The Sentimental Novel in the Eighteenth Century

2019 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Sentimental Novel

Varen'ka Dobroselova: An Experiment in the Desentimentalization of the Sentimental Heroine in Dostoevskii's Poor Folk

Slavic Review ◽  
1986 ◽  
Vol 45 (3) ◽  
pp. 525-533
Author(s):  
Gary Rosenshield
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Human Being ◽  
Sentimental Novel ◽  
The Novel ◽  
The Poor ◽  
Epistolary Form ◽  
Comic Fiction

Ever since its publication the success of Fedor Dostoevskii's first novel Poor Folk has been ascribed primarily to the characterization of its “naturalistic” hero, Makar Devushkin, not to its sentimental heroine, Varen'ka Dobroselova. Although critics have continued to discover new merits in Poor Folk, in the end it is Devushkin who dominates the novel and on whom, in one way or another, most of its virtues depend. Not only is Devushkin the protagonist, he is also at the center of the novel's important innovations in style, theme, and characterization. Dostoevskii took the poor copying clerk, a type that for a decade had been used as a stock device—and most often the butt—of Russian comic fiction, and transformed him into the hero of a tragi-comic sentimental novel. This transformation was much abetted by Dostoevskii's use of the epistolary form— a form common to the sentimental novel of the eighteenth century, but long outdated in Russia by the 1840s—for it permitted the hero to tell his own story and, by so doing, to reveal the sensitive human being behind the comic mask.

Sentimental Frauds

2011 ◽  
Vol 36 (01) ◽  
pp. 83-113
Author(s):  
Simon Stern
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Book Club ◽  
The United States ◽  
Class Action ◽  
Sentimental Novel ◽  
Oprah's Book Club ◽  
Ongoing Concern ◽  
Literary Fraud

The 2006 class action against James Frey, concerning his fabrications in A Million Little Pieces, was the first suit of its kind in the United States. There is nothing new about false memoirs, so what can explain the lawsuit? When the book was promoted on “Oprah's Book Club,” viewers were invited to respond emotionally, and saw their responses as a form of testimony. Those responses produced a sense of betrayal and inauthenticity when Frey's falsehoods were revealed. This view finds support in the eighteenth‐century sentimental novel, which similarly linked readers' reactions to the author's emotional authenticity. Fraud was an ongoing concern for sentimental novelists, some of whom used elaborate editorial to ploys to disavow responsibility for the text, while others populated their novels with fraudulent characters, intended as foils for the protagonist. An investigation of these novels helps to reveal the implications of the Frey case for future claims of literary fraud.

Eighteenth-Century English Reactions to the Nouvelle Héloïse

PMLA ◽  
1937 ◽  
Vol 52 (3) ◽  
pp. 803-819 ◽  
Author(s):  
James H. Warner
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Sentimental Novel

Jean Jacques Rousseau's famous sentimental novel, the Nouvelle Héloïse (1760), had a wide and immediate diffusion in England. Although the date usually ascribed to the first edition is 1761, it was in circulation in England during the later part of 1760. Translation was accomplished as speedily as possible; after three months of preliminary announcements by Becket and DeHondt, booksellers, the first two volumes were placed on sale April 7, 1761.

scholarly journals Legacies of Tortured Sensibility; or, what Shakira learned from Sade

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Courtney Wennerstrom
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Gender And Sexuality ◽  
Sentimental Novel ◽  
Cultural Significance

Apropos of the title, this essay traces the surprising connections between the eighteenth-century pornographer and the contemporary Latina superstar’s portrayals of eroticized torture, as well as elucidates the cultural significance of what I am calling a legacy of tortured sensibility. By illuminating how the gendered spectatorial politics of sensibility—particularly in its fetishization of the (female/feminized) body in pain—continues to inform the numerous interlocking discourses of race, gender, and sexuality we have inherited from Sade’s Europe, and especially from the early sentimental novel, this paper demonstrates how the transnational artist taps into a Sadean resistance to figurations of distressed hearts and flayed skin as sites of geopolitical and individual transcendence. Finally, examining 120 Days of Sodom and “La Tortura” side by side revitalizes attention to the ethical crisis surrounding aesthetic voyeurism: where does the anguish of reading Sade—with his relentless scenes of corporeal torment—go?

scholarly journals Den sentimentala romanen och kampen om medborgarskap: Rousseaus Julie och Staëls Delphine

2009 ◽  
Vol 6 ◽  
pp. 22
Author(s):  
Kristina Fjelkestam
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Common Good ◽  
Liberal Theory ◽  
Sentimental Novel ◽  
Individual Freedom ◽  
The Face ◽  
Epistolary Novels

