Reading 1001 discussion

4 stars.

I read this about 15 years ago and had pretty much forgotten it. On re-reading I found it to be a very interesting epistolary novel. The sheltered Evelina leaves Dorsetshire for London where her inexperience and "vulgar" relatives threaten her happiness and her burgeoning relationship with Lord Orville.

This novel lies between the bawdier earlier eighteenth century ones and Restoration farce and between Austen/Victorian ones. There are some moments which sit oddly in the novel... a race amongst Octogenarians and the treatment of Evelina's grandmother being two, which hark back to the older works.

The social world is well-portrayed but the characters are just a little underdeveloped. I loved Frances Burney's writing though.

I hope to re-read Cecilia in 2022 as I remember that as being a better novel than Evelina.

Rating: 4 stars


This is a satirical, epistolary novel written through letters between characters. The main character, Evelina, is a young woman who is the illegitimate daughter of an aristocratic father who refuses to claim her. Her mother died when she was a small child and she was sent off to be raised by a clergyman. Due to her circumstances and isolated upbringing, her social skills aren't up to par with those of the aristocracy (although said members of the aristocracy aren't always behaving as they should, either). She travels to London as a young woman and meets a variety of colorful people including some potential suitors.

A surprisingly entertaining book for this time period.

3 Stars

I really enjoyed Evelina and particularly appreciated the epistolary nature of the story telling. The letters from Evelina allow the reason access to her innermost thoughts and hopes and the delay in letters arriving allows for comic misunderstandings and for the story to move while at least one principal character is unaware of what is going on.

Evelina herself is a very sweet character but not too sugary she has moments of anger, frustration and embarrassment which show her to be a real person and not a caricature. The gentlemen who surround her are not so well rounded in fact they are deliberate caricatures of the indolent life left by those in town compared to country. With the exception of Lord Orville the men are little better than overgrown children who delight in nothing more than pranks and betting, indeed they are willing to pledge love and devotion to a different woman at the drop of the hat.

I liked the rags to riches element of the story and the questions of paternity and how they are handled by a Lord who suddenly has more children than he knows what to do with. I also enjoyed the slow burn romance played out over letters and through various misunderstandings.