SOURCE: "Classical Epic and the 'New Species of Writing,"' in her Henry Fielding's Novels and the Classical Tradition, University of Delaware Press; Associated University Presses, 1996, pp. 61-76

Now a comic Romance is a comic Epic-Poem in Prose;

—Preface to Joseph Andrews

when any kind of Writing contains all its other Parts, such as Fable, Action, Characters, Sentiments, and Diction, and is deficient in Metre only; it seems, I think, reasonable to refer it to the Epic,

—Preface to Joseph Andrews

I have attempted in my Preface to Joseph Andrews to prove, that every Work of this kind is in its Nature a comic Epic Poem, of which Homer left us a Precedent, tho' it be unhappily lost.

—Preface to The Adventures of David Simple

The generic sources of Fielding's "new species of writing" have generated a lively critical debate over the last seventy years because they affect our understanding of his originality, his use of and place in literary tradition, and his affinities with other eighteenth-century authors. Like his contemporaries, Fielding could have drawn from several different literary models, among them classical epic, satire, romance, history, and spiritual autobiography. What he chose to imitate and which genres he invoked in his critical prefaces reveal both his purpose in writing fiction and the authors with whom he wanted his audience to identify him.

Although some scholars have argued that Fielding drew primarily on satire, the essay, and history, most of the discussion has centered on the importance of the epic and the romance in his concept of the novel. Critics who argue that Fielding wrote firmly in the epic tradition of Homer and Virgil emphasize Fielding's classical background and his ties to Dryden, Addison, Swift, and Pope, who championed the classics in the debate between the ancients and the moderns. ¹ But by asserting that Fielding relied heavily on romance—a genre used by such novelists as Richardson and Defoe—other scholars have maintained that Fielding is more "modern" than his classical references suggest and that his concept of fiction is similar to that of many eighteenth-century romance and novel writers.² Both of these positions have substantial limitations, however. Because they take Fielding's epic pretensions seriously, epic theorists cannot satisfactorily explain his use of the mock-heroic in Jonathan Wild, Joseph Andrews, and Tom Jones or the distinction between Fielding's use of the epic in his earlier novels and in Amelia. Romance theorists weaken their position by measuring Fielding's work against modern definitions of the epic rather than those familiar to Fielding and his readers; consequently, they have not considered the relationship of the critical essays in both Joseph Andrews and Tom Jones to eighteenth-century epic theory and have often claimed falsely that Fielding's plot devices, inflated language, and characters are signs of the influence of romance, not epic.

The problems raised by these theories demonstrate that several questions about Fielding's use of other genres remain to be answered. How frequently does Fielding allude to the epic, and how close are his statements to eighteenth-century epic theory? If he does consider his novels part of the epic tradition, why does he use mockheroics? What connection exists between his use of epic in his earlier novels and in Amelia? Because Fielding's classical allusions and quotations indicate the importance of epic—and such genres as satire, romance, and history—to his conception of the novel, they are useful in addressing these issues.

A review of Fielding's references to classical literature reveals that the classical epic more profoundly shaped his theory of fiction than many recent critics have been willing to allow. Albeit at times ironically, he deliberately defines his new genre in terms that would relate it to eighteenth-century discussions of epic familiar to both him and his audience, and, in his introductory chapters, he distances his work from the romance by his repeated attacks on the form. At the same time that Fielding identifies his work with epic in his prefaces, his mock-heroics betray his ambivalence about the epic hero and his concern that the moral values inherent in these ancient poems were not compatible with Christianity. He introduces this theme in Jonathan Wild, Joseph Andrews, and Tom Jones but develops it most fully in Amelia, where he treats the epic analogy seriously in order to dramatize the difference between the heroic and Christian codes. Consequently, the use of epic shows a greater continuity between the early and late works than has been previously recognized.

References to Classical Epic Poets in Fielding's Novels

Two generalizations have long played an important role in discussions of the classical influence on Fielding's "new species." (1) Noting that Fielding seldom uses the term "epic" in his fiction, some critics have argued that his references to epic are too occasional and local to be taken seriously.³ (2) Because of the reputed influence of Lucian, others have stressed the impact of classical satire on Fielding's theory of the novel.⁴ As widespread as such views are, we must reconsider them in the light of Fielding's references to classical writers, which show that both these commonplaces about his use of ancient sources are questionable.

Although Fielding uses the term "epic" very few times, a tabulation of the classical allusions and quotations in the novels reveals that he refers to epic poets and theorists more often than scholars have generally assumed.⁵ …

… [Two] of the three authors Fielding refers to most often in the novels are Homer and Virgil, who account for 98 (or 30 percent) of his 330 allusions and quotations, whereas in the periodicals the two epic poets represent only 84 (or 14 percent) of the 613 references. The numbers suggest that Fielding deliberately added references to these poets to associate his work with the epic genre. These direct references to Virgil are reinforced by the structural parallels between Amelia and Virgil's Aeneid, which Fielding designated as the model for this novel in the Covent-Garden Journal, no. 8 (28 January 1752): 65.⁷ Such evidence implies that Fielding conceived of his novels—and wanted his readers to think of his novels—in relation to the epic tradition.

The number of references to Horace and Aristotle, who account for 74 allusions and quotations, or 22 percent of the total, is also important, because both were associated with eighteenth-century epic theory and many of Fielding's quotations and allusions come from their critical works. In Tom Jones, where Fielding writes extensively about his theory of fiction, the narrator quotes or alludes to Aristotle 8 times: half of these are to his criticism or the Poetics; the other half, to his Politics. Of the narrator's 24 references to Horace—many of which appear in the prefatory chapters treating Fielding's theory of the novel—20 are specifically related to the Ars Poetica and his other critical works. For example, when he discusses the question of probability in the opening chapter of book 8 of Tom Jones, Fielding alludes to Horace's Ars Poetica (lines 188, 191) and Aristotle's Poetics (24.19, 9.1-3) (Tom Jones, bk. 8, chap. 1, 1:397-402).⁸ Such allusions and quotations indicate that Fielding wanted his readers to relate his concept of the novel to classical criticism and acknowledge that the rules for his "new species" grew out of those set down by Horace and Aristotle for the epic. His reliance on classical critics also heightens the authority of his pronouncements and encourages his readers to compare his narratives to the ancient epics.

