Samuel Richardson (1689-1761)

A selective list of online literary criticism for English novelist Samuel Richardson, favoring signed articles by recognized scholars, and articles from peer-reviewed sources


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Literary Criticism: Pamela (1740)

Batchelor, Jennie. On Pamela: or, Virtue Rewarded. From the Literary Encyclopedia, 11/24/01

Doody, Margaret Anne. Introduction to Pamela (Penguin Classics). At Google Books

Folkenflik, Robert. "Pamela: Domestic Servitude, Marriage, and the Novel." Eighteenth-Century Fiction 5:3 (April 1993)

Gooding, Richard. "Pamela, Shamela and the Politics of the Pamela Vogue." Eighteenth-Century Fiction 7:2 (January 1995)

Keymer, Thomas and Peter Sabor, eds. The Pamela Controversy: Criticisms and Adaptations of Samuel Richardson's Pamela, 1740-1750, 6 Volume Set. (Pickering and Chatto) Publisher's blurb, provides context for Pamela (removed)

Kibbie, Ann Louise. "Sentimental Properties: Pamela and Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure." First page of article only. ELH, Vol. 58, No. 3 (Autumn, 1991), pp. 561-577

Pierce, John B. "Pamela's Textual Authority." Eighteenth-Century Fiction 7:2 (January 1995)

Rivero, Albert J. "The Place of Sally Godfrey in Richardson's Pamela." Eighteenth-Century Fiction 6:1 (October 1993)

Yount, Janet E. Aikins. Professor Yount created this website on illustrations in Pamela, which also discusses Pamela's printing history, to accompany her essay "Pamela Illustrations in the Classroom." From Approaches to Teaching the Novels of Samuel Richardson, edited by Jocelyn Harris and Lisa Zunshine (MLA 2006)


Literary Criticism: Clarissa (1747-1748)

Batchelor, Jennie. On Clarissa, from the Literary Encyclopedia, 11/24/01.

Brown, Murray L. "Authorship and generic exploitation: why Lovelace must fear 'Clarissa.'" Studies in the Novel, 22-JUN-98

Carnell, Rachel K. "Clarissa's Treasonable Correspondence: Gender, Epistolary Politics, and the Public Sphere." Eighteenth Century Fiction, 10:3 (April 1998)

Dachez, Hélène. "Crossing Borders in Samuel Richardson's Clarissa; Or, The 'Ladder Of Dependance' Revisited." On marrying out of one's social class in Richardson's novels. Studies in the Literary Imagination, Fall 2003

Erickson, Robert A. "Written in the Heart: Clarissa and Scripture." Eighteenth-Century Fiction 2:1 (October 1989)

Gunn, Daniel P. "Is Clarissa Bourgeois Art?" Eighteenth-Century Fiction 10:1 (October 1997)

Harries, Elizabeth W. "Fragments and Mastery: Dora and Clarissa." Eighteenth-Century Fiction 5:3 (April 1993)

Harris, Jocelyn. "Protean Lovelace." Eighteenth-Century Fiction 2:4 (July 1990)

McCrea, Brian. "Clarissa’s Pregnancy and the Fate of Patriarchal Power." Eighteenth-Century Fiction 9:2 (January 1997)

McGirr, Elaine. "Why Lovelace Must Die." Contends that in Clarissa "Richardson pits the theater against the novel, Lovelace versus Clarissa... Clarissa's crisis can be best expressed in terms of genre, as the mid-eighteenth century found the Georgian novel struggling for legitimacy, demanding the cultural respect and ideological power the Restoration had accorded to the theater." Novel: A Forum on Fiction, Fall 2003

Melani, Lilia. Reputation of Clarissa, by Professor Melani, CUNY. Also Summary of questions about the ending of Clarissa,, and Summary of political readings of Clarissa,

Moody, Ellen. Commentary on Clarissa. The novel is discussed chapter by chapter by scholars engaged in a discussion-group reading, at a site from Professor Moody, George Mason Univ.

