Vanity Fair (Cyclopedia of Literary Characters)
At a glance:
- Author: William Makepeace Thackeray
- First Published: 1847
- Type of Work: Novel
- Type of Plot: Social satire
- Time of Work: Early nineteenth century
- Setting: England and Europe
- Genres: Long fiction, Satire
- Subjects: Murder or homicide, Nineteenth century, Europe or Europeans, Marriage, Friendship, England or English people, Corruption, Adventure, Satire, Napoleonic Wars
- Locales: London, England, Brussels, Belgium
Characters Discussed
Rebecca (Becky) Sharp, an intelligent, beautiful, self-centered, and grasping woman whose career begins as an orphaned charity pupil at Miss Pinkerton’s School for girls and continues through a series of attempted seductions, affairs, and marriages that form the background of the novel. Unscrupulous Becky is the chief exponent of the people who inhabit Vanity Fair—the world of pretense and show—but she is always apart from it because she sees the humor and ridiculousness of the men and women of this middle-class English world where pride, wealth, and...
[The entire page is 2255 words long]
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