Thank God this is over, 26 Sep 2008
I was so excited before I read this book. It was my first year at university and I was eager to discover the gems of 18th century literature. This is not one of them.

Both characters are revolting. The 'hero' is a failed raper of very low IQ (I blame the intramarriages of the ruling classes) as he cannot succeed to rape an unprotected 15 year old when she is in his sole care.

Pamela on the other hand seems to be considered either virtuous (by the 18th century reader) or oppressed but in my mind she only seemed as a calculating little wrench who is all too aware that in this environment her virginity is the only thing she has to invest on climbing the social ladder and she is using it ingeniously on simple minded Mr B. And that would be all wonderful (who doesn't love Becky Sharp?) if she did not exposed as to 500 pages of badly written accounts of how her sole concern is morality [yeah, right, the moment she sees the man who abhors could make her fortune by marrying her she discovers she was passionately in love with him all along].

That this type of hypocrisy or false confidence had once been presented as en example to young ladies is more interesting for the student of cultural history than literary students.

For those searching for a good read there is Fielding!

a perverse vision of love, 14 Jul 2008
This book is completely unrealistic, and it doesn't surprise me that a man wrote it!

It tells the story of a girl (Pamela) falling in love with her would-be raper...and I say: fat chance!!! (only a man could write that!)

There are shokingly clear scenes in which the guy is ready to rape her, he doesn't want her to marry anyone (while telling himself that he couldn't bear the shame of marrying her himself), almost tells her that if she falls in love with someone else, he'll rape her as violenty as possible...and she falls in love with him.
She finds him marvellous, and herself undeserving (her brain has been adled in the meantime, that's the only explanation possible).

Frankly, thank you M. Richarson for sharing this mysogynist and completly perverse vision of love with us readers!!! (irony here...)

What a waste of my time., 15 Jun 2007
It honestly shocks me that this was a best seller at the time and it caused a storm with the eighteenth century audience. Were they brain dead? It reminds me how the audience now went crazy over the Da Vinci Code, but really, it's just a load of rubbish.

Granted, it was different at the time. 'Robinson Crusoe' was also madly popular, and the public wanted more of this new 'novel' form. This book is mainly an epistolary novel (pioneering attribute in the novel) that tries to convince its readership that there is truth in the words, and that the readers should go away and think about what a good girl Pamela was, and how she was rewarded in the end. So, ladies of the eighteenth century, did you get that? Be pathetic, a lap dog and worship and love those that try to rape you and kidnap you, and you will be rewarded by marrying your kidnapper! Great one!

What is terrible about this book is the character of Pamela, who is overly pure and perfect, who takes everything that is thrown her way, is tormented by Mr B constantly, but then decides, that in fact, she loves him! So she goes back, and takes torment from his sister instead! Very good. The character is immensely unbelievable and serves only as a message to the women of the time to obey their men and be like Pamela (which they wouldn't and couldn't have been; no human being can be like Pamela).

The worst part of this novel isn't even the issues or morals it sends out, rather, it's the form and style of story telling that it uses. There is no denying that it started the epistolary trend and gave yet more forms of narrating for novel writers, but the context in which it is written in makes the story laughable. Pamela is constantly writing letters. That's right. She writes letters even when she knows no one will read them, and she writes letters as things are happening. She must be writing 20 hours a day. How does she have time to be raped and kidnapped? It's a wonder. It's just common sense. It astonishes me that an author in the time where novel writing was highly looked down upon, and so tried to make their novels seem real, adopted the very narrative that made his book ridiculous.

There is hope, however; not all eighteenth century readers were duped by this. If you do get yourself through this awful, dull and boring novel (which is about 500 pages long of nothing), you must reward yourself (you deserve to be rewarded when you torture yourself, remember?!) and read the humorous 'Shamela' and 'Joseph Andrews' by Henry Fielding who took 'Pamela' for what it was: a novel that lacked any credibility.

If you have to read this book to find out the roots of the novel, the roots of the novel is simply not worth knowing about.

Not one for sensitive feminists, 05 May 2007
Having been asked to read this for an English lit course, I was fairly unethusiastic in my approach to it. However, I did become quite interested in the book while reading it, but it was the perverse sort of interest you might get from..say...watching a puppy being kicked.

Lovers of Jane Austen looking for something new, beware - this is not a book whose plot you can become embroiled in and gripped by. It is not a pleasure to read. It is NOT romantic (!!??). Richardson's writing style is as lamentable as the novel's [...] - not only does it make the book a hard and frankly dull read for the most part, it also manages to undermine the moral message he was attempting to convey.

The book's worth comes with its illustration of some shockingly derogative eighteenth century attitudes toward women. What I was most nauseated by was not the attempted rapes, kidnapping, and all that; but a much more profound, ingrained in the social unconscious, type of [...]. Mainly this is prevalent in the (excrutiatingly dull and unnecessary) second part, where Pamela becomes the said puppy, repeatedly booted up the backside by male oppression.

The issues of class politics and morality would have held more interest for contemporary readers than today's, but will certainly merit consideration to those interested by such things. And for historical interest this obviously holds particular value not only as being one of the first English novels but also for its pioneering form. Richardson's idea of 'writing to the moment' was undeniably transgressional in a time when many writers were alarmed by the arrogance of an omniscient authorial narrative.

How anyone can take actual enjoyment from reading this is beyond me, unless you like to be reminded of the advantages of our wonderful modern society compared to ye olde days.

A Long Hard Journey, but Worth it, 18 Jul 2005
Pamela is a novel written in the form of letters and, as in the case of many other stories, is essentially about overwhelming good overcoming evil despite boundaries in class, strength and power.

Pamela is the heroine of the novel and the waffly chatterbox writer of these letters, an extraordinarily beautiful girl of 15, with maturity of mind, a humble heart and a good soul. Throughout the first half of the novel Pamela grapples with her Master known as Mr B, who, bewitched by her beauty, and visibly torn between his pride and dignity as a member of the upper class, and his infatuation with her, attempts to destroy her chastity, using all of his power and status to siege her. The second volume in the novel is more like a traditional romance.

The novel is surprisingly readable considering it's format, in letters, and it is easy to get emotionally caught up in the plot, feeling sympathy for Pamela who at times appears to be a damsel in distress without a trusty handsome prince to save her from her tormentors. Most of the other characters in the novel are very likeable too as Richardson does an excellent job in making his characters very human.

