Autonomous Voices: An Exploration of Polyphony in the Novels of Samuel Richardson

Townsend, Alex

ISBN 10: 3906769801 / ISBN 13: 9783906769806

Published by Peter Lang, Bern, 2003

About this Item

Paperback in like new condition. New shopstock with minor shelf-wear, no faults. TA.

Seller Inventory # 528482

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Autonomous Voices: An Exploration of Polyphony in the Novels of Samuel Richardson
• Publisher: Peter Lang, Bern
• Publication Date: 2003
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 3906769801
• ISBN 13: 9783906769806
• Binding: Paperback
• Condition: New
• Book Type: Used
• Seller catalogs:
  • Literature

About this title

Synopsis

The novels of Samuel Richardson are the essential topic of this book. Its main aim is to use Bakhtin’s definition of polyphony as a way into Richardson’s work and, in turn, to provide a basis from which to revise Bakhtin.
After tracing the development of psychological realism in the eighteenth-century novel and the growing potential for autonomy in the fictional character in general, the book goes on to examine the potential for polyphony which first emerges in Pamela and reaches its height in Clarissa.
Between editions of this momentous novel, Richardson felt compelled to make frantic attempts to control the reader’s interpretation of the text. Lovelace – the villain of Clarissa – acquires a degree of autonomy that bears startlingly vivid testimony to the plurality of human identity itself. Sir Charles Grandison, Richardson’s last novel, is a vivid retreat from the powerful effect of Lovelace.

About the Author

The Author: Alex Townsend was born in 1970. He was educated at the University of East Anglia in Norwich and the University of Kent at Canterbury, where he completed his Ph.D. in 1999. He currently teaches English language and literature to college students and continues to pursue ambitions in both academic and creative writing.