The scarcity of references to Horace's Satires and other ancient satires suggests that this classical genre did not play a large role in Fielding's fiction. In the course of all four novels, Fielding mentions Horace's Satires only 6 times; when we compare this number to the abundance of references to the Roman writer's critical works, we see that Horace was more important to Fielding as a critical and moral standard than as a satirist. The references to other prominent satiric poets support this conclusion: Fielding quotes or alludes to Lucian, Persius, and Juvenal only 19 times (or 6 percent of the total). As in the journalism, Lucian is unimportant; he is mentioned only twice: once in Tom Jones and once in Amelia, where Fielding puffs his proposed translation of the Greek writer.⁹ This evidence suggests that, while Fielding may have drawn on modern satirists like Cervantes and Scarron, ancient satiric poets had little effect on his fiction.

Clearly, Fielding was thinking of the classical epic poets as he wrote his novels, and he alludes frequently to epic theorists to give his fiction the weight of ancient authority. His use of epic theory as a background for the critical essays in Joseph Andrews and Tom Jones also shows his ties to eighteenth-century epic theorists and indicates why he wanted his readers to identify his works with epics rather than romances.

Epic Theory and the Critical Discussions of the New Species

While Fielding alluded frequently to Virgil, Homer, and epic theorists, he also derived many of the guidelines for his new genre from eighteenth-century discussions of the epic, which would have been familiar both to him and his audience. Ethel M. Thornbury and James L. Lynch have noted that Fielding drew on eighteenth-century theories of the epic in his preface to Joseph Andrews, but they have not discussed the extent to which the prefatory essays at the beginning of each book of Joseph Andrews and Tom Jones address issues that concerned eighteenth-century epic theorists.¹⁰ These references to contemporary issues align Fielding with such writers as Dryden, Pope, and Addison, who wrote about and translated epics, and they suggest how Fielding conceived of the purpose of his novels and their place in the literary hierarchy.

Nearly all the eighteenth-century critics who wrote about epic used the formal definition taken from René Le Bossu, whose Treatise of the Epick Poem (1695) was one of the most influential works on this ancient genre. Le Bossu's description of the epic, derived from Aristotle and Horace, emphasized its didactic purpose rather than its formal elements.

The EPOPEA is a Discourse invented by Art, to form the Manners by such Instructions as are disguis'd under the Allegories of some one important Action, which is related in Verse, after a probable, diverting, and surprizing Manner.¹¹

This definition provided a framework for discussions of the epic in the eighteenth century, since epic theorists followed Le Bossu in discussing the fable, action, moral, characters, machines, and language of the epic poem.¹² Fielding and his readers were clearly aware of this definition and the topics usually covered in treatments of epic because many of the critics and writers with whom they were familiar also used it. For example, Dryden structured his entire discussion of the Aeneid around Le Bossu's topics, and, in his translation of the Odyssey, Pope includes an abbreviated version of Le Bossu, entitled "A General View of the Epic Poem and of the Iliad and Odyssey. Extracted from Bossu."¹³ Addison's famous series of essays on Paradise Lost in the Spectator also follows Le Bossu topic by topic. In chapter 1, I demonstrated the popularity of Dryden's and Pope's translations of the epic poets; consequently, even if Fielding and his readers had not read Le Bossu's entire treatise in French or in an English translation, they could easily learn indirectly about this author and his critical pronouncements from such well-known sources. Because of their familiarity with Dryden, Pope, and Addison, Fielding's readers also would associate Fielding's critical remarks with this description of the epic, and they would relate the topics discussed by Fielding to the epic genre.

Fielding's critical essays in Joseph Andrews and Tom Jones reflect the extent of his awareness of epic theory and the key issues that concerned epic theorists. In addition to Aristotle and Horace, the two most important ancient critics related to discussions of the epic, Fielding also refers to seventeenth- and eighteenth-century scholars who wrote treatises on this genre. For example, in Tom Jones he lists Le Bossu and Dacier along with Aristotle and Horace as examples of the great critics the world has produced (bk. 11, chap. 1, 2:569-70). Although he does not mention them by name, Fielding comments on the theories of Richard Bentley and René Rapin about the divisions in Homer's epics (Joseph Andrews, bk. 2, chap. 1, pp. 90-91).¹⁴ While his use of their names does not guarantee that Fielding had actually read these critics, his detailed comments about their positions indicate more than a passing knowledge of their theories.

