The Edinburgh Companion to the Eighteenth-Century British Novel and the Arts
Edited by Jakub Lipski, M-C. Newbould
- Offers a unique panorama of existing interdisciplinary research in the wider field of eighteenth-century studies by comprehensively bringing together developments from different disciplines, critical and theoretical standpoints that address the complex interplay between eighteenth-century fiction and the arts
- Foregrounds a broad understanding of "the arts", going beyond the territories that are typically covered in connection with novel writing to offer a wider perspective on the inter-artistic contexts of the novel’s development
- Embraces the genre’s indebtedness and responsiveness to the art of elocution, of sociability, of politeness, and of reading, and brings fresh perspectives to familiar subject areas
- Includes cutting edge research from an international group of scholars, both emerging and established
The eighteenth century witnessed an explosion in new literary and creative forms that rapidly expanded, and the relations between which became more complex. This has typically been described as a period that ushered in the novel form: the malleability of the concept of the novel genre and its history opens up intriguing possibilities for its role within wider networks of interartistic relationships in the period. This Companion is concerned with how the fertile conversations that different artforms enjoyed in the long eighteenth century intersected fruitfully with the emergent shapes of prose fiction. The essays comprising this volume range from the important overview to the case study, providing readers with a unique opportunity to navigate a vast and sprawling terrain through engaging scholarly insights.
Acknowledgement
List of Illustrations
Notes on Contributors
The Eighteenth-Century British Novel and the Arts, Jakub Lipski and M-C. Newbould
Part I: Styles and Discourses
1. Invisibility and Narration in Haywood (and Behn and Fielding), Marcie Frank
2. Orientalism and Sexuality in the Eighteenth-Century Novel, James Watt
3. Crafting the Past: Antiquarianism, Decorative Handicrafts and the Novel at the Mid-Century, Katharina Boehm
4. Anatomy, Invasion, and Imagination: Reading Gender, Medicine and the Body in the Mid-Century Novel, Ashleigh Blackwood
Part II: Visual Cultures
5. Before & After: Imagining Pleasure in Eighteenth-Century British Art and Literature, from Defoe and Hogarth to Sterne and Gainsborough, Frédéric Ogée
6. The Art of Architecture and the Form of the Novel, Chris Ewers
7. ‘The statue cannot be formed, unless our inclination concur thereto’: Statuary and Sculpture in the Eighteenth-Century Novel, M-C. Newbould
8. Depicting Beautiful Women in the Eighteenth-Century Novel, Katherine Aske
9. Stories behind Pictures: Reconstructing a Pre-History of Horace Walpole’s The Castle of Otranto, Jakub Lipski
10. The Romances of Ann Radcliffe and the ‘Total Work of Art’, Hannah Moss
Part III: Modes and Spaces of Performance
11. Haywood’s Whimsical Adventures: The Novel and the Rococo, Joseph Drury
12. Song in the Novels of Samuel Richardson, Elizabeth Kraft
13. Vexed Diversions: Gulliver’s Travels, the Arts and Popular Entertainment, Daniel Cook
14. Songs, Stories and Sentimentalism: The British Broadside Ballad as Sentimental Fiction, Georgina Bartlett
15. ‘Novel Romance makes me puke!’: Burneys, Shakespeares and the Sentimental Plot, Mascha Hansen
16. Polite Arts/The Arts of Politeness: Manners, Hypocrisy and the Performance of the Self, Przemysław Uściński
17. Musical ‘Epiphanies’ in the late Eighteenth-Century Novel, Pierre Dubois
18. Jane Austen’s Art of Elocution: Discerning Feeling in Persuasion, Fraser Easton
Part IV: Networks and Interactions
19. Multimedia Coterie Romance, Natasha Simonova
20. The Art of Reading and the Eighteenth-Century Novel: The Case of The History of Charlotte Summers, The Parish Girl, Joanna Maciulewicz
21. The Eighteenth-Century Novel and the Sociable Arts, Emrys Jones
22. Novels, Paintings and the Half-Trained Eye in Mid-Eighteenth-Century Reading Culture, Paul Goring
Part V: Adaptations and Afterlives
23. From Visual to Material Culture: The Afterlives of Frontispieces to Robinson Crusoe, Nathalie Collé
24. Text Transformed into Silkwork: British Needlework Pictures and the Adaptation of ‘Charlotte at the Tomb of Werter’, Sandro Jung
25. Extra-Illustration and the Seduction of a ‘Standard’ Text: James Comerford’s Erotic Books, Helen Williams
26. Eighteenth-Century Fiction and the Art of Graphic Satire, from Character to Constellation, Brigitte Friant-Kessler
27. Contemporary Art and the Eighteenth-Century Novel, Amelia Dale
28. Invoking the Implied Viewer in the Eighteenth-Century Novel on Film, Jennifer Preston Wilson
Index
The Edinburgh Companion to the Eighteenth-Century British Novel and the Arts is a weighty tome. But that does not prevent it from being an enjoyable, engaging and stimulating read. Supported by a well-written and crafted introduction, this well-researched companion provides an opportunity for an ongoing discussion about the value of the eighteenth-century novel and the arts in the twenty-first century.
Among the many strengths of this generously conceived volume is its capacious definition of the arts and media with which the new genre interacted. The discussion ranges from the prestigious ‘sister arts’ of eighteenth-century aesthetics to an exciting hinterland of creative practices, from street ballads and domestic needlework to the sociable arts of conversation, politeness, even the ‘art of tormenting’.
