COURSE 11

THE NOVEL IN THE ROMANTIC PERIOD

1780-1830

The novel was the most popular literary form in the period from 1780 to
1830, in the Romantic period. This was due primarily to the industrial revolution
which turned England from an agricultural country to an industrial one bringing
wealth and prosperity to the country at large, but at the same time the growing
feeling that the prosperity of a small group brought the poverty of many.
Nevertheless the period saw the rise of the novel as a consequence of
industrialization on one hand and development of ‘circulating libraries’, on the
other, despite the fact that the novels were expensive at their first appearance.
The character, Sir Anthony Absolute in Sheridan’s The Rivals sentenced: ‘A
circulating library in a town is an ever-green tree of diabolic knowledge!’ This is
particularly because it is well-known the fact that women were acknowledged to
be large contributors to the development of literature of that period.
The popular novel was the conveyor of some ideas usually associated with
Romanticism. One of these Romantic ideas is the cult of feelings, known as
‘sensibility’, known to have a certain history. It is said to have arisen out of a
reaction against the sheer1 brutality of eighteenth-century life and it is based on
the philosophical beliefs in the innate2 goodness of man. Therefore the
eighteenth-century novel was imbued with characters responding emotionally to
life. We can find such examples in Richardson 3, Sterne4, Henry Mackenzie5,
Rousseau6 and Goethe7. Sensibility was expressed in human relations and in
1
Sheer/ absolute (English Assistance UK)
2
Inmate/ inborn/ native (idem)
3
Samuel Richardson (19 August 1689 – 4 July 1761) was an 18th-century English writer and printer. He is best
known for his three epistolary novels: Pamela: Or, Virtue Rewarded (1740), Clarissa: Or the History of a Young
Lady (1748) and The History of Sir Charles Grandison (1753). Richardson was an established printer and
publisher for most of his life and printed almost 500 different works, with journals and magazines.
4
Laurence Sterne (24 November 1713 – 18 March 1768) was an Anglo-Irish novelist and an Anglican clergyman.
He is best known for his novels The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman, and A Sentimental
Journey Through France and Italy; but he also published many sermons, wrote memoirs, and was involved in
local politics. Sterne died in London after years of fighting consumption (tuberculosis).
5
Henry Mackenzie FRSE (August, 1745 - 14 January 1831) was a Scottish lawyer, novelist and miscellaneous
writer. He was also known by the sobriquet "Addison of the North." Mackenzie had attempted to interest
publishers in what would become his first and most famous work, The Man of Feeling, for several years, but
they would not even accept it as a gift. Finally, Mackenzie published it anonymously in 1771, and it became
instantly successful.
6
Jean-Jacques Rousseau (French: [ʒɑɑ ʒak ʁuso]; 28 June 1712 – 2 July 1778) was a Genevan philosopher, writer,
and composer of the 18th-century. His political philosophy influenced the French Revolution as well as the
overall development of modern political, sociological, and educational thought. He argued that private property
was the start of civilization, inequality, murders and wars.
Rousseau's novel Émile, or On Education is a treatise on the education of the whole person for citizenship. His
sentimental novel Julie, or the New Heloise was of importance to the development of pre-romanticism and
romanticism in fiction.
7
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (German: [ˈjoːhan ˈvɔlfɡaŋ fɔn ˈɡøːtə], 28 August 1749 – 22 March 1832) was a
German writer and politician. His body of work includes epic and lyric poetry written in a variety of metres and
styles; prose and verse dramas; memoirs; an autobiography; literary and aesthetic criticism; treatises on botany,

