Rise of the Novel: Studies in Defoe, Richardson, and Fielding," written by Ian Watt. THE RISE OF THE NOVEL The novel is in nothing so characteristic of our culture as in the way that it reflects this characteristic orientation of modern thought" ( Continue Reading...
Popular Culture in the 18th Century A number of different factors would conspire to make popular culture into a new and different thing in eighteenth-century Britain. There had been popular culture before the eighteenth century, of course: Shakespea Continue Reading...
Roxana as Tragedy "Roxana" stands unique among Daniel Defoe's work in that it ends a tragedy. The work is a lot more than that, however. "Roxana" dispenses with the formalities associated with many texts and paints sex as a commodity from the very g Continue Reading...
Price Beauty? 'For though beauty is seen and confessed by all, yet, from the many fruitless attempts to account for the cause of its being so, enquiries on this head have almost been given up" William Hogarth, The Analysis of Beauty, (1753) Not v Continue Reading...
Moll Flanders The eighteenth century is often thought of a time of pure reason; after all, the eighteenth century saw the Enlightenment, a time when people believed fervently in rationality, objectivity and progress. However, Moll Flanders by Daniel Continue Reading...
Colonial America: Questions Puritans Unlike previous European settlers who came to the New World primarily to make a profit, the Puritans arrived with a commitment to create a new society and genuinely 'settle' on the land. They had no plans to ret Continue Reading...
What is truly remarkable about Swift's novel is the fact that the protagonist rarely generates any kind of emotional response to what he encounters, and the adventures that befall him. In this sense, Swift's novel aims at challenging the norms, trad Continue Reading...
A favorite target for conspiracists today as well as in the past, a group of European intellectuals created the Order of the Illuminati in May 1776, in Bavaria, Germany, under the leadership of Adam Weishaupt (Atkins, 2002). In this regard, Stewart Continue Reading...
Ford's most accomplished novel, the Good Soldier, was published when he was forty-two. This famous work features a first person narrative and tells the story of two couples, the English Ashburnhams and the American Dowells. John Dowell is the narra Continue Reading...