<p>The sentimental novel and the struggle for citizenship: Rousseau&rsquo;s <em>Julie </em>and Sta&euml;l&rsquo;s<em> Delphine</em></p><p>The tragic fates of a great number of women in sentimental novels of the eighteenth century can be viewed against the background of classic liberal theory. They provide examples of how individual freedom and restraint in the name of common good can be reconciled. Faced with the impossible choice between a life guided by the principle of love and that of virtue, women often choose self-sacrifice as a means of preserving a sense of individuality in the face of the demands of public universality. The epistolary novels, <em>Julie ou La Nouvelle H&eacute;lo&iuml;se </em>(1761) of Jean Jacques Rousseau and the <em>Delphine </em>(1802) of Germaine de Sta&euml;l, present two rather different treatments of this problem. Rousseau&rsquo;s Julie is a woman whose unquenchable desire transforms her into a prototype of female unreliability not worthy of societal recognition. Sta&euml;l&rsquo;s Delphine, in turn, unmasks a ruthless and unprincipled society which prohibits her from becoming its full-fledged member.</p>

The Continental Influence on the Eighteenth-Century Novel

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Walter L. Reed
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Don Quixote ◽  
The Other ◽  
Sentimental Novel ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Prose Fiction ◽  
English Novel ◽  
British Novelists

The eighteenth-century English novel was influenced by earlier prose fiction from the Continent; the English improved what others had invented. Individual novels from the Continent were imitated by British novelists; particular genres first developed abroad were adapted by them as well. Spanish novels like Don Quixote and the picaresque preceded and influenced novels of Defoe, Fielding, Smollett, and Sterne. Seventeenth-century French romances influenced novels of amorous intrigue by Behn, Manley, and Haywood. These in turn provoked the novel of women’s virtuous resistance created by Richardson. Earlier prose fiction from the Continent was translated into English and widely read throughout the eighteenth century. The transnational traffic in fiction flowed in the other direction as well. Rousseau’s enthusiastic embrace of Richardson popularized the transnational genre of the sentimental novel. From the 1770s onwards German fiction became influential in England, and German-derived tales of terror came to dominate the popular British market.

scholarly journals Del héroe romántico al “feminized man” o de la realidad a la fantasía

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aída Díaz Bild
Keyword(s):  
Women Writers ◽  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Alternative Model ◽  
Self Control ◽  
Dominant Male ◽  
Sentimental Novel ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Conduct Books ◽  
Las Mujeres ◽  
Freedom Of Action

ResumenUna de las maneras en las que las mujeres escritoras del siglo XVIII subvierten el discurso de la novela sentimental es creando un tipo de amor alternativo y un héroe que es una excepción a la regla patriarcal, el denominado “feminized man”. Este amante ideal refl eja la ternura, sensibilidad, amabilidad y auto-control que normalmente se asocia con las mujeres y está dispuesto a recortar su poder y derechos para sancionar la independencia y autonomía de la heroína. Se huye así del estereotipo agresivo y dominante que encontramos en las novelas y manuales de conducta de la época y que supone una amenaza para las mujeres, ya que invade su espacio, coartando su libertad de acción y pensamiento. Detrás de la creación de este nuevo héroe está, por supuesto, el deseo de cambiar las relaciones de poder dentro de la pareja. Tanto el amante apasionado como el nuevo “feminized man” están presentes en Memoirs of Modern Philosphers, demostrando así que la novela no puede clasifi carse meramente como anti-jacobina o conservadora, sino que contiene elementos claramente subversivos.Palabras clave: “Feminized man”, amante apasionado, matrimonio, poder, fantasía.AbstractOne way in which eighteenth-century women writers subvert the discourse of the sentimental novel is by creating an alternative model of love and a hero who proves to be an exception to the patriarchal rule. This ideal lover shows the tenderness, sensibility, kindness and self-control that we usually associate with women and is willing to curtail his power and rights in order to sanction the heroine’s independence and autonomy. Thus the stereotype of the aggressive and dominant male which prevailed in the novels and conduct books of the age is avoided: he represents a threat to women, since he invades their space, encroaching on their freedom of action and thought. Behind the creation of this new hero is, of course, the desire to bring about a change in the power relations between the sexes. Both the passionate lover and the new “feminized man” are present in Memoirs of Modern Philosphers, thus showing that the novel cannot be merely classifi ed as anti-jacobin or conservative, but clearly contains subversive elements.Key words: “Feminized man”, passionate lover, marriage, power, fantasy.

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