Before Novels: The Cultural Contexts of Eighteenth-Century

Before Novels: The Cultural Contexts of Eighteenth-Century English Fiction

â€œBy taking a close look at materials no previous twentieth-century critic has seriously investigated in literary termsâ€•ephemeral journalism, moralistic tracts, questions-and-answer columns, â€˜wonderâ€™ narrativesâ€•Paul Hunter discovers a tangled set of roots for the early novel. His provocative argument for a new historicized understanding of the genre and its early readers brilliantly reveals unexpected affinities.â€ â€•Patricia Meyer Spacks, Edgar F. Shannon Professor of English, University of Virginia
What did people read before there were novels? Not necessarily just other â€œliteraryâ€ works, according to this fascinating study of the beginnings of the English novel. To understand the origins of the novel as a species and to read individual novels well, we must know several pasts and traditionsâ€•even non-fictional and non-narrative traditions, even non-â€œartisticâ€ and non-written pastsâ€•that at first might seem far removed from the pleasures readers find in modern novels.
Country USA
Brand W. W. Norton & Company
Manufacturer W. W. Norton & Company
Binding Paperback
ReleaseDate 1992-06-17
UnitCount 1
EANs 9780393308617

Before Novels: The Cultural Contexts of Eighteenth-Century English Fiction