is wrecked and he is cast upon the shore of the island
of Lilliput. While asleep, he is captured and bound
by thousands of the inhabitants there. They are all six-inch tall.
Gulliver soon finds out everything on the island is ten times as
small as the things in the human world. The Lilliputians call him,
'the Great Man-Mountain'. They have great
difficulties to build a house and prepare food for him. In this
country there are two parties, which are distinguished by the use
of high and low heels. (Obviously here Swift satirizes the Tories
and the Whigs in England ). There are civil strife
and war between Lilliput and the neighboring country due to an
argument 'Should eggs be broken at the big end or the little end ?'
( Here Swift laughs at the religious controversies between the
Catholics and the Protestants in England ). In this
country Gulliver finds out that chief ministers and candidates for
high official posts are given their jobs in accordance with their
skill in dancing on a rope or in leaping over a stick or creeping
under it backwards and forwards. (Here Swift criticizes the
corruption of the English ruling class.)
The first part is full of
references to current politics. Lilliput is the miniature of
England. Swift's satire is directed against the English
ruling class, the two political parties and the religious
disputes.
In the second part,
Gulliver again goes to sea and his ship is again wrecked in a
storm. Gulliver is abandoned on the land of the Brobdingnagians. He
soon finds out that all the inhabitants there are sixty-foot tall
and everything is much taller and bigger than that in the human
world. The Brobdingnagians prove to be superior to the men and
women of Gulliver's society in wisdom and humanity as well as in
stature. Compared with them, he is very small, insignificant, mean
and unworthy. The king, who regards Europe as an ant
hill, despises the Europeans by saying, we cannot but conclude the
bulk of your natives to be the most pernicious race of little
odious vermin that Nature ever suffered to crawl upon the surface
of the earth.
In this part, the King of
Brobdingnag is described as a wise and kind King, and the
inhabitants are said to be a civilized race. The law
of the country is used to defend the natives' freedom and
happiness.
After Gulliver's account
of the English society, the king condemns English social system and
the aggression wars. Here we see that the writer Swift censures
these evils through the mouth of the King.
The third part, which is
often considered to be the least interesting, deals with a series
of the hero's adventures at several places. The first place that
Gulliver gets to is the floating island of Laputa. Gulliver finds
out here the King and the noble persons are a group of
absent-minded philosophers and astronomers who care for nothing but
mathematics and music and who speak always in mathematical terms of
lines and circles. They often do fruitless research work, for
example a scientist makes researches on how to get sun light from
cucumbers. Another scientist is studying how to
construct a house by first building the room and then laying the
base. Through these descriptions, Swift satirizes the scientists
who keep themselves aloof from practical life.
In the country of Laputa,
the king and his ministers have cruel methods of suppressing any
rebellion of the people living on the continent below.
Whenever the people rise up against them, they make the
flying island hover over the place of the rebellion and thus
preventing sun light and rain from reaching it, or let the island
drop directly upon the heads of the rebellion people. Here Swift
condemns the cruelty of the ruling class to the
people.
Then Gulliver comes to
the island of Sorcerers. Here he has the
chance of meeting the famous dead persons in ancient and modern
history (including Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, Homer and
Aristotle). Then the Sorcerers show him the House of Lords in
Ancient Rome which is attended by heroes and some half-man and
half-god figures and the English parliament which is the assembly
of a group of peddlers, pickpockets, robbers and ruffians. This
part contains Swift's sharp satire against all kinds of English
social institutions. While criticizing the English ruling class,
Swift praises the English people, thinking they are honest, brave,
and have truelove for freedom but he points out that the ruling
bourgeoisie has brought some evil influence upon
them.
The fourth part describes
the hero's voyage to the country of the Houyhnhnms and has
generally been considered the best part of the book because the
satire here is the sharpest and the bitterest.
In this part Gulliver
appears as the captain of a ship and goes to sea. His sailors
conspire against him. He is made a prisoner and east upon the shore
of an island, which is the land of the Houyhnhnms, who are horses
endowed with reason, and who are the governing class. In this
country there is a species of wild animals called Yahoos. The
horses are extremely intelligent and noble, and possessed of all
good qua[i-ties, while the Yahoos, though in many ways they are
like human beings, are low and vile and despicable and no better
than beasts. Gulliver praises the life and virtues of the horses
and feels disgusted with the Yahoos. When Gulliver
returns home, he can't endure the human life there. To him all his
country folks are the hateful Yahoos. This part does not show
Swift's hatred and disgust for all the humanity. It just shows that
he hates those hypocritical people. He cherishes deep love for the
rank and file.
