cover next page > title: Joseph Andrews : Notes ... author: Mavor, Michael B. publisher: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. (US) isbn10 | asin: print isbn13: 9780822006824 ebook isbn13: 9780764513008 language: English subject Fielding, Henry,--1707-1754.--History of the adventures of Joseph Andrews. publication date: 1971 lcc: ddc: 820.9005 subject: Fielding, Henry,--1707-1754.--History of the adventures of Joseph Andrews. cover next page > If you like this book, buy it! < previous page cover-0 next page > < previous page cover-0 next page > If you like this book, buy it! cover next page > title: Joseph Andrews : Notes ... author: Mavor, Michael B. publisher: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. (US) isbn10 | asin: print isbn13: 9780822006824 ebook isbn13: 9780764513008 language: English subject Fielding, Henry,--1707-1754.--History of the adventures of Joseph Andrews. publication date: 1971 lcc: ddc: 820.9005 subject: Fielding, Henry,--1707-1754.--History of the adventures of Joseph Andrews. cover next page > If you like this book, buy it! < previous page page_1 next page > Page 1 Joseph Andrews Notes by Michael B. Mavor including Life of the Author Introduction List of Characters Summaries and Commentaries Character Analyses Review Questions Selected Bibliography INCORPORATED LINCOLN, NEBRASKA 68501 < previous page page_1 next page > If you like this book, buy it! < previous page page_2 next page > Page 2 Editor Gary Carey, M.A. University of Colorado Consulting Editor James L. Roberts, Ph.D. Department of English University of Nebraska ISBN 0-8220-0682-0 © Copyright 1971 by Cliffs Notes, Inc. All Rights Reserved Printed in U.S.A. 1997 Printing The Cliffs Notes logo, the names "Cliffs" and "Cliffs Notes," and the black and yellow diagonal-stripe cover design are all registered trademarks belonging to Cliffs Notes, Inc., and may not be used in whole or in part without written permission. Cliffs Notes, Inc. Lincoln, Nebraska < previous page page_2 next page > If you like this book, buy it! < previous page page_3 next page > Page 3 Contents Life of the Author 5 Introduction to Joseph Andrews 8 9 Form 10 Characterization 11 Style 12 Moral Tone List of Characters 13 Summaries and Commentaries 15 Author's Preface 17 Book I 33 Book II 50 Book III 59 Book IV Character Analyses 68 Joseph Andrews 69 Fanny 69 Lady Booby 70 Mrs. Slipslop 70 Parson Adams Review Questions 71 Selected Bibliography 72 < previous page page_3 next page > If you like this book, buy it! < previous page page_5 next page > Page 5 Life of the Author Henry Fielding was born in 1707 into a family that was essentially aristocratic. His mother's father was a justice of the Queen's Bench, while his paternal grandfather was an archdeacon of Salisbury; in these two men there may have been something of the genesis of Fielding's bent toward the law, his great love of learning, and his firm sense of Christian morality. Fielding's father, Sir Edmund Fielding, a colonel of aristocratic descent, married Sarah Gould in 1706; it was a "runaway" marriage, and the sober Henry Gould excluded Sir Edmund from the estate which he left his daughter. When Sarah died in 1718, Fielding's father entered into a long battle with the maternal side of the family over the estate. What there was of the rake in his father was inherited by Fielding; their spirit is that of Tom Jones, whose isolation when young also reflects the early death of Fielding's mother and the ensuing divisions in the family. Both Joseph Andrews and Tom Jones portray a young man on the move until he is brought to a secure standstill by the revelation of his true identity. After attending Eton College, where he was exposed to the classical authors he came to love so much, Fielding joined his father in London and, in 1728, wrote his first play; nearly thirty more were to come from his pen in the next nine years. This was the period when the rake was to the fore in his character; the dismal account of Mr. Wilson's dissipations in London (Joseph Andrews, Book III, Chapter 3) represents a stern warning from an experienced Fielding about the dangers of city life. Before the city completely enveloped him, however, Fielding spent a short spell abroad at the University of Leiden in Holland. He returned to London in the fall of 1729. It was not a time of great theater, but there was much material for parody and satire, and Fielding exercised his talents with such verve, particularly in the political < previous page page_5 next page > If you like this book, buy it! < previous page page_6 next page > Page 6 field, that in 1737 the harassed