Book description
Pressured by her unscrupulous family to marry a wealthy man she
detests, the young Clarissa Harlowe is tricked into fleeing with the
witty and debonair Robert Lovelace and places herself under his
protection. Lovelace, however, proves himself to be an untrustworthy
rake whose vague promises of marriage are accompanied by unwelcome and
increasingly brutal sexual advances. And yet, Clarissa finds his charm
alluring, her scrupulous sense of virtue tinged with unconfessed desire.
Told through a complex series of interweaving letters, Clarissa is a
richly ambiguous study of a fatally attracted couple and a work of
astonishing power and immediacy. A huge success when it first appeared
in 1747, and translated into French and German, it remains one of the
greatest of all European novels.
Samuel Richardson (1689 - 1761) was born in Derbyshire, the son of a
joiner. He received little formal education and in 1706 was
apprenticed to a printer in London. Thirteen years later he set
himself up as a stationer and printer and became of the leading
figures in the trade. He printed political material, newspapers and
literature. He began writing Pamela as a result of a suggestion from
friends that he should compile a book of model letters for use by
unskilled writers. Pamela was a great success and went on to write
Clarissa, one of the masterpieces of European literature.
Angus Ross is Emeritus Professor of English at the University of
Sussex. He writes on eighteenth-century and other literature and has
edited Swift as well as a number of anthologies.