Henry Fielding
(1707-1754)
Fentures of Fielding's
novels
1.
Fielding's method of relating a story is
telling the story directly by the author. His rigid style stands
for the order of the universe.
2.
Satire abounds everywhere in Fielding's
works.
3.
Fielding believed in the educational
function of the novel. The object of his novels is to present a
faithful picture of life, while sound teaching is woven into their
very texture.
4.
Fielding is a master of style.
His style is easy, unlabored and familiar, but extremely
vivid and vigorous. His sentences are always distinguished by logic
and musical rhythm. His command of language is remarkable. His
language is characterized by clarity and suppleness. The plot
construction is usually complicated and masterly made, each thread
is clearly [aid out as the story develops, though the story may
consists of several major and minor threads.
Tom Jones: A Detailed Synopsis
Of
all the landed gentry in Somersetshire, Squire Allworthy is the
most highly regarded for his benevolence, good nature, and wealth.
He lives in peaceful retirement with his maiden sister, Bridget.
Returning one night from a several months' stay in London,
he is shocked to find a baby boy lying in his bed. He takes to the
foundling and insists on bringing it up himself rather than leave
it on the churchwarden's doorstep.
The foundling's parentage is a great mystery. The
Squire and his sister act on the assumption that the mother must be
Jenny Jones, a servant of the local schoolmaster, Partridge; Jenny
Jones had spent some time nursing Bridget during an illness.
Fearing local gossip, Squire Allworthy sends Jenny away. The
schoolmaster leaves the county, too. The foundling is named Tom
Jones.
Soon after, Bridget marries the fortune-hunting
half-pay officer, Captain Blifil, by whom she has a son. The two
boys are brought up together. Captain Blifil, who had hoped to
inherit Squire Allworthy's money, dies of an apoplectic fit while
his son is still a boy.
Tom and young Blifil don't get along together,
for Tom is good-natured, easy-going, and highly mischievous, while
Blifil is a spiritless prig, always concerned with the impression
he is making on his elders. Allworthy hires Thwackum and Square to
educate Tom. This they try to do with frequent beatings. But when
Tom catches the pompous Square in bed with the local slut, Molly
Seagrim, his education ends. Tom's one friend is Allworthy's lazy,
shiftless gamekeeper, Black George, and together they go poaching
about the countryside, and getting into scrapes which sadden the
affectionate Squire.
On
an estate nearby lives Squire Western with his lovely daughter,
Sophia. The Squire is a hard- drinking,
hard-riding, choleric man. Tom spends a good deal of time with the
Westerns because the Squire admires his
rough and ready manner and his horsemanship while Sophia is
impressed with his goodness of
heart. One day while out hunting, Tom breaks his arm catching
Sophia's runaway horse. He stays with the Westerns while
recovering. He and Sophia fall in love.
When Tom learns that Squire Allworthy is ill and
not likely to recover, he rushes to his
benefactor's bedside, where he finds Blifil
in obsequious attendance. But Allworthy makes a
miraculous recovery, and Tom is so delighted that he gets
roaring drunk. Blifil, whose mother has recently died, takes
offense at Tom's behavior. Tom offers to apologize, but Blifil
insultingly refers to his illegitimate birth and the two lads
fight.
Meanwhile, Sophia becomes interested in Blifil, a
favorite with the ladies, in order to conceal her real love for the
penniless, imprudent Tom. When her aunt arrives from London,
she assumes that Sophia and Blifil will marry, and tells Squire
Western to prepare for the wedding. When Sophia's aunt learns the
truth, both she and Western are outraged. Much as the fox-hunting
squire likes Tom, he refuses to consider a foundling as a
son-in-law.
Now that Squire Allworthy is fully recovered,
Blifil tells him about Tom's drunken behavior the night he was so
sick, implying that Tom didn't care what happened to him and
couldn't wait for the reading of the will. Enraged and
disillusioned with Tom whom he liked more than his legitimate
nephew, Allworthy reproaches Tom--who is too dismayed to defend
himself-- and banishes him from the house. He gives Tom ₤500 to
help him make his way in the world. Tom carelessly loses the
money.
Sophia, too, is in disgrace. Refusing to marry
Blifil under any circumstances, she is locked up in her room by her
father. But with the connivance of her maid Honor, she manages to
slip out at night and heads for her aunt's house in
London.
On
the road, Tom falls in with a band of rowdy soldiers and gets into
a fight with them at an inn. His wounds are treated by the local
barber, who turns out to be the banished Partridge. Partridge
becomes Tom's companion on his adventures. They meet a beautiful,
middle-aged woman named Mrs. Waters, who is fighting off the
advances of a soldier in a forest. Tom rescues her and takes her to
the inn at Upton, where she lures him into her
bed.