Fielding's knowledge of epic theory is important because, in his introductory essays, he applies Le Bossu's definition and his list of topics to his new genre. The statements most closely related to Le Bossu appear in the preface to Joseph Andrews, where he initially describes his new form of writing. Although he realizes that some may object to his use of the term epic because he writes prose, not poetry, Fielding says, "[W]hen any kind of Writing contains all its other Parts, such as Fable, Action, Characters, Sentiments, and Diction, and is deficient in Metre only; it seems, I think, reasonable to refer it to the Epic" (preface, 4). Later in the preface, when he distinguishes between his comic work and serious epics or romances, he once again uses Le Bossu's categories (4-5). Because Fielding's narrator is often ironic, some scholars have dismissed the references to epic in this passage, suggesting that Fielding here means no more by the term "epic" than narrative. Fielding may well be parodying serious discussions of the ancient genre; nevertheless, his choice of terms would resonate with readers familiar with the discussion of the epic written by such critics as Le Bossu, Dryden, Pope, and Addison. Thus, the repetition of these criteria establishes a connection between Fielding's novels and this classical genre even as the humor implies a distance between these two forms.¹⁵

The essays that introduce individual books of Joseph Andrews and Tom Jones also show that Fielding was aware of epic theory and that he wanted to draw on his audience's understanding of epic to define his new form. For example, his introductory essays reveal his concern with unity, an important concern in treatments of the epic. Le Bossu had prescribed that the action of the epic be one, entire, and great; in other words, the episodes of the story must bear a close relation to the main action.¹⁶ Fielding is clearly thinking of this matter in Tom Jones when he advises critics not to condemn any of the incidents in his story as "impertinent and foreign to our main Design" (bk. 10, chap. 1, 2:524-25). He also alludes to this issue when he justifies his right to make rules for this new genre and discusses his decision to select from Tom's early life only those events that are significant to the narrative (Tom Jones, bk. 2, chap. 1, 1:75-78; bk. 5, chap. 1, 1:209-10). He invokes this criterion for an epic to contrast his work with loosely organized romantic tales whose complex plots did not revolve around a single great theme.

Although Fielding's adoption of epic terminology ties his work to the best of the classical tradition, his discussions of epic show that he did not believe that his novels should slavishly follow epic conventions or even that such devices were desirable in modern works. His comments about probability are typical of his ambivalence about certain features of epic. Epic critics in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries hotly debated the extent to which epics could violate the laws of probability by including supernatural beings and fantastic episodes; some theorists argued that fairies and magic did not violate probability, whereas others maintained that works using such devices were no more than romances. Fielding clearly agrees that a work should be probable and that supernatural events have no place in his new species. In Jonathan Wild his naïve narrator assures his audience that he would rather have Wild hanged than violate "the strictest Rules of Writing and Probability" (bk. 4, chap. 6, p. 205). In Joseph Andrews he relates the probable directly to his objections to the romance:

for I would by no means be thought to comprehend those Persons of surprising Genius, the Authors of immense Romances, or the modern Novel and Atalantis Writers; who without any Assistance from Nature or History, record Persons who never were, or will be, and Facts which never did nor possibly can happen: Whose Heroes are of their own Creation, and their Brains the Chaos whence all their Materials are collected. (Bk. 3, chap. 1, p. 187)

In Tom Jones Fielding devotes an entire introductory essay to "the Marvellous," in which he discusses the distinction between the possible and the probable and considers which marvelous events and characters are suitable for novels; he argues that the fictions of romance are contrary to the demands of probability (bk. 8, chap. 1, 1:395-407).¹⁷ Thus, Fielding uses this issue to associate his work with epic and distance it from romance.

At the same time, Fielding cannot take seriously critics' lengthy debates over the use of divine machinery in modern epics, in which some advised their contemporaries to substitute angels and saints for heathen gods and goddesses.¹⁸ He alludes to this controversy both in Jonathan Wild and Tom Jones, where he asserts that he will not bring in supernatural agents to rescue heroes, as the ancient epic writers frequently did with heathen deities.¹⁹ Fielding underscores his own disdain for the issue when he humorously concludes that the only supernatural agents fit for modern works are ghosts but advises that they be used sparingly, since the writer using them will most likely elicit a "horse-laugh" from his reader (Tom Jones, bk. 8, chap. 1, 1:399).

Fielding's remarks about character reveal that he is not slavish in his thinking about this issue either. He readily agrees with epic theorists that a key problem is whether characters should be perfectly good or have some bad characteristics.²⁰ In Jonathan Wild he refers to this issue when he defends the "weakness" that Wild shows towards Heartfree by observing that "Nature is seldom so kind as those Writers who draw Characters absolutely perfect" (bk. 4, chap. 4, p. 200). Later Fielding advises critics who read Tom Jones not to condemn characters with some blemishes, citing the authority of Horace (bk. 10, chap. 1, 2:526-27). Although he accepts that novels, like epics, should have consistent characters, he rejects the requirement that the only suitable heroes and heroines are nobles, choosing instead "low" characters, who have noble qualities but with whom his readers can identify more easily. Consequently, Fielding reveals that he shares many of the artistic concerns of epic poets but that he does not think that novelists can, or should, imitate epics in every respect.

Fielding does not simply use these criteria to show to what degree his works resemble epics; he also deliberately invokes epic topoi to distinguish his works from romances. Even though the writers of seventeenth-century heroic romances may have drawn their critical pronouncements from epic theory, many eighteenth-century critics held the form in contempt and used the term "romance" pejoratively. According to writers on epic, romances were written merely for entertainment and lacked the didactic purpose that Le Bossu considered essential to the epic poem. Fielding is thinking of this criticism in Joseph Andrews when he ranks his works with Fenelon's Telemaque and the Odyssey instead of romances, because the latter contain "very little Instruction or Entertainment" (preface, 3-4). Because epic theorists attacked romances for violating the rules of probability, Fielding repeatedly maintains that his works differ from romances, which abandon truth and are the products merely of the fertile imagination of the author. For example, in Tom Jones he says that the historian who ignores probability becomes a writer of romance (bk. 8, chap. 1, 1:402).²¹ He also alludes to the loose, episodic structure that critics associated with romance when speaking of a brook in Tom Jones "which Brook did not come there, as such gentle Streams flow through vulgar Romances, with no other Purpose than to murmur" (bk. 5, chap. 12, 1:264). Although Fielding used romance plot devices and other features associated with this genre, such were the negative associations of this term that in his critical comments he carefully distanced his work from it.

