The True Story of the Novel [Paperback]

Margaret Anne Doody (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1, 1997

A 1996 Choice Outstanding Academic Book. A 1996 National Book Critics Circle Award finalist. "One of the most successful literary lies," declares Margaret Anne Doody, "is the English claim to have invented the novel. . . . One of the best-kept literary secrets is the existence of novels in antiquity." In fact, as Doody goes on to demonstrate, the novel of the Roman Empire is the product of African, Western Asian, and European influences. It is with this argument that The True Story of the Novel overturns and alters widely held views of the history of the novel. "An erudite, intelligent and imaginative work of literary scholarship. With vivacity, grace, and wit, Doody traces the history from the ancient novels of Apuleius and Heliodorus through the Renaissance fictions of Boccaccio, Cervantes, and Rabelais to the 'official' birth of the novel in 18th-century England. . . . More than a work of brilliant and inventive scholarship, this is an invitation to the great adventure of novel reading."--Boston Globe "Written with verve and wit . . . by any standard an extraordinary and idiosyncratic achievement."--Frank Kermode, The London Review of Books "Big, passionate . . . a bold and contrary statement."--Chronicle of Higher Education "Offers a corrective to those who find the origins of the novel in the 16th or 17th century. . . . Her treatment is thorough and sophisticated but accessible to the general reader. It is also ambitious and one of the few works that can truly claim to look at world literature."--Library Journal

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

A 1996 National Book Critics Circle Award finalist, The True Story of the Novel disputes the British claim to the invention of the novel, calling it "one of the most successful literary lies." Margaret Anne Doody claims that the conventional separation of Romance and Novel was 18th-century England's approach to restricting the literary canon from anything "foreign" to their Empire. Not only did this distinction exclude the great novels of the Roman Empire--including Africa, Asia, and Europe--but it forced the novel, and therefore literature as well, into a narrowed definition of necessary "realism" that altered the way we interpret history. In redefining the Novel as a multicultural construct, Doody opens the relationship of literature and history to new connections.

From Library Journal

Doody, a novelist and the director of Vanderbilt University's comparative literature program, offers a corrective to those who find the origins of the novel in the 16th or 17th century. Challenging the distinction between novel and romance, Doody examines in depth ancient Greek and Roman prose narrative, tracing the novel's transformations through the Middle Ages, Renaissance, and 18th century. She shows the continuity between the ancient novel and the modern, as well as the striking affinities between the Western novel and those of Africa, China, and Japan. Her treatment is thorough and sophisticated yet accessible to the general reader. It is also ambitious and one of the few works that can truly claim to look at world literature.?Thomas L. Cooksey, Armstrong State Coll., Savannah, Ga.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 610 pages
• Publisher: Rutgers University Press; 2d ptg. edition (November 1, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0813524539
• ISBN-13: 978-0813524535
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 5.6 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,053,299 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

21 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars changed my reading life, November 21, 2001

By 

Russael BK Johanys (Seoul, Korea) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The True Story of the Novel (Paperback)

This book was an education for me. I had been taught that the novel started with Richardson or if you must Defoe. Doody argues for a much earlier genesis, in the Greek romance. Whether you buy this argument or not depends on whether you define romance as part of the novel. But in the process I learned about the ancient Greek and Roman romances, and I went off and found the books she cited (Collected Ancient Greek Novels and separately the Roman romances), and read most of the romances. It doesn't take long, since they're short and there aren't that many. In particular I loved Petronius, Chariton, and Apuleius. Doody goes on to trace the transmission of the romance through the Renaissance, Boccaccio being the hero here. Printing played a key role in dissemination at this stage. Later on my own I was surprised to find images in Shakespeare that must have come right out of some of these ancient romances. And so on into our own time. Perhaps everybody knows this history, but I didn't. The title is a play on words having to do with the title of one of the old romances.

18 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Truth or Dare?, September 25, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The True Story of the Novel (Hardcover)

Do you dare to attempt a link of the novel to one distinct period or do you dare to call it an English invention? True that many stories, novels, and literature we know today comes from Europe and the English language, but what if the scope was much larger, much longer, and much too involving that the novel as we know it today is really just a small branch of an incredibly large network of writing and influence?

Doody raises these questions and provides wonderful detail and examples to prove her assertion that the novel's origins dates back farther and is influenced by much more than a common understanding would offer. This ambitious work spans many centuries and reaches many parts of the world in attempt to capture the influences of the novel we take for granted today.

Not only does this offer an insightful read, but it also treats the readers in a friendly way by presenting itself as a sort of an idiot's guide to literature's past. Doody avoids the literary form of complexities and allusions that may alienate the reader and make him or her feel like a dolt. This "True Story" is geared towards the "read" fans of novels. If only other literary critics could write as simple and beautifully as Doody there would be many more literary students.

7 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Not really a surprise..., April 13, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: The True Story of the Novel (Paperback)

Actually, this is new only to some sectors of the English-speaking canon, and its popularization in English-speaking countries. The rest of the world has clearly always known that: a)Greek ("Byzantine") novels, as well as the works of Lucian and Apuleius hold the seeds of the modern novel; b) the Italian novella established some of its canonic structural characteristics, and c) Cervantes and the Spanish picaresque did the same thing as Richardson, Defoe, Sterne, and Fielding, only 100 years before them.