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response to nature and art. Sensibility has become a fashionable attribute, but the
rage did not make the world nicer and the heroines of 1790s novelists warned
upon the danger of sensibility. The fashionable sensibility might seem civilizing
and emotional in a man, yet tended to make a woman dangerously feeble and
vulnerable. Two examples here: Emily St. Aubert, heroine of Anne Radcliffe’s
novel, The Mysteries of Udolpho, is warned by her dying father to avoid the
dangers of sensibility, ‘the pride of fine feeling, the romantic error of amiable
minds’; Jane Austen, the exponent of the contemporary fashion, in her Sense
and Sensibility, begun in 1790 and published in 1811, expresses her criticism of
sensibility through her heroine Marianne - that it is not only dangerous to its
possessor, but it a self-centred emotion which makes its possessor unwilling to
recognize the claims of others.
Another Romantic idea is the interest in non-rational experience, as a
reaction against eighteenth-century rationalism. This idea embraced many
forms: with some writers it led towards the pursuit of spiritual reality; with
others it led to the exploration of a personal and social underworld. One such
area was the world of dreams – heightened dreams induced by opium and De
Quincey describes the phantasmagoria of such dreams and discusses the slavery
to the drug which tormented Coleridge in Confessions of an English Opium-
Eater (1821).
The Gothic novels became the exponents of the world of nightmare. These
kinds of novels set in a ‘medieval’ world explore the emotions of terror, guilt
and horror. Gothic novels make use of the medieval settings of castle and
convent aiming at providing the idea of prison, both physically and emotionally.
These settings express the extreme manifestation of physical power and moral
outrage. Their dark, ‘irrational’ architecture and labyrinthine passages symbolize
what Coleridge called ‘the unfathomable hell within”. Nonetheless the Gothic
castle is usually set in a sublime, mountainous landscape, in northern Europe or
the Alps, even if it has nothing to do with Hellenic sunshine. The Gothic villain
is similarly sublime, as OIHEL states. This character exercises a sadistic power
over a helpless heroine. The OIHEL also states that these works are
contemporary with those of Marquis de Sade (1740-1814), though a direct
influence cannot be traced. Anne Radcliffe, The Mysteries of Udolpho, is said to
be the most famous of the novelists; the heroine is under the influence of a
wicked guardian and after many adventures she marries the hero of sensibility.
Gothic novels were designed to keep fearful reader awake at night: Catherine
Morland8 – “what can it be? – But do not tell me – I would not be told upon any
anatomy, and colour; and four novels. In addition, numerous literary and scientific fragments, more than 10,000
letters, and nearly 3,000 drawings by him are extant.
A literary celebrity by the age of 25, Goethe was ennobled by the Duke of Saxe-Weimar, Carl August in 1782
after first taking up residence there in November of 1775 following the success of his first novel, The Sorrows of
Young Werther.
8
Catherine Morland is the principal character in Jane Austen's book Northanger Abbey. She enjoys reading the
mysterious and frightening gothic novels that were popular in her time. She often has a tendency to blur (fuzzy
and unclear image) the lines between fiction and reality, which causes her a great deal of trouble.

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account. I know it must be a skeleton…” The delicacy in Anne Radcliffe’s
novels is absent in The Monk of Mathew Gregory. The novel presents the raping
of a young girl by a monk. The feelings here are terror and fear combined with
moral and physical horror. Jane Austen in her Northanger Abbey takes an
astringent9 view of the Gothic as she had of sensibility. John Thorpe 10 claims he
has read The Monk, while Catherine Morland interprets life in Gothic terms.
At the beginning of nineteenth century the vogue of Gothic renewed.
Gothic villains may be detected behind Mr. Rochester in Jane Eyre and
Heathcliff in Wuthering Heights.
Despite the mocking references upon ‘the tribe of lady novelists”, Mary
Shelley is considered the founder of scientific Gothic”. Mary Shelly’s craft may
be said to reside on the intellectual tradition behind her; her father was William
Godwin, the radical philosopher and novelist, while her mother was Mary
Wollstonecraft, who was part of a group of radicals which also included William
Blake; in 1790 she published A Vindication of the Rights of Men and in 1792, A
Vindication of the Rights of Woman – milestone in the history of feminism.
Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein when she was nineteen and it was part
of a plan she made together with Byron and Shelley while they were staying on
the Lake Virginia. Her project was the only completed. The character of
Frankenstein embodies a scholar preoccupied to find the principle of life; here
we have a similarity with Doctor Faustus’s laboratory. Thus a creature is laid in
the world, gigantic and hideous with needs which have not been anticipated nor
satisfied. The mountains above Chamonix, ‘glorious presence-chamber of
imperial Nature’, as the Romantic poets consider them, are the witnesses of a
scene in which the creature makes his demands after having read Prometheus
Unbound. The book is built in its first part with a focus on the creator’s
responsibilities, whereas in the second part the focus shifts. Because
Frankenstein refuses to supply a mate for him the monster take revenge in
destroying all those the scholar loves and this is to be seen as a psychological
reflection of his creator.
The Romantic period saw the birth of the Doppelgänger effect in The
Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner (1824) of James Hogg.
The protagonist of the novel is possessed by the devil and the atrocious deeds
committed are ‘justified’ according to a perverted form of Calvinism 11. The
Gothic here resides in extreme religious mania. The novel, through its enigmatic
structure and abrupt narrative shifts, already bears the features of psychological
Gothic preparing the terrain for Wuthering Heights and the contemporary
techniques of the Gothic films.
9
Astringent/ harsh
10
Character of Northanger Abbey
11
Calvinism (also called the Reformed tradition or the Reformed faith) is a major branch of Protestantism that
follows the theological tradition and forms of Christian practice of John Calvin and other Reformation-era
theologians. Calvinists broke with the Roman Catholic church but differed with Lutherans on the real presence
of Christ in the Lord's supper, theories of worship, and the use of God's law for believers, among other things.

