Presents a study in 18th century English literature to give a clear and accurate description of a distinct component featuring Asian influences.

Winner of the Christian Gauss Award for excellence in literary scholarship from the Phi Beta Kappa Society Having excavated the world's earliest novels in his previous book, literary historian Steven Moore explores in this sequel the remarkable flowering of the novel between the years 1600 and 1800-from Don Quixote to America's first big novel, an homage to Cervantes entitled Modern Chivalry. This is the period of such classic novels as Tom Jones, Candide, and Dangerous Liaisons, but beyond the dozen or so recognized classics there are hundreds of other interesting novels that appeared then, known only to specialists: Spanish picaresques, French heroic romances, massive Chinese novels, Japanese graphic novels, eccentric English novels, and the earliest American novels. These minor novels are not only interesting in their own right, but also provide the context needed to appreciate why the major novels were major breakthroughs. The novel experienced an explosive growth spurt during these centuries as novelists experimented with different forms and genres: epistolary novels, romances, Gothic thrillers, novels in verse, parodies, science fiction, episodic road trips, and family sagas, along with quirky, unclassifiable experiments in fiction that resemble contemporary, avant-garde works. As in his previous volume, Moore privileges the innovators and outriders, those who kept the novel novel. In the most comprehensive history of this period ever written, Moore examines over 400 novels from around the world in a lively style that is as entertaining as it is informative. Though written for a general audience, The Novel, An Alternative History also provides the scholarly apparatus required by the serious student of the period. This sequel, like its predecessor, is a “zestfully encyclopedic, avidly opinionated, and dazzlingly fresh history of the most 'elastic' of literary forms” (Booklist).

Master of Gothic horror, Matthew Lewis was an English novelist and dramatist, whose 1796 novel ‘The Monk’ made him famous overnight, achieving sensational success. Written when Lewis was nineteen, its was influenced by the leading Gothic writer Ann Radcliffe and by contemporary German literature. Its emphasis on horror rather than romance, amorality over religion, with a penchant for violence and eroticism, it was avidly read, though universally condemned. As well as numerous poems, plays and stories, Lewis’ other enduring work is ‘Journal of a West India Proprietor’, offering an important historical resource for the study of the slave trade. For the first time in publishing history, this eBook presents Lewis’ complete fictional works, with numerous illustrations, rare texts, informative introductions and the usual Delphi bonus material. (Version 1) * Beautifully illustrated with images relating to Lewis’ life and works * Concise introductions to the novels and other texts * All the novels and short stories, with individual contents tables * Features Lewis’ first and unfinished novel, ‘The Effusions of Sensibility’, appearing here for the first time in digital publishing * Images of how the books were first published, giving your eReader a taste of the original texts * Excellent formatting of the texts * The complete four volume text of ‘Romantic Tales’, available in no other collection * Rare uncollected poetry and tales, posthumously published and never digitised before * Special chronological and alphabetical contents tables for the poetry * Easily locate the poems or short stories you want to read * Lewis’ complete poetry collections – available in no other collection * Features a bonus biography * Ordering of texts into chronological order and genres Please note: at the time of publication, no suitable texts of Lewis’ translation of ‘Feudal Tyrants’ are available. As soon as a copy is obtainable, the text will be added to the collection as a free update. CONTENTS: The Novels The Effusions of Sensibility (1839) Ambrosio; or, The Monk (1796) The Bravo of Venice by Heinrich Zschokke (1805) The Shorter Fiction Romantic Tales (1808) A Nancy Story (1839) The Plays The Castle Spectre (1798) The East Indian (1800) Alfonso, King of Castile (1801) The Poetry Collections Tales of Terror (1799) Tales of Wonder (1801) Poems (1812) Uncollected Poems The Poems List of Poems in Chronological Order List of Poems in Alphabetical Order The Non-Fiction Journal of a West India Proprietor (1833) The Biography Matthew Gregory Lewis by Leslie Stephen Please visit www.delphiclassics.com to browse through our range of exciting titles or to purchase this eBook as a Parts Edition of individual eBooks