Pamela, or, Virtue rewarded

by Samuel Richardson

537 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 1985

About the author

Pamela (1740) and Clarissa Harlowe (1748) of English writer Samuel Richardson helped to legitimize the novel as a literary form in English.

An established printer and publisher for most of his life, Richardson wrote his first novel at the age of 51. He is best known for his major 18th-century epistolary novel Sir Charles Grandison (1753).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_...

Reviews

[Lincoln · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved it. I feel like maybe it's a little inappropriate that I did, because the whole value system rich people in 1740 lived under seems so messed up by our standards today. (Although, come to think of it, maybe not all that much has changed?) But the whole idea of the book is that this girl Pamela, though poor, was superior in important ways to all these rich people she worked for and around, because she was honest and smart and had unimpeachable integrity. So that was good. I enjoyed Richardson's florid language, and the interesting customs and conventions of the characters. The story was totally unbelievable, but a satisfying and enjoyable ride nonetheless.