3
 At this point of our endeavour it is worth mentioning that the Romantic
creations did not escape mockery by Thomas Love Peacock (1785-1866), author
of a series of prose tales which satirized the fashionable ideas of the day. The
procedure was for Peacock to utilize a large house full of guests, each of them
being the spokesman for some topical trait or enthusiasm. This kind of current
tended to go opposite direction from the Romanticism.
As a daughter of a clergyman, Jane Austen’s (1775-1817) life was
uneventful, yet her six brothers’ (and one sister) active lives provided her some
knowledge of the greater world; two of her brothers who entered the navy are
owed sympathetic accounts of the navy in Mansfield Park and Persuasion.
Many scenes in her novel are based on the visits of and to the gentry of
Hampshire.
Jane Austen began writing when she was twelve, but her first novel was
published when she was thirty-five and it was Sense and Sensibility. The only
novels she published herself were Pride and Prejudice (1813), Mansfield Park
(1814) and Emma (1816). She died when she was forty-two, her novels
Persuasion and Northanger Abbey were to be published posthumously.
Human nature, as one of her characters12 talked about, was the novelist
Jane Austen’s subject-matter as it manifested in ordinary English setting. Giving
an advice to a niece who attempting to write a novel, Jane Austen wrote ‘3or 4
families in a country village is the very thing to write on’. In other words, Jane
Austen’s heroines are young, at the beginning of their adult lives. All of them at
the end of the novel succeed in having made the commitment which will occupy
their entire happy lives – marriage. The OIHEL [p. 317] states that the abstract
nouns occurring in the titles of several of the novels’ titles indicate that the
heroines make full display of them as they are educated for marriage. Jane
Austen represented a tradition of the English novel lasting throughout the
nineteenth century in writing novels with a realistic setting about reconciliation
of the individual and the society where the concluding marriage indicated that
harmony has been reached.
The same history of English literature states that there were few novelists
who had Austen’s economy and mastery of tone. The example here is from
Pride and Prejudice where Elizabeth Bennet resists her mother in marrying Mr.
Collins who three days later proposed and was accepted by Charlotte Lucas. The
reader is presented the matter from Charlotte’s point of view, that has never been
a beauty and on the other hand from her brothers’ point of view that were
relieved when their sister found a husband. Jane Austen’s world is said to be an
unromantic place where the reader is surprised by the neatness with which
common topics are illuminated from different points of view. Jane Austen

12
Catherine Morland, heroine of Northanger Abbey, waking up from her Gothic fantasies reflected that
„Charming as were all Mrs. Radcliffe’s works, and charming even as were the works of her imitators, it was not
in them perhaps that human nature, at least in the midland counties, was to be looked for.” [OIHEH: 317]

