Henry Fielding's Novels, etc.: Tom Jones, Jonathan Wild, Lisbon Journal, etc.

[Extollager]

Fielding (1707-1754) is historically important as an early English novelist. It seems that some, at least, of his productions, are regarded as still capable of being read with enjoyment. Here's a thread for those who find that to be the case.

I expect to read his novel about the famous fictional foundling Tom Jones and to comment here in the weeks ahead.

 

[The Judge]

I might join you. I'm currently doing some general background reading on the Georgian period and I was thinking of having a re-read of one or two novels to immerse myself in the language and prose style. I have read Tom Jones a long while ago, and I've a feeling I may have toyed with Shamela and Joseph Andrews in the dim and distant past, but I'd not heard of the other two you mention.

 

[Extollager]

It's 31 years since I read Tom Jones, and it seems to be the one that dependable critics* mention most, so, even though I haven't read Jonathan Wild or the Portugal book either, that's the one I'm looking to read now.

*Ian Watt, The Rise of the Novel; Dorothy van Ghent, The English Novel: Form and Function; probably Arnold Kettle, An Introduction to the English Novel, Vol. 1... etc.

 

[Vince W]

I'm half way through Tom Jones at them moment. The whole first half is really setting up the plot for the rest of the book where most of the real plot is.

 

[The Judge]

Well, I was wrong about having read Shamela before, and I can only think I've read a modern spoof of Pamela -- or perhaps of Clarissa -- as I have memories of enormous bottles of ink which are required to enable the heroine to continue her voluminous correspondence, and of her still writing (always in present tense) while being tossed in a small boat going over rapids or some such lunacy.

Anyhow, Shamela was very clever piece of writing, taking incidents from Richardson's Pamela and inverting them, so the naive and virtuous Pamela is here portrayed as a shameless and deceitful semi-prostitute who only pretends to innocence in order to trick Squire Booby into marrying her. Not exactly concise and to the point, but relatively short and it never overstays its welcome.

Joseph Andrews was something of an odd beast. It feels as if it started life as another satire on Pamela, as Joseph is her brother and is also virtuous beyond belief, which at the time no doubt appeared ludicrous in a young man (though I'm not sure if it's meant to be an attack on the double standard of male and female chastity before marriage). However, it spins out into an extended picaresque adventure with minimal plot and a great many digressions.

I've also started Tom Jones, and I've got 3 chapters into Book Three, about a tenth of the way through, but I've put it down for the moment to read some SFFs.

 

[Extollager]

Whoops! Looks like I dropped the ball on this one. This isn't the right time for me to tackle Tom Jones, as I'm reading Jane Austen's Mansfield Park and will start Dickens's Great Expectations soon. But that doesn't mean I'm not interested in others' reading of Fielding's novel.