The novel in the 18th century was fledgeling and there was not an established style, however, most of the novels of the period featured satiric and realistic styles, realistic novels being the most prominent. I will examine early English novels in my article to show the prominence of realistic novels over satiric novels by exemplifying from the novels and comparing them to the period in which they were written. First of all, when I use the term realistic novel, I mean the novels that feature everyday characters with ordinary names in their casual routines and original plots unlike traditional ones as Watt’s Formal Realism suggests and most importantly, real settings with geographical and minute details, basing on real events that have happened or may happen in real life. By the term satirical novel, I mean the novels that aim to highlight the shortcomings of society or the political system through ridiculing, mimicking, mocking the acknowledged norms of society in order to change the corruption and establish a decorum.
So as to understand why these two styles, namely satire and realism were dominant in the early English novel, first we need to examine the historical background of the period. In 18thcentury, the importance given to reading was different than before. Thanks to Industrial Revolution, people, especially women gained much more spare time to stay at home to read books as an entertainment activity. Also, the appearance and growth of the middle class contributed to the affordability of books, thusly spreading this activity throughout the nation. People started to live off writing as a business. With the increase in literacy rates, more and more people could read. Given that the reading class were mostly middle class, they wanted to read realistic books because they favoured the idea of being in the middle of the novel, they were the characters from those novels. The writers of the period tried to write from the viewpoint of those who read them. The cover pages of the early books show this phenomenon as they try to encourage the reader o believe that it is a real account of events.
However, most of the people still could not afford purchasing novels, they needed to save money or cut off from their basic needs to be able to afford books. The income of the people was low, the book prices were high. Literacy rates increased but still they were extremely low as a result of the absence of an authentic public education system. The political turmoil was also to be seen in the upper parts of society. Corruption was inescapable in this low-paid society. So, writers like Jonathan Swift produced satires that show these shortcomings of the society.
Therefore, all these reasons led to the prominence of these two styles in the 18th century English novel. People of the age and the government, nonetheless, could not easily identify satires but still they had some effect on the society. They wanted to see characters and events as real as their lives so that they can take part in the novels. As a result, realist novels dominated the 18th century despite the prevalence of satires as well.
Now, I will examine some early novels to see these styles in practice.
First writer to be examined is Daniel Defoe. He is considered as the father of the English novel with his novel Robinson Crusoe. He is also known to be a journalist who wrote his commentaries about the middle-class concerns as well as his period. Even from this perspective, one can see that he is interested in the middle class who wants to read realistic novels. His novels featured characters of casual magnitude. Standard middle-class characters allowed the reader to manifest themselves in those characters. The subject-matters are those of his target audience, the hard work for survival, or in Mall Flanders, the institution of prostitute, stealing and sexual relations of relatives. Moreover, his Robinson Crusoe has its base story in the real account of a sailor who shipwrecked to an island for 4 years. Also, the point of view is another factor to its realism because it uses the first-person narrative which makes it way easier for commoners to identify themselves with the character.
Another realist figure is Samuel Richardson and his novel Pamela. He was a pioneer in psychological approach towards his characters, particularly females and also, he is thought to have invented epistolary style in novels as can be understood by his novel Pamela. He became a novelist at later ages through educating people about correspondence and he taught a maid girl how to keep herself of high virtue. After a while, he was influenced both by this correspondence idea and the theme of virtue. When he decided to write Pamela in an epistolary style, he based this novel on a real occurrence of a maid girl who stood out against her master’s licentious attempts towards her. In the novel, Pamela correspondences with her father and mother about how to get rid of the assaults of her master trying to entice her. Hence this novel features a real-life incident of sexual and moral assaults, it was easily identified by society thanks to representing a prevalent and realistic moral issue of the damsels who work for the rich as housemaids. Through the novel, they had the chance to learn new ways of resisting their house lords. Also, the novel divided readers into two categories, Pamelists and Anti-Pamelists which show the success and acceptance of realism by the audience. Pamelists were those who thought she just tried to keep her chaste before marriage because she was a girl of chastity. Yet, Anti-Pamelist people though the uses her virtue as a euphemism under which she tries to marry nobleman with the aim of going up in rank in terms of her social class.
The next figure is Henry Fielding who is regarded as the first novelist to use burlesque style in novels. Fielding, unlike the abovementioned novelists, came from the upper, aristocratclass and therefore had a different understanding of morality. For him, chastity was not the uppermost concern of being virtuous and society had more significant moral concerns. This was among the causes that led him to be able to shift from realistic to satirical. The period favoured realist novels but his novels had another, satirical aspect that was also a need for society. According to his definition about his novels, they were comic epic poems in prose. During the period, Alexander Pope produced one of the most influential mock epics of the age. In his The Rape of The Lock, he implemented mock epic to demonstrate and satirize how trivial the concerns of society were. Henry Fielding was also influenced by Pope and he turned out to be a novelist whose satirical side was also salient. In his novel An Apology for the Life of Mrs Shamela Andrews, he mocked Samuel Richardson and his Pamela. As a matter of fact, even the title of the novel, Shamela, mocks Pamela with the pun of fusing two words, Shame and Pamela.
The last literary figure of the age the be examined is Jonathan Swift. He was considered as the greatest satirist of the 18th century. His ultimate goal was to correct society via parodies, satires and ironies regardless of the target class. The witty and satiric contemporaries of Swift even found an organization to attack the vices of society through literature with the name of Scriblerus Club. Yet sadly, as stated above, the target readers of his could not wholly understand his satires and ironies and he was unjustly accused of being shameful. His novel, Gulliver’s Travels, was considered as a children’s book for some time but it, indeed, showed in an allegorical and satirical way the corruption and the hypocrisy of politicians and scholars.
Henceforth, I maintain the opinion that both satire and realism was highly prominent among the novels of 18th century. They were both useful in that realism helped people identify and manifest themselves through the protagonists of the novels thusly encouraged to read more, giving way to increased literacy rates and encouraged novelists. Satire had also its share among the society because it showed the hypocrisy of the political system and the vices of society, not only in a literal manner but also showed how they should be. However, as stated before, relist novels were much more dominant in the century in terms of both volume and quantity as it is the most fundamental and basic level of literature for a society who can hardly read and who cand hardly spare time to read unlike satire, which is a more sophisticated device at the hands of a master but which was not as suitable for the 18th century English people as the realism is.
References
An Apology for the Life of Mrs. Shamela Andrews. The University of Adelaide Library, 2012.
Defoe, Daniel, et al. Robinson Crusoe. Oxford University Press, 2007.
Grimm, Joseph Andrew. “Satire in the Novels of Henry Fielding.” Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers.na, 1950.
Kjelland, Jim. “The 18th Century Novel: Defifining and Redefifining Realism.” The Delta, vol. 3, no. 1, ser. 6, 2008. 6.
Mario, Rosario. “The 18th Century Novel:De Foe-Swift-Richardson-Fielding-Sterne.” Spazio Personale Di Mario Aperto a Tutti 24 Ore Su, 16 Jan. 2014.
Richardson, Samuel. Pamela, or, Virtue Rewarded. 2nd ed., Mint Editions, 2021.
Swift, Jonathan, and David Womersley. Gulliver’s Travels. Cambridge Univ. Press, 2012.
Szwec, Jonathan J. “Satire in 18th Century British Society: Alexander Pope’s The Rape of the Lock and Jonathan Swift’s A Modest Proposal.” Inquiries Journal/Student Pulse 3.06 (2011).