Biography Essay

Laurence Sterne's enduring reputation as an author rests upon two works, The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman (1760-1767) and A Sentimental Journey through France and Italy (1768), both of which were written and published during the last nine years of his life. During that time he was the recipient of excessive praise and the target of vituperative criticism, heralded as a second Francois Rabelais, Miguel de Cervantes, or Jonathan Swift, and condemned as an immoral hypocrite. Controversy continues about the precise nature of Sterne's contribution to English literature, but no one any longer denies him a place among the most important of eighteenthcentury writers. It is Sterne more than any other author of the century whose work has seemed, time and again, of especial interest to modern fiction writers, as they experiment with realism, psychology, and "metacommentary" as the organizing principles of narrative.

Sterne was...