Review

Author(s): David Womersley

Review by: David Womersley
Source: The Review of English Studies, New Series, Vol. 53, No. 211 (Aug., 2002), pp. 444-
445
Published by: Oxford University Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3070660
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444 REVIEWS

unsettled.
unsettled.Ellis's
Ellis'sessay
essay
encapsulates
encapsulates
in microcosm
in microcosm
the ambitious
the ambitious
and intelligent
and intelligent
project project
of this collection.

KATHERINE TURNER St Peter's College Oxford

Samuel Richardson's Pamela: The Critical Controversy, 1741-1761. Edited

by THOMAS KEYMER and PETER SABOR, with the assistance of JOHN MULLAN.
6 volumes: pp. lxxii+260, 1+356, xxx+350, xliv+312, 336, xxx+362. London:
Pickering & Chatto, 2001. ?495.
When he published Pamela in 1741, Richardson had in view nothing less than to
'introduce a new species of writing, that might possibly turn young people into a course
of reading different from the pomp and parade of romance-writing, and dismissing the
improbable and marvellous, with which novels generally abound'. The ultimate intent
behind this act of generic reformation was to 'promote the cause of religion and virtue'.
In this, as is notorious, Richardson enjoyed only partial success, since the morality of
Pamela was immediately seized upon as suspect, the novel itself decried in some
quarters as pornography masquerading as morality, and its heroine mocked as a
chimera which Eleazar de Mauvillon, the French translator of Anti-Pamela, one of the
rejoinders provoked by Richardson's novel, marvelled at as 'une Fille qui a un
attachement presqu'inoui pour la Vertu, & qui neanmoins est la plus grande grimaciere
& la plus ambitieuse personne du monde . . . c'est un caractere si complique, qu'a
chaque feuille du Livre, on croit voir une autre Heroine'. But in the more modest part
of his ambition Richardson was triumphantly successful. As soon as the novel
appeared, 'a Grub Street grabfest' ensued, in which 'a hungry army of entrepreneurial
opportunists and freeloading hacks . . . moved in for a slice of the action'. The
publication of Pamela was indeed, as the editors of these valuable and useful volumes
state in their General Introduction, 'a defining event in the history of print and
consumer culture as much as in that of a genre'. Given the manifold importance of the
episode, it is entirely appropriate that the controversy generated by Richardson's novel
should be encapsulated in an edition of this kind. For Pamela was not just a novel. It
was also 'a site of ideological contestation, and in the . .. writers of the controversy . . .
we can read a whole culture and its discontents. It is for this reason that so much is to
be gained by recovering to view . . . the full range of Pamela's quarrelsome progeny: in
these sources we see displayed, with unrivalled clarity, the diversity, vigour and
turmoil of their cultural moment.'
Tom Keymer and Peter Sabor have assembled a rich collection of facsimile texts,
presented without annotation, but prefaced by substantial, scholarly, and often lively
introductions. The first volume contains various ancillary writings by Richardson
himself, Fielding's Shamela, and a clutch of interesting verse responses. Volume II
reprints four pieces of prose criticism (including Charles Povey's long and strange The
Virgin in Eden, 1741), and visual representations of scenes from the novel, ranging from
Mercier's mildly erotic paintings to Highmore's engravings. Volume III reprints
Haywood's Anti-Pamela together with the anonymous Memoirs of the Life of Lady
H . Volumes IV and V are given over in their entirety to John Kelly's Pamela's
Conduct in High Life, while volume VI reprints five dramatic or operatic adaptations.
Even so, the European response to Pamela has been hardly touched, and would (as the
editors point out) require as many volumes again.
The value of an edition such as this makes itself evident in a number of ways. Firstly,
there is of course the service performed by reprinting scarce material (in this case,