Also arriving at the Upton inn on
their way to London are Sophia and her maid. Before
long the inn is in an uproar when an enraged husband looking for
his runaway wife shows up and is led to Tom's room, where he
discovers Tom with Mrs. Waters, who starts to scream. The man is a
Mr. Fitzpatrick, not Mrs. Waters' husband at all; but by the time
everything is straightened out, Partridge has inadvertently
revealed to Sophia her lover's infidelity. Sophia departs in a
fury, leaving her muff behind for Tom to discover in the
morning.
Soon after she leaves the inn, Sophia meets Mrs.
Fitzpatrick, her cousin, who fled the inn when her jealous husband
caused the row with Tom. Together they travel to London.
Here Sophia is introduced to the sophisticated Mrs. Bellaston, who
promises to show the unspoiled country girl the pleasures of the
town.
Tom and Partridge follow Sophia to London,
where they find congenial lodgings at the home of Mrs. Miller. Soon
Tom is admitted to the social circle and to the beds of Lady
Bellaston and Mrs. Fitzpatrick. One night, seeing Sophia at a play,
he assures her of his eternal devotion and promises to reform. The
quarrel is patched up. Partridge finds love, too, in London
with Nancy Nightingale, whose father objects to him as a
suitor. However, Tom good-naturedly persuades Nightingale to allow
the match, to the delight not only of Partridge but of
Nancy's friend Mrs. Miller, as well.
When he learns of Sophia's escape from his house,
Squire Western abandons fox-hunting long enough to pursue his
daughter to Lotion. He finds her at Lady Bellaston's lodgings and
removes her to his own. Tom is broken-hearted because he knows the
squire will never approve of his marriage to Sophia. To add to his
misery, Partridge brings the news that Squire Allworthy has also
arrived in London with Blifil who is now going to
marry Sophia. Tom goes to Mrs. Fitzpatrick for advice, but with
typical bad luck he is discovered there by her jealous husband, who
challenges him to a duel. Tom wounds him and is immediately hustled
off to jail.
In
his cell Tom is visited by the Mrs. Waters with whom he spent the
night at Upton. Partridge later identifies her as the former
Jenny Jones, reputedly Tom's mother. The lad is so shocked by this
coincidental incest that he determines to reform his casual,
promiscuous ways. Mrs. Miller defends Tom, telling Squire Allworthy
that Tom was not at fault in the duel with Mr. Fitzpatrick, a fact
that Mr. Fitzpatrick, on recovering from his wound, graciously
acknowledges.
Indeed, Squire Allworthy is about to forgive Tom
when he learns of Tom's behavior with Mrs. Waters. Once again the
good man is furious with Tom, but Mrs. Waters assures him that she
is not, indeed, Tom's mother. The real mother, she tells the
Squire, was his own sister, Bridget. On her deathbed, Bridget left
a message with Blifil concerning Tom's true parentage.
Blifil had treacherously destroyed the message. Blifil had
also tried to bribe witnesses to get Tom hanged for the duel with
Mr. Fitzpatrick, even though that gentleman had not died of his
wounds.
Now that Tom is exonerated, he is released from
prison and his fortune improves. Squire Allworthy's affection for
him returns. He apologizes to Sophia for trying to force Blifil on
her and tells Squire Western that Tom is his heir, for the young
man is indeed his nephew. This convinces Squire Western that Torn,
after all, is worthy to marry Sophia, and the match takes place.
Everyone rejoices except the odious Blifil who is sent away with a
yearly stipend, Tom and Sophia live happily on Squire Allworthy's
estate.
ENGLISH NOVELISTS OF SENTIMENTALIST
TRADITION
In the field of prose fiction the 18th
century, sentimentalism had its most outstanding expression.
There were three novelists who followed this tradition in novel
writing. They are Samuel Richardson , Oliver Goldsmith and Laurence
Sterne .
Samuel Richardson (1689-1761
)
Biographical Introduction
Richardson was the son of a joiner. He received little
education. He had a natural talent for writing letters. When he was
still a boy, he was frequently employed by working girls to write
love letters for them. This early experience and his fondness for
the society of ladies gave him the intimate knowledge of the hearts
of sentimental and uneducated women. We can see this from his
novels. Moreover, Richardson was a keen observer of
life. This is also manifest in all of his
works.
When he was seventeen, he began to learn the
printer’s trade. He followed this trade to the end of his life.
