Early Works

'Aesop's Fables', 'Letters Written to and for Particular Friends' and Other Works

Samuel Richardson, Alexander Pettit

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Year: 2011
• Print ISBN: 9780521830522
• eBook ISBN: 9781139210843
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: English Literary Criticism
• Index: Literature

This is the first edition to assemble all of the earliest known works by Samuel Richardson (1689–1761), one of the most influential authors in the English tradition. Richardson's exercises in conduct-writing, religious controversialism, anti-theatrical polemic, occasional verse, literary criticism – and his popular and surprisingly revealing edition of Aesop's Fables – resonate throughout his later work while claiming ample legitimacy of their own. Readers familiar with only Pamela, Clarissa and Sir Charles Grandison will gain a fresh appreciation of the genesis of and the historical and cultural complexities at work in these famous novels, and readers new to Richardson will encounter an agile writer who invites closer consideration. A lengthy introduction situates the constituent works in Richardson's career as well as in the period more broadly, and the extensive textual apparatus records the bibliographical histories of the texts and their treatment by their present editor.

Table of contents

• Cover
• THE CAMBRIDGE EDITION OF THE WORKS OF SAMUEL RICHARDSON 1
• EDITORS
• THE WORKS
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• CONTENTS
• GENERAL EDITOR'S PREFACE
• ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
• CHRONOLOGY
• ABBREVIATIONS
• GENERAL INTRODUCTION
• TEXTUAL INTRODUCTION
• THE APPRENTICE’ VADE MECUM: OR, Young Man’s Pocket-Companion.
• To the RIGHT WORSHIPFUL THE CHAMBERLAIN OF LONDON1; This small TREATISE
• PREFACE.
• CONTENTS of the FIRST PART.
• THE YOUNG MAN’s Pocket Companion.
• THE YOUNG MAN’s Pocket-Companion. PART II.
• THE YOUNG MAN’s Pocket Companion.
• THE YOUNG MAN’s Pocket-Companion. PART III.
• THE YOUNG MAN’s Pocket Companion.
• A SEASONABLE EXAMINATION OF THE PLEAS AND PRETENSIONS Of THE PROPRIETORS Of, AND SUBSCRIBERS to, PLAY-HOUSES, Erected in DEFIANCE Of THE ROYAL LICENCE.
• A COLLECTION Of ENTERTAINING HISTORIES AND NOVELS, DESIGNED To promote the Cause of VIRTUE and HONOUR.
• PREFACE.
• ÆSOP’s FABLES. With Instructive Morals and Reflections, Abstracted from all PARTY CONSIDERATIONS, ADAPTED To All CAPACITIES;
• PREFACE.
• THE LIFE of ÆSOP.
• The FABLES of Æsop, &c.1
• LETTERS Written to and for particular friends, On the most Important Occasions. Directing not only the Requisite style and forms To be Observed in Writing Familiar Letters;
• But How to Think and Act Justly and Prudently, in the common concerns of HUMAN LIFE.
• PREFACE.
• The CONTENTS of the LETTERS.
• Familiar LETTERS On the most IMPORTANT OCCASIONS in COMMON LIFE.
• THE LITERARY REPOSITORY.
• The Infidel Convicted: OR, A BRIEF DEFENCE OF THE Christian Revelation.
• THE Infidel Convicted.
• POSTSCRIPT.
• EMENDATIONS
• WORD-DIVISION
• BIBLIOGRAPHICAL DESCRIPTIONS OF EARLY EDITIONS
• EXPLANATORY NOTES
• INDEX