In his prefaces and the critical essays in Tom Jones and Joseph Andrews, Fielding clearly tied his new species to the epic genre and demonstrated how the reader should distinguish his work from the romances written in both prose and verse. His use of epic terminology and categories demonstrates that the term "epic" meant more than "prose narrative," the definition used by many modern critics. Drawing on Le Bossu, Aristotle, and Horace, Fielding used the term to indicate to his readers that, unlike romance, his new genre had a didactic purpose, unified organization, realistic characters drawn from ordinary life, and an appropriate mixture of the probable and the surprising. By equating his new genre with the ancient form, Fielding aligned his work with a type of narrative at the top of the literary hierarchy, giving it an aura of respectability the romance lacked. At the same time, Fielding's comments about various issues of interest to epic theorists reveal that he did not think that novelists should adopt epic conventions entirely. While he considered his novels part of the classical tradition, he recognized that the novel was a more appropriate vehicle for eighteenth-century readers than the epic. The allusions to epic criticism also heighten the reader's awareness of the verbal epic devices he used in his novels, which are frequently mock-heroic.

Mock-Heroics and Classical Epic

Although Fielding's mock-heroics have been widely noted, few critics have given them more than a passing comment because of the difficulties they raise both for those who dismiss the influence of epic and for those who regard seriously his allusions to this ancient genre.²² The number of times Fielding imitates epic conventions in his novels belies the claim that he rarely draws an analogy between his new species and the epic form; at the same time that it reinforces the connections established in the prefaces, the parody of epic convention may undermine its authority.²³ Claude Rawson demonstrates the dual nature of the epic parodies when he asserts that the mock-heroic elements of Jonathan Wild demonstrate the interplay between the world of the novel and the past, but he maintains that the epic parallels in Fielding's later novels do not share this quality.²⁴ When we examine Fielding's mock-heroic diction, however, we find the same attitudes toward epic revealed in the prefaces and critical essays; furthermore, the mock-heroics address some of the liveliest critical debates of his time.

One of the primary functions of the mock-heroics in Fielding's novels is to distance the reader from the story. In addition to mock-heroic battle descriptions, Fielding uses rhetorical devices associated with classical epic, which are striking because he carefully calls the reader's attention to their artificiality: invocations to the Muses, formulae for dawn and sunset, and epic similes.²⁵ Sometimes he signals the epic convention with a chapter title, such as "A Battle sung by the Muse in the Homerican Stile, and which none but the classical Reader can taste" (Tom Jones, bk. 4, chap. 8) or "An Invocation" (Tom Jones, bk. 13, chap. 1). He often completes an epic simile with a translation "in vulgar Language" or with a lengthy interpretation that forces the reader to note what has preceded it.²⁶ He also heightens our awareness of his artificial diction with direct parodies of scenes in Homer and Virgil.²⁷ For example, the description of Joseph's cudgel in the "battle" involving Joseph, Adams, and the dogs recalls the shield of Achilles in book 18 of the Iliad and the armor of Aeneas in Aeneid 8.608-731 (Joseph Andrews, bk. 3, chap. 6, pp. 238-42).²⁸ With these allusions and figures, he reminds us that this book is a work of art and not a factual history, thus keeping us from getting too involved with the characters he has created.

Fielding probably chose to rely on epic rather than romance conventions because these devices were probably more effective at distancing readers from the narrative than the romance diction used by so many of his contemporaries. Sheridan Baker has noted that few readers would be especially conscious of the romance elements in novels, for, by the eighteenth century, the real world had adopted romance diction, the ideal of conduct, and the romance success story. Consequently, such elements would strike the reader not as artificial but as realistic.²⁹ Since it is more consciously contrived, epic diction remains distinct from the real world and keeps the reader continually attuned to the literary form. When Fielding introduces epic invocations before his description of Sophia and the scenes in London, he prevents readers from becoming too involved in the world of the novel. Thus, they will be more likely to question the values of the characters and the world in which they live.

Fielding's calculated use of these rhetorical techniques is also closely related to his attack on romance in both Joseph Andrews and Tom Jones. As Ronald Paulson and other critics have noted, Fielding was writing an antiromance in the tradition of Cervantes and Scarron.³⁰ Like Quixote's delusion, Adams's preoccupation with the heroic world makes him a ridiculous figure in contemporary society. Adams interprets his surroundings through the mirror of the heroic past, and his battles with ravishers, dogs, and squires for the honor of Fanny Goodwill are to him akin to the deeds of Achilles, Odysseus, and Aeneas. The juxtaposition of the real and epic worlds reveals how unworkable Adams's values are in modern society, and it suggests that the classical heroic ideal may be unsuitable in the Christian world.

While they demonstrate that Adams's view of the world is unrealistic, the mock-heroics also indicate the shortcomings of Adams's opponents, whose behavior is guided by self-interest and ignorance. By engrafting the epic world on the real one, Fielding calls attention to the disparity between ancient and modern values. The epic rhetoric encourages the reader to see that modern society—and such writers as Richardson and Cibber, who glorified it—does not measure up to the standards set by the ancients. The technique is similar to that of The Tragedy of Tragedies (1731), in which Fielding elevates a midget to gigantic proportions to underline the limited aspirations of those in his own world.

As in Joseph Andrews, the use of epic motifs in Tom Jones underscores Tom's unrealistic view of the world and his imprudent actions early in the novel. Unlike Adams, who fights battles for a virtuous young girl, Tom selects inappropriate objects for his chivalry. Neither Jenny Jones nor Molly Seagrim lives up to Tom's idealistic image, and both cause him to abandon his true love, Sophia. Similarly, Tom reveals his heroic code when he chooses to become a soldier after Allworthy sends him away. When Tom abandons his military aspirations and pursues Sophia to London, the epic battle descriptions cease. Although Fielding ennobles Tom by identifying him with epic heroes, therefore, he calls into question the morality of the ancient heroic ideal.

