Novel and Romance: The "Odyssey" to "Tom Jones." (review)

Abstract

170 EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY FICTION 3:2 Hubert McDermott. Novel and Romance: The "Odyssey" to "Tom Jones." London: Macmillan Press, 1989. xi + 257pp. In dûs slim but ambitious study, Hubert McDermott sets out to show diat works like "Pamela and Clarissa were simply «workings of models already in existence" (p. ix) and that "die novels of Richardson and Fielding represent a distinct highlight, but not a separate beginning" in die history of fiction (p. xi). McDermott spends die first hundred pages of his study looking at what he sees as die real beginning in "Ancient Narrative Modes": die Odyssey and Greek and Latin romances. His argument in dûs section can be summed up in his final paragraph on the Odyssey: "It can truly be said mat die Odyssey shows die capacity of romance to express die dark and complex trudis of life unavailable to realism. ... It is little wonder diat die Odyssey, both in its incidentals and in its overall pattern, became die model for all later romances" (p. 23). If we have come to question every assumption mat such sentences make, that does not mean diat tiiey do not contain sometiûng more or less cogent. McDermott reminds us diat prose fiction is not a development of die modem era and diat in recent studies classical models are often overlooked. In die ancient romances he finds all the patterns that later novelists develop and suggests a broad range of narrative devices as represented in works ranging from Ninus and Semiramus (in 100 BC) to Aethiopica (tiûrd century AD). His lively plot summaries are helpful in reminding us of die wealtii of dûs material; and even when he is discussing works which are familiar, such as The Golden Ass, his insights can be valuable. When he says, though, diat "Samuel Richardson was certainly not the first writer of fiction concerning 'procrastinated rape,' since this is what Greek romance is all about" (p. 28), we can be forgiven for wondering what die terms of analysis really are. At times, it seems diat McDermott is solely concerned widi technical innovation: "To claim diat Daphnis and Chloe was influenced to any extent by die pastoral poetry of Theocritus, is to detract from the achievement of Longus. There is little doubt diat die idea of placing Daphnis and Chloe in a pastoral setting was suggested by pastoral poetry, but in every odier respect Longus must be regarded as an innovator" (p. 57). The writer, in dûs case as in many odiers, seems to want to have it bodi ways. He neidier seriously addresses die question of pastoral conventions nor deals widi recent arguments concerning their value. If the book has a diesis, it concerns these early works and the degree to which tiiey anticipate later fiction. But is dûs really the right question to be asking? Were Greek and Roman romance writers as interested in technical innovation as McDermott suggests? His certainty about the relation of particular works to one another and of audiorial intention to fictional form is remarkable: "An analysis of die Satyricon, as fiction, must begin by acknowledging diat die work is a parody of ancient romance, and intended as such by its audior" (p. 71). The certainty with which McDermott makes diese claims masks his unwillingness to question his notions of "influence," "parody," or "intention." The study necessarily suffers from such glibness, at least among tiiose who are unwilling to take so much for granted. McDermott spends less dian ten pages on a section called "Medieval Romance," arguing as he does that "English narrative was in a state of utter moribundity in die fifteendi and early sixteendi centuries, and was only rescued from imminent deatii by die introduction of Spanish picaresque and newly translated Greek romances" (p. 96). His interests obviously lie elsewhere. In a longer section on "Pre-Eighteendi-Century Romance" he spends most of his time examining die classical sources of seventeendi-century romance, discussing "die general patterns of [various] stories" (p. 136) in an attempt to show diat diese works are really a reworking of classical themes. He dien turns to Richardson and Fielding. REVIEWS 171 McDermott's discussion of Richardson is...