Prime Minister, Sir Robert Walpole, introduced a Theatrical Licensing Act. Fielding wrote no more for the stage, but his novels are richer because of his experience as a playwright. The incidents of burlesque humor in Joseph Andrews, the concealment scenes in Tom Jones, and the authentic patterns and rhythms of dialogue attest to Fielding's theatrical background. At a loss for a job, Fielding took up the study of law at the Middle Temple five months after the passage of Walpole's Licensing Act. With his outlet for playwriting quelled, Fielding had to support himself somehow, for he had married Charlotte Craddock in 1734, and they were always short of money. (Charlotte, critics believe, was almost certainly the model for Fielding's portraits of the ideal woman: Amelia, Sophia, and, from Joseph Andrews, possibly Fanny Goodwill and Mrs. Wilson.) From playwriting Fielding turned to journalism. From 1739 to 1741 he edited a satirically political newspaper, The Champion; the writing is quite admirable, and we can see a more serious Fielding emerging as the issues of the day come under his scrutiny. In 1740, Fielding was called to the Bar, but success as a magistrate lay far in the future; at this time, chance joined hands with Fielding's rich experience as a dramatist and a journalist to change the course both of his own life and that of the novel; in 1740, Samuel Richardson published Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded. The novel was an immediate successwith almost everyone but Fielding. Fielding objected to the discrepancy between the expressed morality of "virtue rewarded" and the sexual content in the novel. Perhaps because he was poor and had two young children to provide for, he decided to try and make some money with a parody of Pamela. Whatever the reason, in 1741, he published his riotous and bawdy An Apology for the Life of Mrs. Shamela Andrews. In it, Shamela is a fortune- hunter who uses her "virtue" in a thoroughly lecherous and mercenary way. The theme is one of disguise and pretense, and it is just this theme which is continued in Joseph Andrews, published in 1742. < previous page page_6 next page > If you like this book, buy it! < previous page page_7 next page > Page 7 The years surrounding the publication of Joseph Andrews were hard ones for Fielding. The death of his father in June, 1741, left him sorrowful, and none the richer, and in March of 1742 his favorite daughter died. In June, 1741, Fielding also severed his connection with The Champion; his disaffection with the Patriots, as they were called, is perhaps reflected in his comments on "patriotism" in Joseph Andrews (Book II, Chapter 9). As a result of his literary and political notoriety, it was difficult for Fielding to get ahead in the legal profession, and his last two novels, Tom Jones and Amelia, occasionally reflect the anguish of a man who knows that he has brought wretchedness and poverty to the woman he loves. Yet if Fielding could not get money by practising law, he did use the subject of law in his writing; Jonathan Wild, which was published in 1743, is filled with biting accounts of the grotesque malpractices in the system of criminal law. In 1744, Fielding's wife died and, for a time, Fielding's friends thought that he would lose his mind. But he took up his political pen again and wrote for the anti-Jacobite journal, The True Patriot. In 1747, he married Mary Daniel, who had been a maid to his wife and had shared his grief when Charlotte died. From this time, his fortunes began to brighten. In 1748, he was appointed Justice of the Peace for Westminster and, subsequently, he was made magistrate of all Middlesex, and in 1749 Tom Jones appeared. The concept of good nature which played such an important part in Joseph Andrews is also central to this novel. At one point, Squire Allworthy comments that Tom, despite his many misdemeanors, has a heart of gold: "I am convinced, my child, that you have much goodness, generosity, and honor, in your temper: if you will add prudence and religion to these, you must be happy." One is never quite convinced that Tom becomes either prudent or religious, but the happy ending illustrated that Fielding the artist is again practicing the positive outlook he advocates. Tom and Sophia are optimistically left to "preserve the purest and tenderest affection for each other, an affection daily increased and confirmed by mutual endearments, and mutual esteem." This optimism is hardly the case with Captain and Mrs. Booth in Amelia (1751). Captain Booth's weaknesses are an echo < previous page page_7 next page > If you like this book, buy it!