Epic diction in Tom Jones also reveals the unsavory features of minor characters. When Fielding describes Mrs. Partridge as an Amazon, he suggests her ability to fight with and dominate her husband (Tom Jones, bk. 2, chap. 4, 1:89). The predatory natures of Mrs. Deborah Wilkins and Miss Bridget appear in the epic similes that Fielding uses to describe them (Tom Jones, bk. 1, chap. 6, 1:47-48; bk. 1, chap. 8, 1:56). Overall, the use of epic, reinforced by the attention Fielding calls to it, makes the reader more aware of the pretenses that lie behind the behavior of such characters.

Although the epic devices enhance the reader's awareness of the limitations of the modern world with which the heroic world is compared, then, they indicate a certain ambivalence toward heroic morality that Fielding shared with his contemporaries. Ian Watt has noted that both Defoe and Richardson objected to the vicious behavior inherent in the Homeric ideal.³¹ While valuing the epic form above all others and imitating the epics of Homer and Virgil, even Pope and Dryden were uncomfortable with the heroic code of honor, which is distinctly non-Christian. For example, among Homer's defects Pope lists "the vicious and imperfect Manners of his Heroes." ³² Thus, Fielding's approach to epic associates him with others in the eighteenth century who were uncomfortable with the epic hero.

The epic devices in Jonathan Wild, Joseph Andrews, and Tom Jones indirectly reflect this ambivalence toward the heroic world. In all three novels nearly all the epic similes disclose the vicious nature of the characters. Although Adams's picture of the heroic world offers an alternative to the sordid values of modern society, Fielding indicates that it hardly enables Adams to deal effectively with the people he encounters on the road. Fielding enunciates the problem with the heroic world more clearly in Tom Jones, where Tom's heroic pretensions are associated with imprudent choices. Consider the women of questionable virtue or the military life, whose brutality and ignorance is represented by Northerton: only when he abandons the heroic ideal does Tom develop the restraint that helps him win Sophia. Such uses of heroism are tied to the phenomenon Rawson has noted in Jonathan Wild. Fielding's allusions to Virgil and Homer underscore the sordidness of the moral world that Wild inhabits, but the analogy between Wild and Aeneas suggests that epic heroism itself is unacceptable.³³

Fielding identifies his use of inflated language with epic rather than romance by allusions to and parodies of Homer and Virgil. These devices distance the readers from the characters and story and encourage them to contrast the values of the modern and epic worlds. Each comments on the other: the idealism of the epic heightens the readers' awareness of the selfish motivations lying behind the pretensions of many characters, and the limitations of the heroic code become apparent when characters who adopt it prove ineffectual in the modern world.

Amelia and the Aeneid

In Amelia Fielding abandons the epic devices he relies on in his earlier fiction and draws a deliberate parallel between Amelia's structure and that of the Aeneid. Although many scholars have detailed the similarities between these two works, none has been able to explain satisfactorily why Fielding used Virgil's epic. Maurice Johnson claims that the Virgilian framework exalts the modern domestic characters of the novel, implying that epic heroism may show itself in human nature.³⁴ Lyall Powers suggests that Booth's victory over Bath represents a victory over a passe code of honor, which parallels Aeneas's victory over Tumus, the victory of pietas over violentia, and that, like Aeneas, who triumphed by submitting to the will of the gods, Booth succeeds by yielding to providence.³⁵ While each theory is partially true, neither considers eighteenth-century objections to the heroic code and concern with its applicability in a Christian world.

To account for the differences in the endings of Amelia and the Aeneid, scholars imply that the heroic code is a positive ideal, thus ignoring the ambiguity of the Aeneid's closing scene, which is implicit both in the original and in Dryden's version of the epic. As I have already shown, many eighteenth-century critics and writers questioned the validity of the Homeric concept of heroism, and Virgil's epic shares this ambivalence. Aeneas's murder of Turnus at the end of the Aeneid is not simply the victory of a pious man over a violent one; when Aeneas refuses to grant his opponent mercy, he violates the injunction laid upon him by his father Anchises in book 6: "tu regere imperio populos, Romane, memento / (hae tibi erunt artes), pacique imponere morem, / parcere subiectis et debellare superbos" (6.851-53) [Remember to rule the people in your empire, Roman (this will be your skill), and to impose law in peace, to spare those who have been subjugated, and to make war on the proud] (my translation). In his final confrontation with Turnus, he does not show him mercy, killing him violently. Thus, Virgil suggests that Aeneas has succumbed to his own rage and is little better than the man he defeated.

Although Dryden asserts in his dedication that Aeneas's defeat of Turnus is a victory for pietas, the ambivalence of the heroic ideal is apparent in his translation of the final lines of book 12.

In deep Suspence the Trojan seem'd to stand;
And just prepar'd to strike repress'd his Hand.
He rowl'd his Eyes, and ev'ry Moment felt
His manly Soul with more Compassion melt:
When, casting down a casual Glance, he spy'd
The Golden Belt that glitter'd on his side:
The fatal Spoils which haughty Turnus tore
From dying Pallas, and in Triumph wore.
Then rowz'd anew to Wrath, he loudly cries,
(Flames, while he spoke, came flashing from his Eyes:)
Traytor, dost thou, dost thou to Grace pretend,
Clad, as thou art, in Trophees of my Friend?
To his sad Soul a grateful Off ring go;
'Tis Pallas, Pallas gives this deadly Blow.
He rais'd his Arm aloft; and at the Word,
Deep in his Bosom drove the shining Sword.
The streaming Blood distain'd his Arms around:
And the disdainful Soul came rushing thro' the Wound.
(Lines 136077)³⁶

Dryden's emphasis on Aeneas's wrath and the blood of Turnus links the gory death of Aeneas's opponent to the violent behavior of Achilles when he slaughters Hector in the Iliad. Aeneas's violation of Anchises' injunction enhances the reader's sense of discomfort with the ending.³⁷ Thus, Dryden's version demonstrates that Fielding and his readers undoubtedly knew this interpretation of the final scene of Virgil's epic.

