Clarissa - Samuel Richardson

Clarissa 'The longest novel in the european language'. A statement that is about as qualiatative as 'Britain's loudest band'. This is how most people will know of Clarissa. Which is a shame for two reasons: the length of the damn thing is what perhaps justifiably puts people off reading it; moreover, the novel truly deserves to be considered one of the finest in the English language, regardless of its length. I won't distil the plot as the other review on here has done a decent enough job of that. Also I want to focus instead on the intricacies of the novel and why Dr Samuel Johnson considered it to be 'the first book in the world for the knowledge it ...  Read the complete review

Clarissa OR The History of a Young Lady (1748) By Samuel Richardson (1689 -1761) The heroine, Clarissa Harlowe is a young and virtuous woman who inherits an expensive house from a dead relative. A little jealous and worried about the newly acquired wealth, her family starts pressuring her to accept her rich and dreadful suitor. Clarissa does her best to dissuade her family from this idea and informs them about her wish to remain single, but they suspect that she is secretly in love with a member of the aristocracy with the name of Mr. Lovelace, who was also supposed to be in love with Clarissa's elder sister. Having secret designs ...  Read the complete review

They haven't even heard of Samuel Richardson in the pub in the village he was born in. I know, I went there specially to ask after him. But one day, I hope, they will acknowledge him. Richardson is a genius - but like all pioneers, his achievement seems less now than it is - simply because we take for granted what he achieved. If you love the classical English novel - Fielding, Austen, Dickens, the Brontë's - you will one day have to set the record straight by reading Richardson, for they all stand upon his shoulders. The novel was first published in the 1740's. It is epistolary - written in the form of a series of letters. It is about a young woman, ...  Read the complete review