When he was 50, he had already had a small reputation as a writer
of elegant epistles. Then some publishers came to him with a
proposal that he write a series of Familiar Letters, which could be
used as models by people who could not write. Richardson
gladly accepted the proposal. He made these letters tell the
connected story of a girl’s life. Thus he contrived a novel in the
form of letters about a virtuous serving girl named Pamela Andrews.
This is his first novel entitled “Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded
“.
Pamela, or Virtue
Rewarded
The novel was written in the form of a series of
letters from the heroine to her parents and two friends, telling
them in great detail her adventures at her employer’s house. The
first part of the novel tells us that Pamela the heroines is a
young maidservant in a rich family. After the mistress’s death, her
son Mr. B. pursues the beautiful maid with sweet words. He wants to
make love to her and seduce her. In order to avoid more troubles,
she leaves the house and goes away.
Moved by Pamela’s virtue Mr. B begins to have
true love to the girl and determines to marry
her.
The second part deals with Pamela’s life after
marriage, with how she tries to bear the burden of a profligate
husband and how she does all her best to reform
him.
In
this novel for the first time Richardson gave a
detailed of the 18th century. There isn’t much
action in the story but the novel is extremely long because
Richardson describes and analyses the thoughts and
especially the feelings of the heroine in great detail. The chief
contribution of this novel to the development of the English novel
lies in the penetrating psychological study of the heroine.
Moreover the novel criticizes the bourgeois moral standards and
moral hypocrisy.
Features of Richardson’s
novels
1.
Richardson is the first novelist of sentimentalist tradition.
His novels have a moral purpose. His Chief object in most of his
works is to inculcate virtue and good
deportment.
2.
Richardson is an outstanding novelist because he had much
sympathy for women in their inferior social status and entered into
detailed psychological study of female characters and because he
not only showed the conflict between the helpless woman and the
social evils around her, but also laid bare, though perhaps quite
unwittingly the moral hypocrisy of the aristocratic–bourgeois
society of his day.
3.
All of his novels are written in the form of letters, known
as epistolary novel.
Laurence Sterne ( 1713-1768 )
The Life and Opinions of Tristram
Shandy
This novel is Sterne’s masterpiece. It consists
of nine books. The first two books describe how the family
anticipates the hero’s birth and how the hero is born. In the four
middle books (from the 3rd to the 6th) the excitement over the
birth of the hero is described, and the unfortunate misnaming of
the baby at the christening is followed by discussions on the
possibility of changing the name. And then his father consults with
his mother and a scholar whether to put the growing boy into
breeches and what kind of breeches to be made for the son. The 7th
book deals with a married woman
The novel is totally different from the novels of
Defoe and Fielding and Smollett. It does not pretend to be an
objective narration of the life and adventures of any hero.
Emphasis is laid upon the subjective consciousness of the
characters rather than upon their external actions. Just like
Richardson’s novels, it gives a detailed psychological
analysis of the characters. This arouses the readers’ interest and
curiosity by creating suspense and sometimes provides for them
significant passages.
The novel has an unusual and queer artistic form.
Sterne consciously plays all sorts of tricks in his style of
writing. Incidents are not arranged in their normal chronological
order. The novel is not begun with its preface and dedication, but
they are placed in the middle of things, would be cut short
unexpectedly and another episode would be introduced. A sentence
would be written and called a chapter. Occasionally entire chapter
would be a blank, left to the imagination of the reader to fill in,
and then sometimes these blanks would be unexpectedly filled in by
the author himself. Punctuation marks are frequently juggled with,
and pictures of curves and fantastic drawings sometimes appear on
the pages instead of words. Whimsicality dominates the form of the
novel as well as its contents, and in the place of logic there is
haphazardness and irrationalism. Underneath all this we may discern
the author’s humor and his apparent desire to supplant reason with
sentiment.
Features of Sterne’s
novels
1.
Sterne was
the representative of sentimentalism in the 18th
century. To him sentiment was more important than
reason.
2.
Sterne
gave detailed descriptions of the characters’ inner thought and
feeling. His deep psychological analysis was a good example for
later writers.
3.
Sterne’s
characters are ordinary persons. Sterne described the unimportant
i9nterest of the character ironically and humorously. They are like
real persons with faults and merits.
POETRY OF
SENTIMENTALISM AND PRE-ROMANTICISM
Robert Burns
(1759-1796)
Biographical
Introduction
Should auld acquaintance be
forgot,
And never brought to
min’?
Should auld acquatintance be
forgot,
And days o’ auld lang
syne?
(chorus) For auld lang syne, my
dear,
For auld lang syne,
We’ll tak a cup o’ kindness
yet,
For auld lang syne!