Fielding shares Dryden's concern about the epic hero. The connection between greatness and the violence of war is apparent in the poem "Of True Greatness," where he derives the image of the plain drenched with gore from the battle scenes in Dryden's Aeneis and Pope's Iliad.³⁸ In Jonathan Wild he draws the parallel between Homer's heroes and the behavior of Alexander when Wild expresses his admiration for both at the same time (bk. 1, chap. 3, pp. 12-13). Clearly Fielding associated the heroic ideal with greatness, which he repeatedly condemns for its violence and cruelty. In Tom Jones he acknowledges that women love men because they are glorious, citing Penelope in the Odyssey as an example (bk. 4, chap. 13, 1:202). When Lady Bellaston tries to persuade Lord Fellamar to rape Sophia, she uses the example of Paris's behavior towards Helen and the Romans to the Sabine women (bk. 15, chap. 4, 2:794-95). Again, Fielding associates the heroic code with violence and cruelty.

In Amelia Fielding underscores the relationship between the soldier's concept of honor and the heroic code in his allusions to the Aeneid and Homer's epics. When Dr. Harrison and Colonel Bath discuss the conflict between honor and Christianity, Harrison denies that the Greeks and Romans dueled. But Bath cites examples from both Homer and Virgil that implicitly establish a connection between the code of honor that he follows and that of the Greeks and the Trojans (bk. 9, chap. 3, pp. 365-66). Fielding reinforces the connection between Bath and the Homeric hero at the masquerade when Bath pulls off his mask before the bucks, who flee "as the Trojans heretofore from the Face of Achilles" (bk. 10, chap. 2, p. 416). Clearly, Fielding associates the military code of honor followed by Booth, Bath, and Colonel James with the heroic code of classical epic.

Dr. Harrison returns to the conflict between the Christian and the heroic ideal after Amelia reveals that Colonel James has challenged Booth to a duel. He argues with Amelia that her concern for her husband's military honor is wrong. He relates this concept to classical heroism by observing that in Homer Helen criticizes Paris for unheroic behavior after he fights Menelaus (bk. 12, chap. 3, p. 504). When she again mentions the importance of Booth's "reputation," Harrison replies, "Virgil knew it a great While ago. The next Time you see your Friend Mrs. Atkinson, ask her what it was made Dido fall in Love with Aeneas" (bk. 12, chap. 3, p. 505). Even in his discussions with Mrs. Atkinson, he remarks that Homer's "Pollemy" is "the true Characteristic of a Devil" (bk. 10, chap. 4, p. 427). While Harrison consistently maintains that his favorite classical writers were critical of the heroic ideal, he and other characters establish a connection between the epic heroes and the soldier's code of honor that is unmistakable.

Within the context of this conflict between Christianity and Homeric morality, Fielding's use of the Aeneid and his departure from Virgil's ending are understandable. As a soldier, Booth is bound to the traditional military code of honor. Early in his marriage to Amelia, his honor dictates that he abandon his wife and follow his regiment to Gibraltar, undermining the domestic happiness that Fielding designates as the main subject of the novel. Later Booth threatens his marriage again when he must fight a duel with Colonel Bath. His preoccupation with obtaining a military position distracts him from the threats to his wife's virtue offered by the Peer and Colonel James, which nearly destroy his marriage. Finally, after Booth recognizes the value of Christianity, Amelia is able to avert the duel between him and Colonel James, providing the novel with a Christian rather than a heroic ending. Significantly, at the end of Amelia, Booth abandons the military life in order to live happily, surrounded by his family.

Although it uses epic structure and avoids the burlesque diction of mock epic, Fielding's Amelia offers his final comment on the heroic code of behavior. In Joseph Andrews Fielding views the Homeric hero as an ideal against which to measure the sordid values of the modern world, but he suggests that such a hero cannot be an effective guide to modern life. The perception of the epic world reflected in both Jonathan Wild and Tom Jones is more ambivalent: while the heroic world represents an ideal that offsets the sordidness of reality, its connection with that reality throws its values into question. Finally, in Amelia Fielding seriously considers the viability of the heroic ethic in the domestic and Christian world and finds it completely lacking.

Although Fielding probably did not consider his novels "epics" in the traditional sense, he drew plentifully on his audience's familiarity with epic theory and the translations of Pope and Dryden to define his new form and heighten the reader's awareness of the conflict between the ancient and modern worlds, between the world of romance and reality, and between the heroic and Christian ideals. He also used epic effectively as a thread that unites his novels from Jonathan Wild through Amelia. He exploits the associations aroused by epic as part of a strategy to make his readers more discerning about the story.…

Notes

¹ Ethel M. Thombury, Henry Fielding's Theory of the Comic Prose Epic, University of Wisconsin Studies in Language and Literature 30 (1931; rpt., New York: Russell and Russell, 1966); Martin C. Battestin, The Moral Basis of Fielding's Art: A Study of Joseph Andrews (Middletown: Wesleyan University Press, 1959), 40-41, 86-88, 104, 151-52; E. T. Palmer, "Fielding's Joseph Andrews: A Comic Epic in Prose," English Studies 52 (1971): 331-39; Leon Gottfried, "The Odyssean Form," in Essays on European Literature in Honor of Liselotte Dieckmann, ed. P. Hohendahl, H. Lindenberger, and E. Schwarz (St. Louis: Washington University Press, 1972), 19-43; J. Paul Hunter, Occasional Form: Henry Fielding and the Chains of Circumstance (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1975), 16-17, 130-40, 185.