When reading the novel, at points, it felt like it would make a great television series, due to the fact that the movement is very slow throughout the novel and the action seems to occur in isolated incidents. However this can make this read less riveting as often you will need to work at reading this novel, and at over 500 pages long this novel can sometimes be a hard slog.

In Conclusion, however, this is well worth a read, with good morals, a feel-good plot and human, likeable characters, but do not expect this book to read itself. It needs some work, but it's a rewarding read.

Thank God this is over, 26 Sep 2008
I was so excited before I read this book. It was my first year at university and I was eager to discover the gems of 18th century literature. This is not one of them.

Both characters are revolting. The 'hero' is a failed raper of very low IQ (I blame the intramarriages of the ruling classes) as he cannot succeed to rape an unprotected 15 year old when she is in his sole care.

Pamela on the other hand seems to be considered either virtuous (by the 18th century reader) or oppressed but in my mind she only seemed as a calculating little wrench who is all too aware that in this environment her virginity is the only thing she has to invest on climbing the social ladder and she is using it ingeniously on simple minded Mr B. And that would be all wonderful (who doesn't love Becky Sharp?) if she did not exposed as to 500 pages of badly written accounts of how her sole concern is morality [yeah, right, the moment she sees the man who abhors could make her fortune by marrying her she discovers she was passionately in love with him all along].

That this type of hypocrisy or false confidence had once been presented as en example to young ladies is more interesting for the student of cultural history than literary students.

For those searching for a good read there is Fielding!

a perverse vision of love, 14 Jul 2008
This book is completely unrealistic, and it doesn't surprise me that a man wrote it!

It tells the story of a girl (Pamela) falling in love with her would-be raper...and I say: fat chance!!! (only a man could write that!)

There are shokingly clear scenes in which the guy is ready to rape her, he doesn't want her to marry anyone (while telling himself that he couldn't bear the shame of marrying her himself), almost tells her that if she falls in love with someone else, he'll rape her as violenty as possible...and she falls in love with him.
She finds him marvellous, and herself undeserving (her brain has been adled in the meantime, that's the only explanation possible).

Frankly, thank you M. Richarson for sharing this mysogynist and completly perverse vision of love with us readers!!! (irony here...)

What a waste of my time., 15 Jun 2007
It honestly shocks me that this was a best seller at the time and it caused a storm with the eighteenth century audience. Were they brain dead? It reminds me how the audience now went crazy over the Da Vinci Code, but really, it's just a load of rubbish.

Granted, it was different at the time. 'Robinson Crusoe' was also madly popular, and the public wanted more of this new 'novel' form. This book is mainly an epistolary novel (pioneering attribute in the novel) that tries to convince its readership that there is truth in the words, and that the readers should go away and think about what a good girl Pamela was, and how she was rewarded in the end. So, ladies of the eighteenth century, did you get that? Be pathetic, a lap dog and worship and love those that try to rape you and kidnap you, and you will be rewarded by marrying your kidnapper! Great one!

What is terrible about this book is the character of Pamela, who is overly pure and perfect, who takes everything that is thrown her way, is tormented by Mr B constantly, but then decides, that in fact, she loves him! So she goes back, and takes torment from his sister instead! Very good. The character is immensely unbelievable and serves only as a message to the women of the time to obey their men and be like Pamela (which they wouldn't and couldn't have been; no human being can be like Pamela).

The worst part of this novel isn't even the issues or morals it sends out, rather, it's the form and style of story telling that it uses. There is no denying that it started the epistolary trend and gave yet more forms of narrating for novel writers, but the context in which it is written in makes the story laughable. Pamela is constantly writing letters. That's right. She writes letters even when she knows no one will read them, and she writes letters as things are happening. She must be writing 20 hours a day. How does she have time to be raped and kidnapped? It's a wonder. It's just common sense. It astonishes me that an author in the time where novel writing was highly looked down upon, and so tried to make their novels seem real, adopted the very narrative that made his book ridiculous.

There is hope, however; not all eighteenth century readers were duped by this. If you do get yourself through this awful, dull and boring novel (which is about 500 pages long of nothing), you must reward yourself (you deserve to be rewarded when you torture yourself, remember?!) and read the humorous 'Shamela' and 'Joseph Andrews' by Henry Fielding who took 'Pamela' for what it was: a novel that lacked any credibility.

If you have to read this book to find out the roots of the novel, the roots of the novel is simply not worth knowing about.

Not one for sensitive feminists, 05 May 2007
Having been asked to read this for an English lit course, I was fairly unethusiastic in my approach to it. However, I did become quite interested in the book while reading it, but it was the perverse sort of interest you might get from..say...watching a puppy being kicked.

Lovers of Jane Austen looking for something new, beware - this is not a book whose plot you can become embroiled in and gripped by. It is not a pleasure to read. It is NOT romantic (!!??). Richardson's writing style is as lamentable as the novel's [...] - not only does it make the book a hard and frankly dull read for the most part, it also manages to undermine the moral message he was attempting to convey.

The book's worth comes with its illustration of some shockingly derogative eighteenth century attitudes toward women. What I was most nauseated by was not the attempted rapes, kidnapping, and all that; but a much more profound, ingrained in the social unconscious, type of [...]. Mainly this is prevalent in the (excrutiatingly dull and unnecessary) second part, where Pamela becomes the said puppy, repeatedly booted up the backside by male oppression.

The issues of class politics and morality would have held more interest for contemporary readers than today's, but will certainly merit consideration to those interested by such things. And for historical interest this obviously holds particular value not only as being one of the first English novels but also for its pioneering form. Richardson's idea of 'writing to the moment' was undeniably transgressional in a time when many writers were alarmed by the arrogance of an omniscient authorial narrative.

How anyone can take actual enjoyment from reading this is beyond me, unless you like to be reminded of the advantages of our wonderful modern society compared to ye olde days.

A Long Hard Journey, but Worth it, 18 Jul 2005
Pamela is a novel written in the form of letters and, as in the case of many other stories, is essentially about overwhelming good overcoming evil despite boundaries in class, strength and power.

Pamela is the heroine of the novel and the waffly chatterbox writer of these letters, an extraordinarily beautiful girl of 15, with maturity of mind, a humble heart and a good soul. Throughout the first half of the novel Pamela grapples with her Master known as Mr B, who, bewitched by her beauty, and visibly torn between his pride and dignity as a member of the upper class, and his infatuation with her, attempts to destroy her chastity, using all of his power and status to siege her. The second volume in the novel is more like a traditional romance.

