SOURCE: "Origins and Developement of the Novel before 1740," in Critical Survey of Long Fiction: English Language Series, edited by Frank N. Magill, Salem Press, Inc., 1983, pp. 3013-21.

In the following essay, Thaiss traces the development of the English novel from the late sixteenth century to the publication of Samuel Richardson's Pamela in 1740.

The English-speaking world has long considered 1740, the year in which Samuel Richardson's Pamela was published, pivotal in the development of the novel, a broad term which for several centuries has been applied to many different forms of long fiction. Richardson's first novel remains a convenient landmark in the history of the form because, at least in England, it went further than any previous work in exploring an individual character's "sensibility," that wonderful mix of perception, culture, logic, sentiment, passion, and myriad other traits that define one's individuality. Pamela has been called the first intellectual novel, that...