² For detailed discussion of the position of the "romance" theorists, see Homer Goldberg, "Comic Prose Epic or Comic Romance: The Argument of the Preface to Joseph Andrews," Philological Quarterly 43 (1964): 193-215; and Sheridan Baker, "Fielding's Comic Epicin-Prose Romances Again," Philological Quarterly 58 (1979): 63-81. These articles give useful, though biased, summaries of the previous criticism on this issue. The only recent addition to this debate is James Lynch, Henry Fielding and the Heliodoran Novel: Romance, Epic, and Fielding's New Province of Writing (Rutherford, N.J.: Fairleigh Dickenson University Press, 1986), which covers much of the same ground as Baker, Goldberg, and Henry Knight Miller, Henry Fielding's Tom Jones and Romance Tradition, University of Victoria English Literary Studies 6 (Victoria: University of Victoria Press, 1976).

³ See Baker, "Fielding's Comic," 64-67; Hunter, Occasional Form, 131; J. Paul Hunter, Before Novels: The Cultural Contexts of Eighteenth-Century Fiction (New York: W. W. Norton, 1990), 18-21; Ian Watt, The Rise of the Novel: Studies in Defoe, Richardson and Fielding (Berkeley: University of Califomia Press, 1957), 257-59; and Claude Rawson, Henry Fielding and the Augustan Ideal under Stress (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1972), 147-70.

⁴ For example, see Paulson's discussion of the influence of Lucian and other classical satirists in Satire and the Novel in Eighteenth-Century England, 132-41, 161-64.

⁵ I have not included Shamela in this tabulation. Because it is a close parody of Richardson, Shamela has very few references to classical authors; most are Williams's miscitations of Latin writers, the significance of which I will discuss in chapter 4.I have chosen to use the second edition of Jonathan Wild, published in 1754, rather than the first edition, which appeared in volume three of the Miscellanies (1743); Fielding added several references to classical authors in the second edition, but the first edition has no references that are unique to it.

⁶ For a complete list of authors, see appendix C [of Henry Fielding's Novels and the Classical Tradition, by Nancy A. Mace (Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1996)].

⁷ See George Sherbum, "Fielding's Amelia: An Interpretation," ELH 3 (1936): 1-14; Lyall Powers, "The Influence of the Aeneid on Fielding's Amelia," Modern Language Notes 71 (1956): 330-36; and Maurice Johnson, Fielding's Art of Fiction: Eleven Essays on Shamela, Joseph Andrews, Tom Jones, and Amelia (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1961), 139-56. Although Joseph F. Bartolomeo argues that Fielding makes the analogy to the Aeneid to mount a clever defense of "a tepidly received novel," the parallels that other critics have outlined between Amelia and Virgil's epic suggest that Fielding's remarks were more than just a rhetorical device. See Joseph F. Bartolomeo, A New Species of Criticism: Eighteenth-Century Discourse on the Novel (Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1994), 71.

⁸ Fielding also cites Horace and Aristotle when discussing epic theory in the following: the title page, which quotes Horace's comment in the Ars Poetica about Homer (lines 141-42); bk. 11, chap. 1, 2:569-70, where they are listed with epic theorists Le Bossu and Dacier; bk. 5, chap. 1, 1:210, in which Fielding alludes to Horace's rules about the five-act structure of plays in connection with unity; bk. 9, chap. 1, 1:490 and 491, where Fielding supports his comments about the need for genius and learning in authors with allusions to Horace (Ars, lines 408-18); and bk. 10, chap. 1, 2:527, where Fielding justifies the mixed character with a quotation from Horace (Ars, lines 352-53). Other references are connected with Horace's critical pronouncements in the Ars: bk. 4, chap. 14, 1:208, and bk. 7, chap. 6, 1:344, where Fielding mentions Horace's strictures on what material is suitable for description (Ars, lines 149-50); and bk. 9, chap. 2, 1:494, where Fielding says that the author who makes his reader weep, must first weep himself (Ars, lines 102-3).

⁹ See Tom Jones, bk. 13, chap. 1, 1:686, where Fielding groups Lucian with Aristophanes, Cervantes, Rabelais, Moliere, Shakespeare, Swift, and Marivaux; and Amelia, bk. 8, chap. 5, pp. 325-26.

¹⁰ See Thornbury, Henry Fielding's Theory, and Lynch, Henry Fielding and the Heliodoran Novel, 17-19. Arthur L. Cooke, "Henry Fielding and the Writers of Heroic Romance," PMLA 62 (1947): 984-94, mentions Fielding's concern with probability, unity, characters, and moral purpose, but he suggests that Fielding and the writers of seventeenth-century heroic romances share these interests. As I will show, Fielding repeatedly argued that these are the very areas in which the romance and his new genre differed.

¹¹ René Le Bossu, Treatise of the Epick Poem (1695), in Le Bossu and Voltaire on the Epic, introduced by Stuart Curran (Gainesville, Fla.: Scholars' Facsimiles and Reprints, 1970), 6.

¹² For a detailed discussion of the theory of the epic in the eighteenth century, see A. F. B. Clark, Boileau and the French Classical Critics in England, 1660-1830 (Paris: Librarie Ancienne Edouard Champion, 1925), 232-55, 286-88; and H. T. Swedenberg Jr., The Theory of the Epic in England, 1650-1800, University of California Publications in English 15 (1944; rpt., Milwood, N.Y.: Kraus Reprint Co., 1977), 16-27, 43-57.

¹³ See John Dryden, dedication of the Aeneis, in The Works of John Dryden (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1987), 5:267-341; Alexander Pope, preface to The Iliad of Homer, ed. Maynard Mack, in The Poems of Alexander Pope (London: Methuen, 1967), 7:3-25 and The Odyssey of Homer, ed. Maynard Mack, in The Poems of Alexander Pope (London: Methuen, 1967), 9:3-24.

