The Year of Wonders

Battle of Lowestoft

The Oxford English Dictionary states that the first time this phrase "Annus Mirabilis" was used, was as the title of the poem written by the famous and talented English poet John Dryden.  This poem was written in the year 1666, and published the following year.

                The meaning of this Latin phrase is “a year of particularly notable events”, or “a year of miracles”.

One of these notable events was “the Battle of Lowestoft”, the 13^th of June of 1665, fought by England and Holland. In this battle, the English soundly defeated the Dutch. A year later, “The Four Day´s Battle” took place, from the first of June until the fourth of June of 1666. The final victory was a month later, on “St. James Day Battle”, the 25^th of July. These three battles are what Dryden talks about in the first part of his poem.

The Four Day´s Battle

                Another very important event, that marked England at that time, was the Great Fire of London that lasted five days. It started the 2^nd of September, and went until the 7^th of September of 1666.  So after these three battles that cost a lot of economic trouble among other things, the Great Fire burnt a lot of important manuscripts that belonged to the Middle Ages, a lot of pieces of art, and also a lot of important buildings that were representative for the city. However, the Fire could have been much worse; it could have burnt the whole city. But fortunately, it was stopped. This was one more reason for the king, Charles II to rearrange the streets, and the city in general, whom he had said, before the fire, that he wanted to do so.

Therefore, we can infer that the historical aspects had such a great impact in the society of the time, that they were reflected in literature, and this is a great example of it. 

Great Fire of London (1666)

A little bit of Samuel Richardson

        He was born the 19th of August of 1689 and died the 4th of July of 1761. He had a difficult addult life, taking into consideration that his first wife died, and their five children died too. After some time, Richardson remarried, but something so tragic like that changes your like forever. With his second wife, he had four daughters, but no heir to take over the publishing bussiness. When he was 51 he wrote his first novel. As a consequence, and very fast, he became one of the most popular writers of his time.

He worked all his life with books. however, not writting them, but printing and publishing them. He published more than 500 works, like books, journals and magazines.

Richardson started to write because he wanted to write a series of "familiar letters" with a down-to-Earth tone, in which he would talk about everyday life aspects.

More about Clarissa

      Richardson´s masterpiece, Clarissa is characterized by several aspects. First of all, as I said in the previous post, it is written in epistolary form. However, it is not only the main character who writes these letters. Apart from her other three characters take part in the action of the novel. These characters are Clarissa´s friend Anna Howe, Lovelace and his friend John Belford.

    Thanks to this, the reader has four different points of view throughout the story. 

        To get an idea of how popular this novel became, we just have to see that it was translated into several languages, only a few years after being published. First of all, it was translated into French in the year 1751 by Abbé Prévost. Later on, it was translated into German and Dutch. 

             The main themes of this novel are money, class and competition. 

   The impact of the story of this young lady can be seen throughout the years; it has been so important for English literature that it has been adapted to the big screen. A movie based on the novel was filmed in 2005. And next you will be able to see a short video of the movie.

           

Sanders, Andrew. The Short Oxford Hisotory of English Literature. 2nd Editon. New York: Oxford UP Inc., 2000.

Clarissa, or, The History of a Young Lady

       This novel written by Samuel Richardson, was published in 1748. It is written in epsitolary style. This style had just started to be in fashion. It was this writer who used it for the first time in "Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded" published eight years before "Clarissa, or, The History of a Young Lady".

        The Enciclopedia Britanica defines the epistolary novel like: "a novel told through the medium of letters written by one or more of the characters. Originating with Samuel Richardson’s Pamela; or, Virtue Rewarded  (1740)".

"The advantages of the novel in letter form are that it presents an intimate view of the character’s thoughts and feelings without interference from the author and that it conveys the shape of events to come with dramatic immediacy. Also, the presentation of events from several points of view lends the story dimension and verisimilitude. Though the method was most often a vehicle for sentimental novels, it was not limited to them. Of the outstanding examples of the form, Richardson’s Clarissa (1748) has tragic intensity, Tobias Smollett’s "Humphry Clinker" (1771) is a picaresque comedy and social commentary, and Fanny Burney’s "Evelina" (1778) is a novel of manners"

 http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/190331/epistolary-novel