Park, Julie. "'I shall enter her heart': fetishizing feeling in Clarissa." Studies in the Novel, 22-DEC-05

Park, William. "Clarissa as Tragedy." First page of article only. Studies in English Literature, 1500-1900, Vol. 16, No. 3, Restoration and Eighteenth Century (Summer, 1976), pp. 461-471

Pascoe, Judith. "'Before I read Clarissa I was nobody: Aspirational reading and Samuel Richardson's great novel." A humorous first-person essay about reading Clarissa in graduate school. Hudson Review, Summer 2003

Stuber, Florian. Samuel Richardson's Published Commentary on Clarissa,, 1747–1765 (Pikering and Chatto, 1998, 3 Vol. Set). Publisher's blurb

Vermillion, Mary. "Clarissa and the Marriage Act." Eighteenth-Century Fiction 9:4 (July 1997)

Warner, William B. A review of Warner's Reading Clarissa: The Struggles of Interpretation (Yale Univ. Press, 1979). Only first page of article is available


Literary Criticism: Sir Charles Grandison (1753)

Batchelor, Jennie. On Sir Charles Grandison, from the Literary Encyclopedia, 11/24/01

Chaber, Lois A. "'Sufficient to the Day': Anxiety in Sir Charles Grandison." Eighteenth-Century Fiction 1:4 (July 1989)

Haggerty, George E. "Sir Charles Grandison and the 'Language of Nature.'" Eighteenth-Century Fiction 2:2 (January 1990)

Jones, Wendy. "The Dialectic of Love in Sir Charles Grandison." Eighteenth-Century Fiction 8:1 (October 1995)

McGirr, Elaine. "Manly lessons: Sir Charles Grandison, the rake, and the man of sentiment." Studies in the Novel, 22-SEP-07

Price, Leah. "Sir Charles Grandison and the Executor's Hand." Eighteenth-Century Fiction 8:3 (1996)

Temple, Kathryn. Printing like a post-colonialist: The Irish piracy of Sir Charles Grandison. A post-colonial interpretation of the 1753 Irish piracy of Richardson's novel, focusing on the political nature of the piracy dispute. Novel: A Forum on Fiction, Spring 2000


Literary Criticism

Batchelor, Jennie. A substantial introduction to Samuel Richardson from the Literary Encyclopedia, 11/24/01

Blewett, David, ed. A review of Passion and Virtue: Essays on the Novels of Samuel Richardson (Univ. of Toronto Press). "This collection, culled from articles that have appeared in the journal Eighteenth-Century Fiction since 1989, sets out to offer testimony 'to the vitality of Richardson studies today.'" University of Toronto Quarterly, 72,1 (Winter 2002/3) reviewed by Devoney Looser (removed)

Bray, Joe. The source of "dramatized consciousness": Richardson, Austen, and stylistic influence [influence on novelist Jane Austen]. Style, Spring, 2001

Doody, Margaret Anne. Review of Doody's A Natural Passion: A Study of the Novels of Samuel Richardson (Clarendon Press, 1974). Reviewed in Eighteenth-Century Studies, Vol. 10, No. 2 (Winter, 1976-1977), pp. 262-264 by Jocelyn Harris

Dussinger, John A. Selected Bibliography:Samuel Richardson." From 18th Century Bibliographies Online, ed. Jack Lynch, Rutgers Univ.

Harris, Jocelyn and Lisa Zunshine. Approaches to Teaching the Novels of Samuel Richardson (Modern Language Association, 2006). Publisher's website

Hunt, Russell A. "Johnson on Fielding and Richardson: A Problem in Literary Moralism." An essay on Samuel Johnson's detestation of the novels of Henry Fielding and liking for the novels of Samuel Richardson. The Humanities Association Review, 27, 4 (Fall 1976) pp 412-20

Oliver, Kathleen M. Samuel Richardson, Dress, and Discourse (Palgrave 2008). Publisher's web site

Rivero, Albert J. Review of Rivero's New Essays on Samuel Richardson. (St. Martin's Press, 1996). First page only. Reviewed by Margaret Anne Doody in South Atlantic Review, 63, 3 (Summer, 1998), pp 110-13

Temple, Kathryn. "The Angry Owner: Samuel Richardson, Modern Authorship and the Ancient Romance," on the Irish piracy dispute in Sir Charles Grandison. Romanticism and the Law Introduction, Romantic Circles Praxis Series


Web Sites

The Samuel Richardson Society website Information about Richardson resources and events.

The American Society for Eighteenth Century Studies. Web site for the scholarly journal.


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