¹⁴ For a discussion of the critical theories of these men, see A. F. B. Clark, Boileau, 275-79; and M. L. Clarke, Greek Studies in England, 1700-1830 (1945; rpt. Amsterdam: Adolf M. Hakkert, 1986), 136-38.

¹⁵ For a discussion of the meaning of "comic epic" in this passage, see W. L. Renwick, "Comic Epic in Prose," Essays and Studies 32 (1946): 40-43; and Claude Rawson, Satire and Sentiment, 1660-1830 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), 146-47. Bartolomeo (New Species of Criticism, 70-71) discusses the interpretive problems created by the narrative voice in this passage. See also Abraham Adams's discussion of the Iliad in Joseph Andrews, bk. 3, chap. 2, pp. 196-99, where he uses categories similar to those of Le Bossu.

¹⁶ See Swedenberg, Theory of the Epic, 216-19.

¹⁷ See also Tom Jones, bk. 4, chap. 1, 1:150, where Fielding refers to "those idle Romances which are filled with Monsters, the Productions, not of Nature, but of distempered Brains."

¹⁸ See A. F. B. Clark, Boileau, 308-10; Swedenberg, Theory of the Epic, 266-70.

¹⁹Jonathan Wild, bk. 2, chap. 12, p. 112; Tom Jones, bk. 17, chap. 1, 2:875-76.

²⁰ See Swedenberg, Theory of the Epic, 306-8.

²¹ See also Jonathan Wild, bk. 3, chap. 11, p. 167, where Fielding argues that the readers of romance like to be deceived; bk. 4, chap. 4, p. 198, where he talks about the extravagancies of romance; Joseph Andrews, bk. 3, chap. 1, p. 185, where he equates historians with romance writers who are not concerned with the truth; pp. 185-86, in which he refers to works that readers justly consider romances because "the Writer hath indulged a happy and fertile Invention"; and Tom Jones, bk. 9, chap. 1, 1:489, where he says that he has avoided the term romance because he wants to make sure that his readers understand that his novels have some truth.

²² See, for example, Paulson, Satire and the Novel, 106-7; Hunter, Occasional Form, 130. Although Thornbury discusses the mock-heroic description of the fight involving Molly Seagrim, she argues that it is not mockheroic but comic; she maintains that the battle is fitted to the importance of the characters and reflects their seriousness about the fight (Henry Fielding's Theory, 128-30).

²³ For a discussion of the mock-heroic as imitation and critical parody, see Ulrich Broich, The Eighteenth-Century Mock-Heroic Poem, trans. David Henry Wilson (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), 1-6, 50-67. Although Broich observes that the serious epic is never consciously mocked in mock-heroics as in a critical parody, he concludes by admitting that such parodies often have the inadvertent effect of putting the classical epic in a "comic light" (66-67).

²⁴ Rawson, Henry Fielding and the Augustan Ideal Under Stress, 147-70, esp. 159-60.

²⁵ See Joseph Andrews, bk. 1, chap. 12, pp. 55-56; bk. 1, chap. 8, pp. 37-38; and bk. 3, chap. 4, p. 225; and Tom Jones, bk. 9, chap. 2, 1:495.

²⁶ See, for example, Joseph Andrews, bk. 1, chap. 8, pp. 37-38; Tom Jones, bk. 1, chap. 6, 1:47-48; bk. 4, chap. 2, 1:154-55; bk. 5, chap. 11, 1:259; and bk. 9, chap. 2, 1:495.

²⁷Joseph Andrews, bk. 2, chap. 9, pp. 138-39, the battle between Adams and Fanny's intended ravisher; bk. 3, chap. 6, pp. 237-43, between Joseph, Adams, and the dogs; bk. 3, chap. 10, pp. 256-59, between Joseph and Adams and the emissaries of the Squire; Tom Jones, bk. 2, chap. 4, 1:89-90, between Mr. and Mrs. Partridge over Jenny Jones; bk. 4, chap. 8, 1:177-84, involving Molly Seagrim and the townspeople; bk. 5, chap. 11, 1:259-63, involving Tom, Thwackum, and Blifil over Molly; and bk. 9, chap. 3, 1:501-4, involving Partridge, Jones, the Innkeeper, and his wife over the honor of Mrs. Waters.

²⁸ See also the parody of the libation in the Iliad in Tom Jones, bk. 9, chap. 4, 1:508.

²⁹ Sheridan Baker, "The Idea of Romance in the Eighteenth-Century Novel," Papers of the Michigan Academy of Science, Arts, and Letters 49 (1964): 507-22. For a detailed discussion of the adoption of courtly language in Pamela and Clarissa, see Carey McIntosh, Common and Courtly Language: The Stylistics of Social Class in 18th-Century English Literature (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1986), 77-78, 118-30.

³⁰ See Paulson, Satire and the Novel, 22-41, 89-92, 111-21.

³¹ See Watt, Rise of the Novel, 240-47.

³² Alexander Pope, preface to The Iliad of Homer, 13-14.

³³ Rawson, Henry Fielding and the Augustan Ideal Under Stress, 150-61.

³⁴ Johnson, Fielding's Art of Fiction, 155-56.

³⁵ Powers, "Influence of the Aeneid," 334-36.

³⁶ Dryden, Aeneis, 6:806.

³⁷ For a full discussion of Dryden's ambivalence towards the Homeric hero, see William Frost, Dryden and the Art of Translation, Yale Studies in English 128 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1955), 62-69; and Judith Sloman, Dryden: The Poetics of Translation (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1985), 126-36.

³⁸ See Miscellanies, 1:21-22, lines 67-90, and Miller's note.