The Female Quixote; or, The Adventures of Arabella is a comedic novel by Scottish writer Charlotte Lennox imitating and parodying the ideas of Miguel de Cervantes' Don Quixote. Published in 1752, two years after she wrote her first novel, The Life of Harriot Stuart, it was her best-known and most-celebrated work. It was approved by both Henry Fielding and Samuel Richardson, applauded by Samuel Johnson, and used as a model by Jane Austen for Northanger Abbey.[1] It has been called a burlesque, "satirical harlequinade", and a depiction of the real power of females.[2] Norma Clarke has ranked it with Clarissa, Tom Jones and Roderick Random as one of the "defining texts in the development of the novel in the eighteenth century".[3]
Lady Arabella, the heroine of the novel, is brought up by her widowed father in a remote English castle, where she reads many French Romances, and, imagining them to be historically accurate, expects her life to be equally adventurous and romantic. When she is 17, Arabella is introduced to her cousin, Glanville, whom her father expects her to marry. Upon meeting him, Arabella finds that her cousin falls short of her expectations for a proper suitor, which are founded on the heroes she finds in the novels of Madeleine de Scudery and Gauthier de Costes, seigneur de la Calprenède, but her attitude towards him begins to soften. At one point, Arabella decides to have Glanville read one of her favorite French novels. When Glanville pretends to have complied with Arabella's request, she begins to discuss the novel with him, but grows furious once it becomes apparent that he has lied to her. After learning how his daughter's mistaken notions of life have influenced her attitude towards Glanville, Arabella's father attempts to burn French Romances his child has read, but is stopped by his nephew. When Arabella's father falls ill and dies, he declares that she will lose part of her estate if she does not marry Glanville. Glanville departs for a time, intending to let Arabella grieve. After a period of mourning, Arabella is joined by Sir Charles, Glanville's father; Glanville's sister, Miss Glanville and Glanville. When she is taken to a horse race, Arabella meets Sir George Bellmour, Glanville's friend, who has been courting Miss Glanville. Upon realizing Arabella's delusions, Bellmour attempts to court her in the same chivalric language and high-flown style as in the novels. After making many wild misconceptions based on her experience with French novels in the country, she visits Bath and London with Glanville, Sir Charles, and Miss Glanville. Glanville is concerned at Arabella's mistaken ideas, but continues to love her. Glanville's vain and shallow sister envies Arabella's beauty, and occasionally attempts to contrive means of exposing Arabella's romantic delusions in order to give others a negative opinion of her. In Richmond, Bellmour hires an actress to frame Glanville as a libertine. Bellmour successfully deceives Arabella, who is left distraught at what she believes is Glanville's true nature. Shortly there afterwards, a depressed Arabella takes a walk around Twickenham with several other young women who live nearby, during which she silently hopes to encounter evidence of Glanville's innocence. When she throws herself into the Thames in an attempt to flee from horsemen whom she mistakes for "ravishers" in an imitation of Clélie, she becomes weak and ill. In the meantime, Miss Glanville disguises herself as Arabella to test Bellmour's fidelity. As Glanville enters, he sees Bellmour making overtures to who he thinks is Arabella. In a rage, Glanville stabs his friend. Immediately afterwards, an unconscious Arabella is carried inside. A doctor is called to take care of her. Arabella is eventually visited by a clergyman who, upon learning of Arabella's delusions concerning romance, explains to her the difference between literature and reality. He disparages 17th century French literature and praises the work of authors like Samuel Richardson. Afterwards, Bellmour admits his deception to Arabella. As a result of these events, Arabella finally decides to accept Glanville's hand in marriage. Bellmour ultimately recovers from his injuries and weds Miss Glanville, but it is implied that they are not happy together.
Critical reception
The critical reception of The Female Quixote was generally favourable: its plot and elevated language, moral vision, and witty commentaries on romance novels were applauded. Fielding's Covent-Garden Journal gave a favorable notice of her book.[4] Dr. Johnson gave a party in honor of her first novel, The Life of Harriot Stuart, in which he served a "magnificent hot apple-pye ... and this he would have stuck with bay-leaves," and "further, he had prepared for her a crown of laurel, with which, but not till he had invoked the muses by some ceremonies of his own invention, he encircled her brows". He was much taken with her work and supportive of The Female Quixote.[5] However, Mrs. Barbauld criticized that it was "rather spun out too much, and not very well wound up." Ronald Paulson remarked that though at first the book seemed to focus "on the heroine's mind", it turned into an "intense psychological scrutiny of Arabella ... replaced by a rather clumsy attempt at the rapid satiric survey of society".[6]
Critics have debated whether the last chapter of The Female Quixote was written by Lennox herself or Samuel Johnson, due to its stylistic differences that appeared to be similar to Johnson's own writing, that stand out from the other chapters of the book. Margaret Dalziel, editor of the 1970 edition of The Female Quixote, mentioned characteristics which she believed to be of Johnson's in a two-page note in the heading of chapter eleven in book nine.[7] However, in the appendix of the same edition, Duncan Isles rejected the claim, saying that the claim rested too much on subjective stylistic evidence.[8] Other factors that suggest Johnson as the author of the last chapter include various typesetting differences. However, the errors have been attributed to various factors, including Lennox's difficulty to complete the last chapters, which likely would have led to her submitting them late to the printing press, resulting in the typeset errors.[9]
Influences
Arabella's plunge into the Thames might have been inspired by the French satire The Mock-Clielia, in which the heroine "rode at full speed towards the great Canal which she took for the Tyber, and wherein to she threw herself, that she might swim over in imitation of Clelia whom she believed herself to be".[10]
References
↑Doody, Margaret Anne (1989). Introduction to The Female Quixote. United States: Oxford University Press. ISBN978-0-19-954024-2.
↑Philippe Sejourne, The Mystery of Charlotte Lennox, First Novelist of Colonial America, Vol. 62 (Aix-En-Provence: Publication Des Annales De La Faculte Des Lettres, 1967).
↑Henry Fielding, The Covent-Garden Journal," no. 24, 24 March 1752; see The Covent-Garden Journal," ed. Gerard Edward Jensen, 2 vols. (1915), I: 279–82.
↑Sir John Hawkins, The Life of Samuel Johnson. LL.D. (1787), p. 286
↑Paulson, Satire and the Novel in Eighteenth Century England (1967), p. 277
↑Adrien-Thomas Perdou de Subligny, The Mock-Clielia: Being a Comical History of French Gallantries, and Novels, in Imitation of Don Quixote (1678), p. 14
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