The novel is surprisingly readable considering it's format, in letters, and it is easy to get emotionally caught up in the plot, feeling sympathy for Pamela who at times appears to be a damsel in distress without a trusty handsome prince to save her from her tormentors. Most of the other characters in the novel are very likeable too as Richardson does an excellent job in making his characters very human.

When reading the novel, at points, it felt like it would make a great television series, due to the fact that the movement is very slow throughout the novel and the action seems to occur in isolated incidents. However this can make this read less riveting as often you will need to work at reading this novel, and at over 500 pages long this novel can sometimes be a hard slog.

In Conclusion, however, this is well worth a read, with good morals, a feel-good plot and human, likeable characters, but do not expect this book to read itself. It needs some work, but it's a rewarding read.

I wish it were longer!, 19 Jun 2007
What an epic novel. Thoroughly engrossing from the first letter of Anna Howe to Clarissa Harlowe until the conclusion penned by the reformed Jack Belford, I loved every minute of it. Even at the last couple of pages I had my heart in my mouth awaiting the outcome of a long awaited encounter between two of the characters. I feel quite satisfied at having seen this book through to its conclusion, and was rewarded duly. One of my best reads for a very long time. (Unabridged Penguin Classics Version)

Stick with it, it's worth it!, 30 Aug 2006
This copy is the abridged version but it is well worth reading the full text - if you don't enjoy it at least you can feel proud that you've read a book bigger than 'War and Peace'! I found the correspondence between Anna and Clarissa amazing, Anna is such a modern girl. 'Clarissa' tells the age old story of a woman who thinks she can tame a bad boy. The scene describing Anna by Clarissa's coffin is very moving and worth sticking with the novel for.

Perhaps inadvertent feminist classic, 04 Jan 2006
Well, I've just finished all 1499 pages of the unabridged version (ISBN 0-140-43215-9) based upon the first edition and not by any means the longest. The fact that I've finished it attests partly to its quality, partly to my vanity. For me, it is pleasant to see how conscious the Georgians were of the unfairness (as we would see of it) of the marriage articles and the treatment of women by men generally. I can't really be sure exactly where Richardson stood but in the character of Anne Howe you have have a very plain speaking and intelligent feminist, surely... albeit that the author has her marry a man she doesn't fancy, apparently against her inclination. Indeed, one of the novel's many problems is it's improbabilities. I personally think that the characterisation of Lovelace is quite crude, the novel suffers from a lack of humour, the heroine dies of we know not quite what..On the other hand, the novel is still a major narrative achievement that makes good use of its length to render an often more realistic portrayal of life in many details. For anyone genuinely interested in reading the "classics" this is one that perhaps shouldn't be too far down the list. And in the first third of the book I simply couldn't help but be amused by the comic barbarity of the parents. Their unreasonableness in contrast to their beforehand reasonableness to her is another glaring inconsistency but it doesn't spoil the novel.

Excellent book - but don't you want the non abridged version, 09 Apr 2005
I just thought i'd point out to other buyers that the edition shown here is not in fact the whole book - it's abridged which i don't think is made clear. i only found out when i ordered it having read a library copy of the non abridged version which i can't recommend enough!

Caveat before tackling this great but weighty novel, 15 Aug 2000
I have to confess to reading this novel partly out of guilt, since I kept coming across references to it elsewhere. While I did enjoy it, it was largely this literary conscience that kept me going. It is indeed a superb novel, and you can read the other reviews to see why, but it is very slow and I think I'm not the only one who found it quite a slog, or got frustrated from time to time by Clarissa's unspeakable virtuousness (although her distraught state after the rape is portrayed most movingly).

As a comparison, read Laclos' Les Liaisons Dangereuses, one of my favourite novels and one which makes one wonder why the epistolary form was abandoned. A beautifully structured, enthralling study of sexual intrigue in eighteenth-century France, it is far more exciting and the characterisation is extraordinary, exploring both good and vicious characters with great depth and achieving the rare feat of making characters at both ends of the scale human, realistic and sympathetic. One of the main differences, apart from the driven plot of Les Liaisons against the thoughtful consideration of what in Clarissa is, classically, basically an expansion of one incident, is that Laclos explored human depravity with such rigorous honesty and fascinated sympathy that he caused a great scandal and got himself banned; Richardson, on the other hand, always had an eye out for the moral lesson (he gives everyone their just deserts at the end in quite a scrupulous manner) and to my mind his portrayal of human nature is less believable, and certainly less interesting. Clarissa would have been far more likeable for a few faults (even Melanie in Gone with the Wind makes a sarcastic comment once), and the interaction with Lovelace would perhaps, I feel, have been deeper and more tragic if she had lowered her standards and communicated with him more.

Clarissa is a densely woven, lovingly detailed novel with a plot that can be summed up in one sentence, and I think that whether it appeals to you depends very much on whether or not this is to your taste. I certainly found it of great interest in relation to other literature and will no doubt dip into it again, but I couldn't face a re-read. One problem with boasting about having finished it is that even though it was much harder work than War and Peace (and twice as long), most people won't have heard of it!

Thank God this is over, 26 Sep 2008
I was so excited before I read this book. It was my first year at university and I was eager to discover the gems of 18th century literature. This is not one of them.

Both characters are revolting. The 'hero' is a failed raper of very low IQ (I blame the intramarriages of the ruling classes) as he cannot succeed to rape an unprotected 15 year old when she is in his sole care.

Pamela on the other hand seems to be considered either virtuous (by the 18th century reader) or oppressed but in my mind she only seemed as a calculating little wrench who is all too aware that in this environment her virginity is the only thing she has to invest on climbing the social ladder and she is using it ingeniously on simple minded Mr B. And that would be all wonderful (who doesn't love Becky Sharp?) if she did not exposed as to 500 pages of badly written accounts of how her sole concern is morality [yeah, right, the moment she sees the man who abhors could make her fortune by marrying her she discovers she was passionately in love with him all along].

That this type of hypocrisy or false confidence had once been presented as en example to young ladies is more interesting for the student of cultural history than literary students.

For those searching for a good read there is Fielding!

a perverse vision of love, 14 Jul 2008
This book is completely unrealistic, and it doesn't surprise me that a man wrote it!

It tells the story of a girl (Pamela) falling in love with her would-be raper...and I say: fat chance!!! (only a man could write that!)

