Noura Ahmed Ebaid

Dr. Ahmed Mokhtar.

English Department/ Assiut University.

Samuel Richardson’s Pamela: as an Epistolary

and Psychological Novel

• Introduction
Samuel Richardson (1689-1761) is an English author known for three major
epistolary novels: Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded (1740), Clarissa, or The History of
a Young Lady (1748), and The History of Sir Grandison (1753) all of which
predate the publication of Susannah Minifie Gunning's epistolary novel, Barford
Abbey in 1678. The long epistolary novels of Richardson would have been
familiar to Gunning, and may have been one of the cultural factors contributing
to the much shorter length of her Barford Abbey (Doody & Milberger,
"Introduction," 14). Richardson Pamela "follows the travails of a young, virtuous
maidservant as she seeks to fend off and then reform her rakish employer.
Astonishingly for the time, Richardson’s epistolary novel highlighted the inner
life and moral principles of a protagonist from a modest background" ("Samuel
Richardson"). Pamela is Samuel Richardson’s great masterpiece. Since the initial
publication of Pamela in 1740, it has received extensive attentions. It’s generally
accepted that Samuel Richardson’s Pamela is a prime example of the epistolary
and psychological novel. His novel Clarissa also portrays a chaste and virtuous
lady being relentlessly pursued by the rake, Richard Lovelace, but his Sir
Grandison, relates a story "in which male moral virtue was lauded" ("Samuel
Richardson"). Given the prevalence of good men in Gunning's Barford Abbey,
she may have been working to combine representations of both virtuous women
and virtuous men in her epistolary novel with Richardson's examples in mind.
Pamela as an Epistolary Novel
Epistolary literally means ‘in the form of letters’, which is exactly what a novel
of this style is. It is a novel written in the form of letters, written from the
perspective of one person, or multiple persons. As per the Encyclopaedia
Britannica, “Epistolary novel, 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 story of a servant girl’s victorious struggle
against her master’s attempts to seduce her, it was one of the earliest forms of
the novel to be developed and remained one of the most popular up to the 19 th
century. The epistolary novel’s reliance on subjective points of view makes it the
forerunner of the modern psychological novel”(Encyclopedia Britannica). An
epistolary novel is one of the most effective styles in creating deep characters.
Letters let the author portray first-hand feelings of a person. This helps the
readers to understand the emotional state of the character and the reason
behind suffering or happiness.
The first novel in English to be composed entirely of letters is usually
considered to be "Love Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister," published
in 1684 and attributed to the versatile playwright and author Aphra Behn.
Although Behn's characters are fictional, they were modeled on real-life
likenesses. But the epistolary novel really came into its own with the immensely
popular novels of Samuel Richardson in the mid-18th century: Pamela in 1740
and the even more massive Clarissa of 1748. Richardson had enormous influence
on the development of the novel. His epistolary works transposed the details of
ordinary life into high dramas of moral decision-making. In Richardson’s novels,
his characters reveal the minutiae of their thoughts, their emotional responses
to social conflict and their efforts to understand themselves. This innovative
approach to literary form, which Richardson called ‘writing to the moment’,
would spur later novelists to attempt to bring fictional narrative even closer to
everyday life.
Born in Derbyshire, Richardson was one of nine children of a joiner, or
carpenter. He became an apprentice printer to John Wilde and learned his trade
well from that hard master for 7 years. After serving as "Overseer and Corrector"
in a printing house, he set up shop for himself in Salisbury Court, Fleet Street, in