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proves a real artist devoting herself to the novel. In this sense she once wrote ‘an
artist cannot do anything slovenly’13.
In connection to her work there existed two criticisms; one of them was
that her range is too narrow, the explanation would be that she wrote during the
Napoleonic wars; the second came from Charlotte Bronte who declared herself
not particularly impressed by her novels ‘the Passions are perfectly unknown to
her; she rejects even a speaking acquaintance with the stormy Sisterhood14.’
The Oxford history believes these criticisms might be considered in
relation to Emma. Emma is considered unusual among Austen’s novels in that
there are no military men among the characters. Jane Austen herself said of
Emma that she ‘was a heroine whom no-one but myself will much like her.’ She
is a rich and snobbish young girl who amuses herself by planning marriages for
other people.
About Jane Austen’s novels it is worth mentioning quoting Oxford
Illustrated History of English Literature: ‘Her novels were not particularly
popular, and only two of them reached a second edition in her lifetime. There
was too much subtlety, and not enough sensation, in her novels for the majority
of popular novel readers; but she had some gratifying admirers. Scott reviewed
Emma favourably and the novel was dedicated to the Prince Regent at his
request. Jane Austen’s reputation rose throughout nineteenth century, until she
became established as one of our major novelists and the first woman writer in
the English literary tradition who is unassailably15 in the first rank.’[p. 321]
In July 1814, Waverly or ‘Tis Sixty Years since, appeared anonymously. In
a couple of months Jane Austen complained to her niece: ‘Walter Scott has no
business to write novels, especially good ones. – It is not fair. – He has Fame
and Profit enough as a Poet, and should not be taking the bread out of other
people’s mouths. – I do not like him, & do not mean to like Waverly if I can help
it – but fear I must.’
Scott started writing Waverley in 1805, but discouraged, he abandoned it,
during the time he became a successful poet. When he published it, it instantly
became a success and went on writing Guy Mannering, The Antiquary, Old
Mortality, Rob Roy, The Heart of Midlothian, The Bride of Lammermoor. They
are mostly historical novels and are set in Scotland. In 1819 he extended his
range with medieval novels, Ivanhoe set in England, Quentin Durward (1823)
set in France. Then he went on with Scotland again Redgauntlet (1824). Scott’s
novels, especially those set in Scotland earned their fame due to the portrayal of
Scottish life – the clans of Highlands and the lards and peasants of the
13
Slovenly = carelessly
14
The close relationship among women based on shared experiences, concerns (Merriam Webster Dictionary
online)
In Jane Austen this may be detected when Jane Fairfaix breaks off her secret engagement and in Mansfield Park,
when Maria Rushworth runs away with Henry Crawford, which are considered at the periphery of Jane Austen’s
works.
15
Unassailable = so sound or well established that it cannot be challenged or overtaken (English Assistance UK)

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Lowlands, through presenting various trades and professions, shopkeepers,
fishermen, farmers, and lawyers, a range of eccentrics on the periphery of the
society, the beggar, the village idiot, the smuggler, the gipsy.
In comparison to Jane Austen’s novels, Scott’s novels are wide-ranging in
theme and setting. Scott became rich due to his novels; he was paid large sums
of money by his publisher, and soon became the partner of the firm which
printed them. Of all the writers of the times, he gained worldly recognition. He
was offered the post of Poet Laureate, but refused it. His novel, immensely
popular were translated into most European languages and were avidly waited
for in America. He was offered a Baronetcy by the Prince Regent. Unfortunately,
in 1826, an economic recession brought about the collapse of Scott’s publisher
and jeopardized the position of the printing firm whose partner Scott was. The
writer was ruined. The bitter years that followed are presented in his journal.
Despite his bad health he went on writing and succeeded in paying his debts by
his death in 1832.
Scott remained in the history of literature as the creator of the historical
novel. It was obvious for the historical novels to be set in the past. But there
were other novels too that were set in the past, like for instance the Gothic
novels. On the other hand, there were different reasons for the two types of
novels to be set in the past: the Gothic novel wanted an escape from the present,
whereas Scott, as a historian set his novel in significant times. It is worth
mentioning that Scott’s writing influenced the writing of history in the
nineteenth century.
In Scott’s characters the reader finds an awareness of the flow of history,
the people are consciously conditioned by the historical and political
circumstances of their birth. His characters have an ancestry which imposes a
tradition which they have either to follow or reject and this is the central
situation of his novels.
Despite their different views, one can find similarities with Jane Austen’s
novel in that the characters of both of them seek to impose his mental ideas on
the real world. What is important to emphasize is that Scott remarked as a
Romantic novelist because he will not abandon realism.
At the beginning of the chapter, it was alleged that Romanticism appeared
as a reaction to Rationalism, yet Peacock in Crotchet Castle (1831) gives the
best conclusion in saying that before he died he would like to see a
reconciliation of the great controversies: of the sentimental against the rational,
the intuitive against the inductive, the ornamental against the useful, the intense
against the tranquil, the romantic against the classical.