There are shokingly clear scenes in which the guy is ready to rape her, he doesn't want her to marry anyone (while telling himself that he couldn't bear the shame of marrying her himself), almost tells her that if she falls in love with someone else, he'll rape her as violenty as possible...and she falls in love with him.
She finds him marvellous, and herself undeserving (her brain has been adled in the meantime, that's the only explanation possible).

Frankly, thank you M. Richarson for sharing this mysogynist and completly perverse vision of love with us readers!!! (irony here...)

What a waste of my time., 15 Jun 2007
It honestly shocks me that this was a best seller at the time and it caused a storm with the eighteenth century audience. Were they brain dead? It reminds me how the audience now went crazy over the Da Vinci Code, but really, it's just a load of rubbish.

Granted, it was different at the time. 'Robinson Crusoe' was also madly popular, and the public wanted more of this new 'novel' form. This book is mainly an epistolary novel (pioneering attribute in the novel) that tries to convince its readership that there is truth in the words, and that the readers should go away and think about what a good girl Pamela was, and how she was rewarded in the end. So, ladies of the eighteenth century, did you get that? Be pathetic, a lap dog and worship and love those that try to rape you and kidnap you, and you will be rewarded by marrying your kidnapper! Great one!

What is terrible about this book is the character of Pamela, who is overly pure and perfect, who takes everything that is thrown her way, is tormented by Mr B constantly, but then decides, that in fact, she loves him! So she goes back, and takes torment from his sister instead! Very good. The character is immensely unbelievable and serves only as a message to the women of the time to obey their men and be like Pamela (which they wouldn't and couldn't have been; no human being can be like Pamela).

The worst part of this novel isn't even the issues or morals it sends out, rather, it's the form and style of story telling that it uses. There is no denying that it started the epistolary trend and gave yet more forms of narrating for novel writers, but the context in which it is written in makes the story laughable. Pamela is constantly writing letters. That's right. She writes letters even when she knows no one will read them, and she writes letters as things are happening. She must be writing 20 hours a day. How does she have time to be raped and kidnapped? It's a wonder. It's just common sense. It astonishes me that an author in the time where novel writing was highly looked down upon, and so tried to make their novels seem real, adopted the very narrative that made his book ridiculous.

There is hope, however; not all eighteenth century readers were duped by this. If you do get yourself through this awful, dull and boring novel (which is about 500 pages long of nothing), you must reward yourself (you deserve to be rewarded when you torture yourself, remember?!) and read the humorous 'Shamela' and 'Joseph Andrews' by Henry Fielding who took 'Pamela' for what it was: a novel that lacked any credibility.

If you have to read this book to find out the roots of the novel, the roots of the novel is simply not worth knowing about.

Not one for sensitive feminists, 05 May 2007
Having been asked to read this for an English lit course, I was fairly unethusiastic in my approach to it. However, I did become quite interested in the book while reading it, but it was the perverse sort of interest you might get from..say...watching a puppy being kicked.

Lovers of Jane Austen looking for something new, beware - this is not a book whose plot you can become embroiled in and gripped by. It is not a pleasure to read. It is NOT romantic (!!??). Richardson's writing style is as lamentable as the novel's [...] - not only does it make the book a hard and frankly dull read for the most part, it also manages to undermine the moral message he was attempting to convey.

The book's worth comes with its illustration of some shockingly derogative eighteenth century attitudes toward women. What I was most nauseated by was not the attempted rapes, kidnapping, and all that; but a much more profound, ingrained in the social unconscious, type of [...]. Mainly this is prevalent in the (excrutiatingly dull and unnecessary) second part, where Pamela becomes the said puppy, repeatedly booted up the backside by male oppression.

The issues of class politics and morality would have held more interest for contemporary readers than today's, but will certainly merit consideration to those interested by such things. And for historical interest this obviously holds particular value not only as being one of the first English novels but also for its pioneering form. Richardson's idea of 'writing to the moment' was undeniably transgressional in a time when many writers were alarmed by the arrogance of an omniscient authorial narrative.

How anyone can take actual enjoyment from reading this is beyond me, unless you like to be reminded of the advantages of our wonderful modern society compared to ye olde days.

A Long Hard Journey, but Worth it, 18 Jul 2005
Pamela is a novel written in the form of letters and, as in the case of many other stories, is essentially about overwhelming good overcoming evil despite boundaries in class, strength and power.

Pamela is the heroine of the novel and the waffly chatterbox writer of these letters, an extraordinarily beautiful girl of 15, with maturity of mind, a humble heart and a good soul. Throughout the first half of the novel Pamela grapples with her Master known as Mr B, who, bewitched by her beauty, and visibly torn between his pride and dignity as a member of the upper class, and his infatuation with her, attempts to destroy her chastity, using all of his power and status to siege her. The second volume in the novel is more like a traditional romance.

The novel is surprisingly readable considering it's format, in letters, and it is easy to get emotionally caught up in the plot, feeling sympathy for Pamela who at times appears to be a damsel in distress without a trusty handsome prince to save her from her tormentors. Most of the other characters in the novel are very likeable too as Richardson does an excellent job in making his characters very human.

When reading the novel, at points, it felt like it would make a great television series, due to the fact that the movement is very slow throughout the novel and the action seems to occur in isolated incidents. However this can make this read less riveting as often you will need to work at reading this novel, and at over 500 pages long this novel can sometimes be a hard slog.

In Conclusion, however, this is well worth a read, with good morals, a feel-good plot and human, likeable characters, but do not expect this book to read itself. It needs some work, but it's a rewarding read.

I wish it were longer!, 19 Jun 2007
What an epic novel. Thoroughly engrossing from the first letter of Anna Howe to Clarissa Harlowe until the conclusion penned by the reformed Jack Belford, I loved every minute of it. Even at the last couple of pages I had my heart in my mouth awaiting the outcome of a long awaited encounter between two of the characters. I feel quite satisfied at having seen this book through to its conclusion, and was rewarded duly. One of my best reads for a very long time. (Unabridged Penguin Classics Version)

Stick with it, it's worth it!, 30 Aug 2006
This copy is the abridged version but it is well worth reading the full text - if you don't enjoy it at least you can feel proud that you've read a book bigger than 'War and Peace'! I found the correspondence between Anna and Clarissa amazing, Anna is such a modern girl. 'Clarissa' tells the age old story of a woman who thinks she can tame a bad boy. The scene describing Anna by Clarissa's coffin is very moving and worth sticking with the novel for.

