Institutions of the English novel from Defoe to Scott / Homer Obed Brown.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Brown, Homer Obed, 1933- author.

Series:

Critical Authors and Issues

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Canon (Literature).

English fiction--18th century--History and criticism.

English fiction.

English fiction--19th century--History and criticism.

Literature and society--Great Britain.

Literature and society.

Literature and history--Great Britain.

Literature and history.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (253 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania : University of Pennsylvania Press, 1997.

Language Note:

In English.

Summary:

In Institutions of the English Novel, Homer Obed Brown takes issue with the generally accepted origin of the novel in the early eighteenth century. Brown argues that what we now call the novel did not appear as a recognized single "genre" until the early nineteenth century, when the fictional prose narratives of the preceding century were grouped together under that name. After analyzing the figurative and thematic uses of private letters and social gossip in the constitution of the novel, Brown explores what was instituted in and by the fictions of Defoe, Fielding, Sterne, and Scott, with extensive discussion of the pivotal role Scott's work played in the novel's rise to institutional status. This study is an intriguing demonstration of how these earlier narratives are involved in the development and institution of such political and cultural concepts as self, personal identity, the family, and history, all of which contributed to the later possibility of the novel.

Contents:

Front matter

Contents

Preface

Acknowledgments

Introduction: Beginning with No Beginning

1. The Errant Letter and the Whispering Gallery

2. The Displaced Self in the Novels of Daniel Defoe

3. Tom Jones: The "Bastard" of History

4. Tristram to the Hebrews: Some Notes on the Institution of a Canonic Text

5. Sir Walter Scott and the Institution of History: The Jacobite Novels in the Relation of Fathers

6. The Institution of the English Novel

Notes

Index

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

0-8122-9229-4

OCLC:

928987467