This is Auld Lang Syne, the
thematic song to the world famous movie Waterloo
Bridge. The words of this song is
composed by Robert Burns, the national poet of Scotland
in the 18th century.
Burns was the eldest son of a poor Scotch peasant
family. From childhood he had to struggle with poverty and toil in
the fields day and night. Burns had only a little education. He had
a great passion for Scottish folk songs and an intimate knowledge
of Scottish poets and their works. When he was 16, he was already
the principal laborer on the farm, but his interest in poetry
developed and he already started writing some poetry. When he was
27, the poet resolved to go abroad. He gathered together some of
his early poems and published them under the title Poems
Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect. The collection was a great
success and took all Scotland by storm. The poet’s
name became known. Encouraged by the success of his collection,
Burns decided to give up his journey abroad and went to
Edinburgh to arrange for another edition of his
poems. He was welcomed and feasted by the best of the Scottish
society. But nobody gave him real help, and very soon he found
himself looked down upon by the aristocracy. Then he left the city
in anger and disappointment.
The last few years of the
poet’s life was miserable. Though he was appointed the collector of
liquor revenue, he could only get a small salary. He lived in
poverty. His support for the French Revolution brought him much
trouble. In 1796, when he was only 37 years old, he
died.
Classifications of his
poetry
a.
lyrics of love and
friendship
Most of Burns’ poems are lyrics on love and
friendship. They have a great charm of simplicity. They are very
musical and can be sung. His best known lyrics of this kind
include: John Anderson, My Jo, A Red,Red Rose
and A Fond Kiss, of which A
Red, Red Rose is the most popular among Chinese students
of English.
b.
patriotic
poems
Burns wrote some
patriotic poems, in which he expresses his deep love for his
motherland. The best-known piece is My Heart is in the
Highlands.
c.
Scottish
ballads
Burns wrote some verse
tales, which he based on the old Scottish legends. In these poems,
he sings of the heroic spirit of the Scottish people in their
struggle against their rulers. The best example of these poems is
John Barleycorn. John Barleycorn is a legendary Scottish
peasant hero. He rose up and led the peasants in a rebellion. He
becomes a symbol of the indestructible strength and indomitable
courage of the people.
d.
Poems to show sympathy for
the poor
Burns wrote some poems to express his hatred for
the oppression of the ruling class and his love for freedom. A
best-known poem of this kind is A Man’s A Man for
A’That.
WILLIAM BLAKE (
1757--1827 )
Blake’s major
works
1. Songs of
Innocence
This collection contains
poems written for children. Through the mouths of the little
children, the poet expresses his love for the beauty of the world.
Each poem in the collection is the expression of love and tender
feeling and of belief in the goodness of nature. Using the language
of little babies, Blake expresses his delight in the sun, the
hills, the streams; the insects and the flowers. The best-known
poem in the collection is The
Lamb.
The whole collection is
pervaded with the breath of simplicity and fancy, The sweetest
poems are those cradle songs. The melody is simple, artless, and
yet exquisite,
2. Songs of
Experience
This collection is the
matured counterpart of the first one. The poems show that the
poet's eyes are opened the evils and vices of the world, He points
out that the earth is unhappy and she lacks love and gaiety. The
miserable living conditions of the poor are described. Through
symbolic method, Blake expresses his democratic ideas. The
best-known poems in the collection are The Tiger, The
Fly, London, and The Chimney
Sweeper.
3. The Marriage of
Heaven and Hell
It is Blake’s most
important prose work. It acquires the great popularity because of
its fresh and independent outlook. In this work, Blake expresses
his revolt against the capitalist oppression, and exposes and
attacks all civil, moral and religious codes. The central idea of
this work is his denial of the authority of
injustice.
Comments on
Blake
1.
William Blake occupies an important
position in English literature. He was the most extraordinary
literary genius of his age. His lyrics display all the
characteristics of the romantic spirit. He paved the way for the
romantic poets of the 19th century.
2.
William Blake’s poetry used to be labeled
mysterious. As a matter of fact, the mysterious atmosphere of his
poems is an inalienable part of his creative imagination, which is
essential to good versification.
QUESTIONS FOR
DISCUSSION
1.
Define the following terms: enlightenment;
neoclassicism; sentimentalism; the rise of the
novel.
2.
Name the representative realistic
novelists in the eighteenth century England and
comment on them.
3.
Name the representative sentimental
novelists in the eighteenth century England and
comment on them.
4.
Comment on Robinson
Crusoe.
5.
Write about Henry Fielding’s literary
style.
6.
Name the two romantic poets at the end of
the eighteenth century and comment on them.