Perhaps inadvertent feminist classic, 04 Jan 2006
Well, I've just finished all 1499 pages of the unabridged version (ISBN 0-140-43215-9) based upon the first edition and not by any means the longest. The fact that I've finished it attests partly to its quality, partly to my vanity. For me, it is pleasant to see how conscious the Georgians were of the unfairness (as we would see of it) of the marriage articles and the treatment of women by men generally. I can't really be sure exactly where Richardson stood but in the character of Anne Howe you have have a very plain speaking and intelligent feminist, surely... albeit that the author has her marry a man she doesn't fancy, apparently against her inclination. Indeed, one of the novel's many problems is it's improbabilities. I personally think that the characterisation of Lovelace is quite crude, the novel suffers from a lack of humour, the heroine dies of we know not quite what..On the other hand, the novel is still a major narrative achievement that makes good use of its length to render an often more realistic portrayal of life in many details. For anyone genuinely interested in reading the "classics" this is one that perhaps shouldn't be too far down the list. And in the first third of the book I simply couldn't help but be amused by the comic barbarity of the parents. Their unreasonableness in contrast to their beforehand reasonableness to her is another glaring inconsistency but it doesn't spoil the novel.

Excellent book - but don't you want the non abridged version, 09 Apr 2005
I just thought i'd point out to other buyers that the edition shown here is not in fact the whole book - it's abridged which i don't think is made clear. i only found out when i ordered it having read a library copy of the non abridged version which i can't recommend enough!

Caveat before tackling this great but weighty novel, 15 Aug 2000
I have to confess to reading this novel partly out of guilt, since I kept coming across references to it elsewhere. While I did enjoy it, it was largely this literary conscience that kept me going. It is indeed a superb novel, and you can read the other reviews to see why, but it is very slow and I think I'm not the only one who found it quite a slog, or got frustrated from time to time by Clarissa's unspeakable virtuousness (although her distraught state after the rape is portrayed most movingly).

As a comparison, read Laclos' Les Liaisons Dangereuses, one of my favourite novels and one which makes one wonder why the epistolary form was abandoned. A beautifully structured, enthralling study of sexual intrigue in eighteenth-century France, it is far more exciting and the characterisation is extraordinary, exploring both good and vicious characters with great depth and achieving the rare feat of making characters at both ends of the scale human, realistic and sympathetic. One of the main differences, apart from the driven plot of Les Liaisons against the thoughtful consideration of what in Clarissa is, classically, basically an expansion of one incident, is that Laclos explored human depravity with such rigorous honesty and fascinated sympathy that he caused a great scandal and got himself banned; Richardson, on the other hand, always had an eye out for the moral lesson (he gives everyone their just deserts at the end in quite a scrupulous manner) and to my mind his portrayal of human nature is less believable, and certainly less interesting. Clarissa would have been far more likeable for a few faults (even Melanie in Gone with the Wind makes a sarcastic comment once), and the interaction with Lovelace would perhaps, I feel, have been deeper and more tragic if she had lowered her standards and communicated with him more.

Clarissa is a densely woven, lovingly detailed novel with a plot that can be summed up in one sentence, and I think that whether it appeals to you depends very much on whether or not this is to your taste. I certainly found it of great interest in relation to other literature and will no doubt dip into it again, but I couldn't face a re-read. One problem with boasting about having finished it is that even though it was much harder work than War and Peace (and twice as long), most people won't have heard of it!

I wish it were longer!, 19 Jun 2007
What an epic novel. Thoroughly engrossing from the first letter of Anna Howe to Clarissa Harlowe until the conclusion penned by the reformed Jack Belford, I loved every minute of it. Even at the last couple of pages I had my heart in my mouth awaiting the outcome of a long awaited encounter between two of the characters. I feel quite satisfied at having seen this book through to its conclusion, and was rewarded duly. One of my best reads for a very long time. (Unabridged Penguin Classics Version)

Stick with it, it's worth it!, 30 Aug 2006
This copy is the abridged version but it is well worth reading the full text - if you don't enjoy it at least you can feel proud that you've read a book bigger than 'War and Peace'! I found the correspondence between Anna and Clarissa amazing, Anna is such a modern girl. 'Clarissa' tells the age old story of a woman who thinks she can tame a bad boy. The scene describing Anna by Clarissa's coffin is very moving and worth sticking with the novel for.

Perhaps inadvertent feminist classic, 04 Jan 2006
Well, I've just finished all 1499 pages of the unabridged version (ISBN 0-140-43215-9) based upon the first edition and not by any means the longest. The fact that I've finished it attests partly to its quality, partly to my vanity. For me, it is pleasant to see how conscious the Georgians were of the unfairness (as we would see of it) of the marriage articles and the treatment of women by men generally. I can't really be sure exactly where Richardson stood but in the character of Anne Howe you have have a very plain speaking and intelligent feminist, surely... albeit that the author has her marry a man she doesn't fancy, apparently against her inclination. Indeed, one of the novel's many problems is it's improbabilities. I personally think that the characterisation of Lovelace is quite crude, the novel suffers from a lack of humour, the heroine dies of we know not quite what..On the other hand, the novel is still a major narrative achievement that makes good use of its length to render an often more realistic portrayal of life in many details. For anyone genuinely interested in reading the "classics" this is one that perhaps shouldn't be too far down the list. And in the first third of the book I simply couldn't help but be amused by the comic barbarity of the parents. Their unreasonableness in contrast to their beforehand reasonableness to her is another glaring inconsistency but it doesn't spoil the novel.

Excellent book - but don't you want the non abridged version, 09 Apr 2005
I just thought i'd point out to other buyers that the edition shown here is not in fact the whole book - it's abridged which i don't think is made clear. i only found out when i ordered it having read a library copy of the non abridged version which i can't recommend enough!

Caveat before tackling this great but weighty novel, 15 Aug 2000
I have to confess to reading this novel partly out of guilt, since I kept coming across references to it elsewhere. While I did enjoy it, it was largely this literary conscience that kept me going. It is indeed a superb novel, and you can read the other reviews to see why, but it is very slow and I think I'm not the only one who found it quite a slog, or got frustrated from time to time by Clarissa's unspeakable virtuousness (although her distraught state after the rape is portrayed most movingly).