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 REVIEWS 445

represented
representedmost
mostgraphically
graphicallybyby
the
the
anonymous
anonymous
dramatic
dramatic
burlesque
burlesque
of 1750,
of 1750,
Mock-Mock-
Pamela,
Pamela, which
whichotherwise
otherwisesurvives
survives
in in
a single
a single
recorded
recorded
copycopy
at Trinity
at Trinity
College,
College,
Dublin).
Dublin). In
In the
thesecond
secondplace,
place,the
the
introductions
introductions
to the
to the
separate
separate
volumes
volumes
of this
of edition
this edition
are
are well
well written,
written,unfailingly
unfailinglyinteresting,
interesting,
andand
occasionally
occasionally
rise rise
to the
to level
the level
of serious
of serious
and and
ground-breaking
ground-breakingscholarship
scholarship as as
well
well
as as
being
being
serviceable
serviceable for for
the the
student
student
who wants
who wants
to to
orientate
orientate themselves
themselvesininthisthis rich
richbutbut
confusing
confusing literary
literary
terrain.
terrain.
Finally,
Finally,
the juxta-
the juxta-
positions
positions which
whichnaturally
naturallyarise
arisewhenwhen a collection
a collection
such suchas this
as this
is put
is together
put togethercan have
can ahave a
transforming
transformingeffecteffectononour our understanding
understanding of of
a particular
a particular work. work.
As TomAs TomKeymerKeymer
remarks
remarks in inthe
thecase
caseofofPamela
Pamela Censured,
Censured, what
whatmight
might when when
readread
alonealone
seemseem
unambigu-
unambigu-
ously
ously 'a'a humourless
humourlessexercise
exerciseininscandalized
scandalized paranoia'
paranoia'now, now,
restored
restored
to theto rich
the rich
context
context
of publication
publicationininwhich
whichititfirst
first appeared,
appeared,begins
begins to shift,
to shift,and and
becomes
becomes'not moral
'not moral
denunciation'
denunciation'but but'pornography
'pornography disguised
disguisedas the
as the
moralizing
moralizing exposure
exposure
of pornography
of pornography
in moral
moral disguise'.
disguise'.Instances
Instancessuch
such as as
these
these
provide
provide striking
striking
vindications
vindications
of theofpower
the power
of of
contextualization
contextualizationtotofreshen
freshen andanddeepen
deepenourour
awareness
awareness of individual
of individualworks works
as pieces
as pieces
of of
writing.
As Keymer and Sabor explore the literary demi-monde of the Pamela controversy,
strange and exotic literary figures suddenly caper out from the shadows: figures such as
Charles Povey, that weird survival from the Puritanism of the previous century, whose
anti-Pamela tract seems at times like a literary version of one of his inventions, a water-
filled bomb to put out fires, or Richard Chandler, who later shot himself. Most
fascinating of all, though, is John Kelly, about whom Keymer writes at absorbing
length. Of Jacobite stock, and fallen upon hard times, Kelly turned to Grub Street:
'opportunist and improvisatory, generically flexible and politically mobile, and above
all keenly alert to whatever looked likely to sell, he provides in the shifting nature of his
literary output a finely tuned barometer of the marketplace for print in a period of
change and growth'. Embodying in himself so many of the themes and tendencies at
work in this episode of cultural and literary history, Kelly also exemplifies the many
valuable surprises contained in these volumes.
DAVID WOMERSLEY Jesus College Oxford

HELEN THOMAS. Romanticism and Slave Narratives: Transatlantic

Testimonies. Pp. xii+332 (Cambridge Studies in Romanticism 38). Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2000. ?37-50.

Slavery was the underbelly of Georgian culture, just as abolition was one of the
Romantic period's noblest causes celebres. Helen Thomas's book ambitiously attempts
to connect the courageous, elliptical, and moving writings of the 'black Atlantic' in the
era of abolition with the work of canonical Romantic poets such as Cowper, Blake,
Coleridge, and Wordsworth. Areas of conjuncture between slavery and Romanticism
have been addressed by Moira Ferguson, Alan Richardson, and Paul Edwards (to name
but three) in the last decade or so, in the wake of the groundbreaking black
historiography of Winthrop D. Jordan, C. L. R. James, and Henry Louis Gates Jr.
Although the difficult topic of racialism in the period is still hotly debated, revisionary
scholars have suggested that even the humanitarian impulse underpinning the
abolitionist zeal of many Romantic writers was often tainted by prejudice. Moreover,
the noble cause of abolitionism can't be equated with moral critique of British
colonialism in any straightforward way. Even ex-slaves such as Olaudah Equiano
advocated versions of 'free-trade imperialism' to replace the costly and inefficient-as

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