Joseph Andrews And Shamela Edited With An Introduction And Notes By Martin C Battestin

Joseph Andrews, and Shamela. Edited with an introduction and notes by Martin C. Battestin.

The History of the Adventures of Joseph Andrews and of His Friend Mr. Abraham Adams

'I beg as soon as you get Fielding's Joseph Andrews, I fear in Ridicule of your Pamela and of Virtue in the Notion of Don Quixote's Manner, you would send it to me by the very first Coach.' (George Cheyne in a letter to Samuel Richardson, February 1742) Both Joseph Andrews (1742) and Shamela (1741) were prompted by the success of Richardson's Pamela (1740), of which Shamela is a splendidly bawdy parody. But in Shamela Fielding also demonstrates his concern for the corruption of contemporary society, politics, religion, morality, and taste. Thesame themes - together with a presentation of love as charity, as friendship, and in its sexual taste - are present in Joseph Andrews, Fielding's first novel. It is a work of considerable literary sophistication and satirical verve, but its appeal lies also in its spirit of comic affirmation,epitomized in the celebrated character of Parson Adams. This revised and expanded edition follows the text of Joseph Andrews established by Martin C. Battestin for the definitive Wesleyan Edition of Fielding's works. The text of Shamela is based on the first edition, and two substantial appendices reprint the preliminary matter from Conyers Middleton'sLife of Cicero and the second edition of Richardson's Pamela (both closely parodied in Shamela). A new introduction by Thomas Keymer situates Fielding's works in their critical and historical contexts.

Carnal Reading

The question of an erotic readership has always vexed scholars. With little evidence of anyone's actually reading erotic material, scholars have had to make do with variations of an "ideal reader" approach. Insofar as it presupposes authorial intention and a stable meaning, this theoretical model proves unsatisfactory. Using an interdisciplinary approach, Carnal Reading: Early Modern Language and Bodies proposes a new theory of erotic reading that refigures bodily responses as constitutive of cognitive understanding. In its content and style, erotic writing was perceived to interact physically with the reader's body-or more specifically, the sensitive soul via the imagination. "Lively" descriptions infused desires that could permanently affect not only the entire "animal economy," or constitution, but also a person's reasoning faculties. All good writing was meant to move the passions, but there was no way to determine whether the "warmth" derived from reading was erotic or otherwise. Chapter 1, "'Thoughts Swelled with Carnosity': Imagination, Enthusiasm, and Love," briefly rehearses Adrian John's account of how religious reading can inspire enthusiasm in readers. This understanding of how religious reading inflames the imagination applies equally well to amorous discourses. "The Passions: Music, 'Infusion,' and Teen-Age Reading Habits" (chapter 2) examines early modern conduct books and discourses about music to illustrate the notion of the early modern body as "permeable" and, as such, impressionable to all forms of stimulating media. The chapter offers a close reading of Manley's New Atalantis to demonstrate how reading habits could transform a young person's constitution. Chapter 3, "The Physiological Aesthetics of Erotic Response: Intention, Style, Association," focuses on contemporary literary critiques that privilege "lively" depictions and the consequences that style has on authorial intention. The final chapter, "Sexy Rhetoric: Nice Figures, or Books that Do It 'the old Grammar rule