As a comparison, read Laclos' Les Liaisons Dangereuses, one of my favourite novels and one which makes one wonder why the epistolary form was abandoned. A beautifully structured, enthralling study of sexual intrigue in eighteenth-century France, it is far more exciting and the characterisation is extraordinary, exploring both good and vicious characters with great depth and achieving the rare feat of making characters at both ends of the scale human, realistic and sympathetic. One of the main differences, apart from the driven plot of Les Liaisons against the thoughtful consideration of what in Clarissa is, classically, basically an expansion of one incident, is that Laclos explored human depravity with such rigorous honesty and fascinated sympathy that he caused a great scandal and got himself banned; Richardson, on the other hand, always had an eye out for the moral lesson (he gives everyone their just deserts at the end in quite a scrupulous manner) and to my mind his portrayal of human nature is less believable, and certainly less interesting. Clarissa would have been far more likeable for a few faults (even Melanie in Gone with the Wind makes a sarcastic comment once), and the interaction with Lovelace would perhaps, I feel, have been deeper and more tragic if she had lowered her standards and communicated with him more.

Clarissa is a densely woven, lovingly detailed novel with a plot that can be summed up in one sentence, and I think that whether it appeals to you depends very much on whether or not this is to your taste. I certainly found it of great interest in relation to other literature and will no doubt dip into it again, but I couldn't face a re-read. One problem with boasting about having finished it is that even though it was much harder work than War and Peace (and twice as long), most people won't have heard of it!

Thank God this is over, 26 Sep 2008
I was so excited before I read this book. It was my first year at university and I was eager to discover the gems of 18th century literature. This is not one of them.

Both characters are revolting. The 'hero' is a failed raper of very low IQ (I blame the intramarriages of the ruling classes) as he cannot succeed to rape an unprotected 15 year old when she is in his sole care.

Pamela on the other hand seems to be considered either virtuous (by the 18th century reader) or oppressed but in my mind she only seemed as a calculating little wrench who is all too aware that in this environment her virginity is the only thing she has to invest on climbing the social ladder and she is using it ingeniously on simple minded Mr B. And that would be all wonderful (who doesn't love Becky Sharp?) if she did not exposed as to 500 pages of badly written accounts of how her sole concern is morality [yeah, right, the moment she sees the man who abhors could make her fortune by marrying her she discovers she was passionately in love with him all along].

That this type of hypocrisy or false confidence had once been presented as en example to young ladies is more interesting for the student of cultural history than literary students.

For those searching for a good read there is Fielding!

a perverse vision of love, 14 Jul 2008
This book is completely unrealistic, and it doesn't surprise me that a man wrote it!

It tells the story of a girl (Pamela) falling in love with her would-be raper...and I say: fat chance!!! (only a man could write that!)

There are shokingly clear scenes in which the guy is ready to rape her, he doesn't want her to marry anyone (while telling himself that he couldn't bear the shame of marrying her himself), almost tells her that if she falls in love with someone else, he'll rape her as violenty as possible...and she falls in love with him.
She finds him marvellous, and herself undeserving (her brain has been adled in the meantime, that's the only explanation possible).

Frankly, thank you M. Richarson for sharing this mysogynist and completly perverse vision of love with us readers!!! (irony here...)

What a waste of my time., 15 Jun 2007
It honestly shocks me that this was a best seller at the time and it caused a storm with the eighteenth century audience. Were they brain dead? It reminds me how the audience now went crazy over the Da Vinci Code, but really, it's just a load of rubbish.

Granted, it was different at the time. 'Robinson Crusoe' was also madly popular, and the public wanted more of this new 'novel' form. This book is mainly an epistolary novel (pioneering attribute in the novel) that tries to convince its readership that there is truth in the words, and that the readers should go away and think about what a good girl Pamela was, and how she was rewarded in the end. So, ladies of the eighteenth century, did you get that? Be pathetic, a lap dog and worship and love those that try to rape you and kidnap you, and you will be rewarded by marrying your kidnapper! Great one!

What is terrible about this book is the character of Pamela, who is overly pure and perfect, who takes everything that is thrown her way, is tormented by Mr B constantly, but then decides, that in fact, she loves him! So she goes back, and takes torment from his sister instead! Very good. The character is immensely unbelievable and serves only as a message to the women of the time to obey their men and be like Pamela (which they wouldn't and couldn't have been; no human being can be like Pamela).

The worst part of this novel isn't even the issues or morals it sends out, rather, it's the form and style of story telling that it uses. There is no denying that it started the epistolary trend and gave yet more forms of narrating for novel writers, but the context in which it is written in makes the story laughable. Pamela is constantly writing letters. That's right. She writes letters even when she knows no one will read them, and she writes letters as things are happening. She must be writing 20 hours a day. How does she have time to be raped and kidnapped? It's a wonder. It's just common sense. It astonishes me that an author in the time where novel writing was highly looked down upon, and so tried to make their novels seem real, adopted the very narrative that made his book ridiculous.

There is hope, however; not all eighteenth century readers were duped by this. If you do get yourself through this awful, dull and boring novel (which is about 500 pages long of nothing), you must reward yourself (you deserve to be rewarded when you torture yourself, remember?!) and read the humorous 'Shamela' and 'Joseph Andrews' by Henry Fielding who took 'Pamela' for what it was: a novel that lacked any credibility.

If you have to read this book to find out the roots of the novel, the roots of the novel is simply not worth knowing about.

Not one for sensitive feminists, 05 May 2007
Having been asked to read this for an English lit course, I was fairly unethusiastic in my approach to it. However, I did become quite interested in the book while reading it, but it was the perverse sort of interest you might get from..say...watching a puppy being kicked.

Lovers of Jane Austen looking for something new, beware - this is not a book whose plot you can become embroiled in and gripped by. It is not a pleasure to read. It is NOT romantic (!!??). Richardson's writing style is as lamentable as the novel's [...] - not only does it make the book a hard and frankly dull read for the most part, it also manages to undermine the moral message he was attempting to convey.

The book's worth comes with its illustration of some shockingly derogative eighteenth century attitudes toward women. What I was most nauseated by was not the attempted rapes, kidnapping, and all that; but a much more profound, ingrained in the social unconscious, type of [...]. Mainly this is prevalent in the (excrutiatingly dull and unnecessary) second part, where Pamela becomes the said puppy, repeatedly booted up the backside by male oppression.

The issues of class politics and morality would have held more interest for contemporary readers than today's, but will certainly merit consideration to those interested by such things. And for historical interest this obviously holds particular value not only as being one of the first English novels but also for its pioneering form. Richardson's idea of 'writing to the moment' was undeniably transgressional in a time when many writers were alarmed by the arrogance of an omniscient authorial narrative.

How anyone can take actual enjoyment from reading this is beyond me, unless you like to be reminded of the advantages of our wonderful modern society compared to ye olde days.