1720, where he married, lived for many years, and carried on his business.
Within 20 years he had built up one of the largest and most lucrative printing
businesses in London. Although he published a wide variety of books, including
his own novels, he depended upon the official printing that he did for the House
of Commons for an important source of income. Richardson claimed to have
written indexes, prefaces, and dedications early in his career, but his first known
work, published in 1733, was The Apprentice's Vade Mecum; or, Young Man's
Pocket Companion, a conduct book addressed to apprentices. A Seasonable
Examination … (1735) was a pamphlet supporting a parliamentary bill to regulate
the London theaters. In 1739, while at work on a book of model letters for social
occasions proposed to him as a publishing venture by two booksellers,
Richardson decided to put together a series of letters that would narrate the
tribulations of a young servant girl in a country house. His first epistolary
novel, Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded, was published in two volumes in November
1740 and became an instantaneous and enormous success. Richardson created
the novel Pamela using the epistolary technique to give it an air of naturalness
and probability. Everything that he wrote was valid for his era and his
imagination just created a story which could be possible even in reality, not only
imaginary.
Pamela wrote her letters under the immediate impression of every event she
lived far away from her parents. Her instantaneous descriptions and reflections
after the events she faced make the novel to seem more realistic and give an air
of present being more credible. Richardson’s style was mostly familiar making
his characters to tell a story in an informal way and somehow moralistic. In her
initial letters written to her parents, she describes her state working for the
mistress, the knight’s mother, and describes that she is quite happy. When the
mistress passes away, Pamela shows her concerns in the subsequent letters, as
she would have to go back to her parent’s village and live the life in poverty
again. And when the knight informs the servants that wouldn’t terminate any of
them, she expresses her joy and relief.
As the story progresses, her letters become more and more intense. With
each letter, one comes to know more and more about the characters, especially
Pamela. Her feelings, her dilemma, her desire for a financially stable life, her
determination to protect her modesty, etc, all her feelings grip reader, and being
letters it comes straight out of the horse’s mouth. The novel also shows multiple
conversations Pamela has, like with her parents, and with the man in the
unknown town. In fact, with the latter, Pamela exchanged letters by hiding them
in sunflower fields, as the meeting wasn’t a possibility. Each conversation gives
an insight into her character from a different perspective, which is essentially an
important characteristic of an epistolary novel. Even when Pamela suffers
through her worst times in the unknown town, she continues to write the letters
to her parents, though they never reach them. Somewhere deep inside, by the
end of the novel, one realizes the hidden desire she had for the knight, and the
only thing that kept her from submitting to his demands was her wish to become
a wife rather than a mistress. Subtly hidden throughout the letters, her desire to
break from the lower class, and rise up to the higher ones was always there,
though not intentionally.
The length of the text is too large, and the premise of the story too common
and predictable. Back in the day, Pamela was ground-breaking stylistically. It
paved the way for a number of epistolary novels that followed, and continue to
do so even today. In any case, because Pamela's "voice" dominates the novel, its
style is pretty much hers. She is conversational and straightforward while
describing the events that have transpired, though she also infuses her tale with
plenty of detail, emotion, and moral commentary.

