TEXT BANK 22

Index

Bacci Caterina, Giorgia Gaggini, Laura Lionetti

07. Style

04. Origins

01. The author

08. Moral aim

05. Plot and setting

02. The genre

06. Characters

09. The text

03. The novel

.01

Henry Fielding

Portrait of Henry Fielding

Life and works

-1707; Henry was born into an aristocratic family in Glastonbury. -He started writing comedies (in which he mocked politicians) -1737; The Licensing Act censored his plays and he was compelled to leave theatre and become a magistrate -Late 1730s- early 1740s; He continued to write satirical articles for The Champion and for other newspapers -He started to write novels. -1754; He died.

.02

The comic epic novel

-Fielding created the comic epic novel that becomes an ‘epic’, even if a mocking one. -The characters are psychologically similar to those of epic heroes. He doesn’t appeal to the reader’s heart and feelings, but to his sense. He presents not feelings and emotions, but actions and manners which reveal his characters’ nature. -He addresses a larger public, which includes the upper classes.

.03

THE HISTORYOF THE LIFE OF THE LATE MR JONATHAN WILD THE GREAT

1743

INFO

.04

Origins

The sources for this novel was Defoe with the ‘True and Genuine Account of the Life and Actions of the Late Jonathan Wild’ based upon an interview in Newgate prison.

INFO

.05

Plot and setting

This novel is the mock-heroic biography of the criminal Jonathan Wild, who was born in 1682 in London, where he worked as a buckle-maker’s apprentice. He was arrested for theft, released and then set up as a brothel-keeper with his wife. He had organised a procedure for obtaining the return of stolen goods and he ran a ‘lost property’ office between the Old Bailey and the Newgate prison. The government passed an Act which made it unlawful for anyone to take a reward for giving back stolen goods, but Wild was able to bypass the law. He was eventually arrested in 1725, convicted and hanged.

.06

Characters

Fielding's characters behave consistently from the beginning to the end and they come from various social classes to give us a picture of 18th-century society.In fact in this novel the protagonist is a criminal.

Style

.07

-Obtrusive and third person narrator; -Conversational and ironic tone; -Use of humour and sharp irony.

.08

Moral aim

Goodness is of no consequence to greatness according to the rules of society.

.09

T22. The birth of our hero

.09

T22. The birth of our hero

.09

T22. The birth of our hero

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