A Long Hard Journey, but Worth it, 18 Jul 2005
Pamela is a novel written in the form of letters and, as in the case of many other stories, is essentially about overwhelming good overcoming evil despite boundaries in class, strength and power.

Pamela is the heroine of the novel and the waffly chatterbox writer of these letters, an extraordinarily beautiful girl of 15, with maturity of mind, a humble heart and a good soul. Throughout the first half of the novel Pamela grapples with her Master known as Mr B, who, bewitched by her beauty, and visibly torn between his pride and dignity as a member of the upper class, and his infatuation with her, attempts to destroy her chastity, using all of his power and status to siege her. The second volume in the novel is more like a traditional romance.

The novel is surprisingly readable considering it's format, in letters, and it is easy to get emotionally caught up in the plot, feeling sympathy for Pamela who at times appears to be a damsel in distress without a trusty handsome prince to save her from her tormentors. Most of the other characters in the novel are very likeable too as Richardson does an excellent job in making his characters very human.

When reading the novel, at points, it felt like it would make a great television series, due to the fact that the movement is very slow throughout the novel and the action seems to occur in isolated incidents. However this can make this read less riveting as often you will need to work at reading this novel, and at over 500 pages long this novel can sometimes be a hard slog.

In Conclusion, however, this is well worth a read, with good morals, a feel-good plot and human, likeable characters, but do not expect this book to read itself. It needs some work, but it's a rewarding read.

I wish it were longer!, 19 Jun 2007
What an epic novel. Thoroughly engrossing from the first letter of Anna Howe to Clarissa Harlowe until the conclusion penned by the reformed Jack Belford, I loved every minute of it. Even at the last couple of pages I had my heart in my mouth awaiting the outcome of a long awaited encounter between two of the characters. I feel quite satisfied at having seen this book through to its conclusion, and was rewarded duly. One of my best reads for a very long time. (Unabridged Penguin Classics Version)

Stick with it, it's worth it!, 30 Aug 2006
This copy is the abridged version but it is well worth reading the full text - if you don't enjoy it at least you can feel proud that you've read a book bigger than 'War and Peace'! I found the correspondence between Anna and Clarissa amazing, Anna is such a modern girl. 'Clarissa' tells the age old story of a woman who thinks she can tame a bad boy. The scene describing Anna by Clarissa's coffin is very moving and worth sticking with the novel for.

Perhaps inadvertent feminist classic, 04 Jan 2006
Well, I've just finished all 1499 pages of the unabridged version (ISBN 0-140-43215-9) based upon the first edition and not by any means the longest. The fact that I've finished it attests partly to its quality, partly to my vanity. For me, it is pleasant to see how conscious the Georgians were of the unfairness (as we would see of it) of the marriage articles and the treatment of women by men generally. I can't really be sure exactly where Richardson stood but in the character of Anne Howe you have have a very plain speaking and intelligent feminist, surely... albeit that the author has her marry a man she doesn't fancy, apparently against her inclination. Indeed, one of the novel's many problems is it's improbabilities. I personally think that the characterisation of Lovelace is quite crude, the novel suffers from a lack of humour, the heroine dies of we know not quite what..On the other hand, the novel is still a major narrative achievement that makes good use of its length to render an often more realistic portrayal of life in many details. For anyone genuinely interested in reading the "classics" this is one that perhaps shouldn't be too far down the list. And in the first third of the book I simply couldn't help but be amused by the comic barbarity of the parents. Their unreasonableness in contrast to their beforehand reasonableness to her is another glaring inconsistency but it doesn't spoil the novel.

Excellent book - but don't you want the non abridged version, 09 Apr 2005
I just thought i'd point out to other buyers that the edition shown here is not in fact the whole book - it's abridged which i don't think is made clear. i only found out when i ordered it having read a library copy of the non abridged version which i can't recommend enough!

Caveat before tackling this great but weighty novel, 15 Aug 2000
I have to confess to reading this novel partly out of guilt, since I kept coming across references to it elsewhere. While I did enjoy it, it was largely this literary conscience that kept me going. It is indeed a superb novel, and you can read the other reviews to see why, but it is very slow and I think I'm not the only one who found it quite a slog, or got frustrated from time to time by Clarissa's unspeakable virtuousness (although her distraught state after the rape is portrayed most movingly).

As a comparison, read Laclos' Les Liaisons Dangereuses, one of my favourite novels and one which makes one wonder why the epistolary form was abandoned. A beautifully structured, enthralling study of sexual intrigue in eighteenth-century France, it is far more exciting and the characterisation is extraordinary, exploring both good and vicious characters with great depth and achieving the rare feat of making characters at both ends of the scale human, realistic and sympathetic. One of the main differences, apart from the driven plot of Les Liaisons against the thoughtful consideration of what in Clarissa is, classically, basically an expansion of one incident, is that Laclos explored human depravity with such rigorous honesty and fascinated sympathy that he caused a great scandal and got himself banned; Richardson, on the other hand, always had an eye out for the moral lesson (he gives everyone their just deserts at the end in quite a scrupulous manner) and to my mind his portrayal of human nature is less believable, and certainly less interesting. Clarissa would have been far more likeable for a few faults (even Melanie in Gone with the Wind makes a sarcastic comment once), and the interaction with Lovelace would perhaps, I feel, have been deeper and more tragic if she had lowered her standards and communicated with him more.

Clarissa is a densely woven, lovingly detailed novel with a plot that can be summed up in one sentence, and I think that whether it appeals to you depends very much on whether or not this is to your taste. I certainly found it of great interest in relation to other literature and will no doubt dip into it again, but I couldn't face a re-read. One problem with boasting about having finished it is that even though it was much harder work than War and Peace (and twice as long), most people won't have heard of it!

I wish it were longer!, 19 Jun 2007
What an epic novel. Thoroughly engrossing from the first letter of Anna Howe to Clarissa Harlowe until the conclusion penned by the reformed Jack Belford, I loved every minute of it. Even at the last couple of pages I had my heart in my mouth awaiting the outcome of a long awaited encounter between two of the characters. I feel quite satisfied at having seen this book through to its conclusion, and was rewarded duly. One of my best reads for a very long time. (Unabridged Penguin Classics Version)

Stick with it, it's worth it!, 30 Aug 2006
This copy is the abridged version but it is well worth reading the full text - if you don't enjoy it at least you can feel proud that you've read a book bigger than 'War and Peace'! I found the correspondence between Anna and Clarissa amazing, Anna is such a modern girl. 'Clarissa' tells the age old story of a woman who thinks she can tame a bad boy. The scene describing Anna by Clarissa's coffin is very moving and worth sticking with the novel for.