• Pamela as a Psychological Novel

The English novelist Samuel Richardson brought dramatic intensity and
psychological insight to the epistolary novel. The first rise of the psychological
novel as a genre is said to have started with the sentimental novel of Samuel
Richardson’s Pamela. Many factors contribute to the success of Pamela, the
most important one is the vivid description of heroine’s psychological activities.
It has profound impact on the later writers and played a significant role in the
world literature. Pamela’s inner world is incompatible, she suffered a lot from
the upper class and she was longing for an independent life and social position.
Also she could not cast off the shackle of the patriarchy society. Recently, most
researches are focused on the novel’s moral value, the epistolary form,
feminism, history and religious perspective.
The heroine of Richardson's first novel is neither a meretricious young hussy
nor a paragon of virtue; she is a complex personality who moves from a naïve
adolescence to a composed maturity in the course of the narrative. The conflict
between her devotion to moral principle and her growing affection for Mr. B.,
which develops in the first, or Bedfordshire, section of the novel, brings a near-
psychic collapse in the second, or Lincolnshire, section. The imagery and
symbolism show the nature of her torments, her growing awareness of a love
that combines eros and agape, and her need for the reconciliation between
conscience and libido which is completed after her return to the Bedfordshire
estate in the third section. The formal symmetry of the novel evolves from the
narrative process within which Pamela is tested and proved capable of an honest
love and a tranquil marriage.
Pamela is a novel of sentimentalism, psychologism, individualism and realism;
Richardson’s intention and Real purpose of adopting a particular narrative
method is in order to better unfold the heroine’s inner world; Pamela is
struggled between her complicated self, she has multiple personas; According to
John Richetti’s The Cambridge Companion to The Eighteenth Century Novel, he
stresses that “Pamela’s interiority is functionally subordinate to the External
social and political environment that she insistently keeps in front of us and her
would-be seducer.”(Blewett, 2001, p37). Therefore, moral values, ideologies,
hierarchy, gender inequality and other external factors of the 18 th century
England affect Pamela’s behavior and psyche. Pamela’s psyche is complicated
because of the injustice of the society. She is a paradox. Sometimes she feels
that she is an ordinary maid, other times she considers herself as a great beauty.
Sometimes she desperately wants to get rid of her master and other times she
hates to leave him. Sometimes she despises her master and other times she
could not help thinking about him. From the beginning of the novel, Pamela
displays herself in front of the readers as the superego figure. Her parents are
devout Puritans and told her chastity is more important than her life. Pamela’s id
comes quietly, when Mr.B expresses his affections for her, Pamela feels that her
heart beats rapidly and she prays to God because she did not know what she
was thinking. As for her ego, she prays to Mr.B not to harass her anymore, she
wants to keep her virginity. The moral idealism which Richardson praised in his
work was based on the bourgeois religious ethics rather than the dignity of
human being himself. However, Richardson has many contributions to the
British literature. This thesis attempts to study Pamela, the heroine’s actions and
deeds in order to analyze her inward world and dissect her emotional
motivations. Furthermore, from the exploration of Pamela’s psyche, one can
have a peek at the 18th century British society, including its class system, moral
values, female status and etc. It has certain significance for the research of the
early British novels. The inconsistency of Pamela’s psyche is in accordance with
the external causes and internal causes. Pamela is raised by her old lady in a
ladylike way, she only skills at singing, dancing, reading and other aristocratic
talents; Richardson’s time is a time honors the traditional values such as titles,
classes, possessions and the Puritan spirit; Both hierarchically and sexually
speaking, she is the inferior side; However, she is a great beauty and her
master’s romantic overture makes her indulge herself in fantasy. At the end of
the novel Pamela receives things that everyone is longing for: Love, money,
social status and recognition. Although this is only a silver lining in the dark
reality, the whole book is fulfilled with optimism and idealism. Pamela is a
humble servant girl but she has the guts to fight for her freewill and follow her
dreams. This novel renders people with hope. It tells an inspiring truth, an
ordinary people who dares to fight against the power and stick to his or her
believes is somewhat heroic and extraordinary.
 Work Cited
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Literary Terms." Oregon State University, 2022,
https://liberalarts.oregonstate.edu/wlf/what-epistolary-novel

"Richardson, Samuel (1689–1761)." Encyclopedia,

https://www.encyclopedia.com/international/encyclopedias-almanacs-
transcripts-and-maps/richardson-samuel-1689-1761.

"Richardson's Use Of Epistolary Style In Richardson's Pamela." Bartleby

Research, https://www.bartleby.com/essay/Richardsons-Use-Of-
Epistolary-Style-In-Richardsons-FCZR2YYG3U.

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Richardson." Bombay Reads, 16 July 2020,
https://www.bombayreads.com/pamela-an-epistolary-novel-by-
samuel-richardson/.

"Samuel Richardson: Biography, Pamela and the Epistolary

Novel." Study.com, 20 January 2013,
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the-epistolary-novel.html.

Zhang, Nija, and Yanhong Fan. "An Analysis on the Psyche of

Richardson’s Pamela." ResearchGate, February 2015,
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/276439476_An_Analysis_on
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