Samuel Richardson

"Pamela: Or, Virtue Rewarded is perhaps the most influential novel published in Britain in the eighteenth century. On its first publication in 1740, it became an immediate bestseller. Its epistolary structure, tight plotting and didactic message were praised, imitated, but also criticised and satirised. This new critical edition of Samuel Richardson's first novel features an authoritative text based on the first edition, general and textual introductions, extensive explanatory notes and textual apparatus. Appendices provide bibliographical descriptions of all lifetime editions as well as the editions of 1801 and 1810, Richardson's introduction to the second edition (fully annotated), and the illustrations and Richardson's index from the octavo edition. The publication of this volume heralds the first full scholarly edition of Richardson's complete works, a long-awaited event in eighteenth-century studies"--

"Defying her parents' desire for her to marry a loathsome man for his wealth, the virtuous Clarissa escapes into the dangerous arms of the charming rogue Lovelace, whose intentions are much less than honorable. This thought-provoking work, written entirely in intimate letters, exposes the delicacy and complexity of affairs of the human heart. The fatal attraction between villain and victim builds and unfolds into a relationship that haunts the imagination as fully as that of Romeo and Juliet or Tristan and Isolde."--Back cover.

"Pamela in Her Exalted Condition follows the heroine of Richardson's hugely popular first novel into married life. In the process, he explores both the experience of women beyond the stage of courtship and provides a fascinating insight into the social and cultural life of the mid eighteenth century. The first ever scholarly edition of the novel, this volume features a critically edited text, general and textual introductions, full annotations and textual apparatus. Appendices describe all the editions published in Richardson's lifetime as well as early nineteenth-century editions. The original illustrations from the popular octavo edition of 1742 and Richardson's index are reproduced. The publication of this novel in the Cambridge edition allows the sequel to Pamela to take its rightful place in the critical study of Richardson's development as a novelist"-- "The Cambridge Edition of the Works of Samuel Richardson is the first fully annotated scholarly edition of Richardson's works, including his securely attributable minor works, ever to have been undertaken. Five substantial collected editions have been published before now: The Works of Samuel Richardson, with an introduction by Edward Mangin (19 volumes, 1811); The Works of Samuel Richardson, with an introduction by Leslie Stephen (12 volumes, 1883); The Novels of Samuel Richardson, with an introduction by William Lyon Phelps (19 volumes, 1901-2); The Novels of Samuel Richardson, with an introduction by Ethel M. McKenna (20 volumes, 1902); and finally The Novels of Samuel Richardson (18 volumes, 1929-31). None of these editions, however, contains any explanatory or textual apparatus, and none contains any of Richardson's writings beside his three major novels"--

Lovelace's love for Clarissa and the young woman's attitudes toward marriage are revealed through the series of letters comprising this eighteenth-century classic.