Perhaps inadvertent feminist classic, 04 Jan 2006
Well, I've just finished all 1499 pages of the unabridged version (ISBN 0-140-43215-9) based upon the first edition and not by any means the longest. The fact that I've finished it attests partly to its quality, partly to my vanity. For me, it is pleasant to see how conscious the Georgians were of the unfairness (as we would see of it) of the marriage articles and the treatment of women by men generally. I can't really be sure exactly where Richardson stood but in the character of Anne Howe you have have a very plain speaking and intelligent feminist, surely... albeit that the author has her marry a man she doesn't fancy, apparently against her inclination. Indeed, one of the novel's many problems is it's improbabilities. I personally think that the characterisation of Lovelace is quite crude, the novel suffers from a lack of humour, the heroine dies of we know not quite what..On the other hand, the novel is still a major narrative achievement that makes good use of its length to render an often more realistic portrayal of life in many details. For anyone genuinely interested in reading the "classics" this is one that perhaps shouldn't be too far down the list. And in the first third of the book I simply couldn't help but be amused by the comic barbarity of the parents. Their unreasonableness in contrast to their beforehand reasonableness to her is another glaring inconsistency but it doesn't spoil the novel.

Excellent book - but don't you want the non abridged version, 09 Apr 2005
I just thought i'd point out to other buyers that the edition shown here is not in fact the whole book - it's abridged which i don't think is made clear. i only found out when i ordered it having read a library copy of the non abridged version which i can't recommend enough!

Caveat before tackling this great but weighty novel, 15 Aug 2000
I have to confess to reading this novel partly out of guilt, since I kept coming across references to it elsewhere. While I did enjoy it, it was largely this literary conscience that kept me going. It is indeed a superb novel, and you can read the other reviews to see why, but it is very slow and I think I'm not the only one who found it quite a slog, or got frustrated from time to time by Clarissa's unspeakable virtuousness (although her distraught state after the rape is portrayed most movingly).

As a comparison, read Laclos' Les Liaisons Dangereuses, one of my favourite novels and one which makes one wonder why the epistolary form was abandoned. A beautifully structured, enthralling study of sexual intrigue in eighteenth-century France, it is far more exciting and the characterisation is extraordinary, exploring both good and vicious characters with great depth and achieving the rare feat of making characters at both ends of the scale human, realistic and sympathetic. One of the main differences, apart from the driven plot of Les Liaisons against the thoughtful consideration of what in Clarissa is, classically, basically an expansion of one incident, is that Laclos explored human depravity with such rigorous honesty and fascinated sympathy that he caused a great scandal and got himself banned; Richardson, on the other hand, always had an eye out for the moral lesson (he gives everyone their just deserts at the end in quite a scrupulous manner) and to my mind his portrayal of human nature is less believable, and certainly less interesting. Clarissa would have been far more likeable for a few faults (even Melanie in Gone with the Wind makes a sarcastic comment once), and the interaction with Lovelace would perhaps, I feel, have been deeper and more tragic if she had lowered her standards and communicated with him more.

Clarissa is a densely woven, lovingly detailed novel with a plot that can be summed up in one sentence, and I think that whether it appeals to you depends very much on whether or not this is to your taste. I certainly found it of great interest in relation to other literature and will no doubt dip into it again, but I couldn't face a re-read. One problem with boasting about having finished it is that even though it was much harder work than War and Peace (and twice as long), most people won't have heard of it!

I wish it were longer!, 19 Jun 2007
What an epic novel. Thoroughly engrossing from the first letter of Anna Howe to Clarissa Harlowe until the conclusion penned by the reformed Jack Belford, I loved every minute of it. Even at the last couple of pages I had my heart in my mouth awaiting the outcome of a long awaited encounter between two of the characters. I feel quite satisfied at having seen this book through to its conclusion, and was rewarded duly. One of my best reads for a very long time. (Unabridged Penguin Classics Version)

Stick with it, it's worth it!, 30 Aug 2006
This copy is the abridged version but it is well worth reading the full text - if you don't enjoy it at least you can feel proud that you've read a book bigger than 'War and Peace'! I found the correspondence between Anna and Clarissa amazing, Anna is such a modern girl. 'Clarissa' tells the age old story of a woman who thinks she can tame a bad boy. The scene describing Anna by Clarissa's coffin is very moving and worth sticking with the novel for.

Perhaps inadvertent feminist classic, 04 Jan 2006
Well, I've just finished all 1499 pages of the unabridged version (ISBN 0-140-43215-9) based upon the first edition and not by any means the longest. The fact that I've finished it attests partly to its quality, partly to my vanity. For me, it is pleasant to see how conscious the Georgians were of the unfairness (as we would see of it) of the marriage articles and the treatment of women by men generally. I can't really be sure exactly where Richardson stood but in the character of Anne Howe you have have a very plain speaking and intelligent feminist, surely... albeit that the author has her marry a man she doesn't fancy, apparently against her inclination. Indeed, one of the novel's many problems is it's improbabilities. I personally think that the characterisation of Lovelace is quite crude, the novel suffers from a lack of humour, the heroine dies of we know not quite what..On the other hand, the novel is still a major narrative achievement that makes good use of its length to render an often more realistic portrayal of life in many details. For anyone genuinely interested in reading the "classics" this is one that perhaps shouldn't be too far down the list. And in the first third of the book I simply couldn't help but be amused by the comic barbarity of the parents. Their unreasonableness in contrast to their beforehand reasonableness to her is another glaring inconsistency but it doesn't spoil the novel.

Excellent book - but don't you want the non abridged version, 09 Apr 2005
I just thought i'd point out to other buyers that the edition shown here is not in fact the whole book - it's abridged which i don't think is made clear. i only found out when i ordered it having read a library copy of the non abridged version which i can't recommend enough!

Caveat before tackling this great but weighty novel, 15 Aug 2000
I have to confess to reading this novel partly out of guilt, since I kept coming across references to it elsewhere. While I did enjoy it, it was largely this literary conscience that kept me going. It is indeed a superb novel, and you can read the other reviews to see why, but it is very slow and I think I'm not the only one who found it quite a slog, or got frustrated from time to time by Clarissa's unspeakable virtuousness (although her distraught state after the rape is portrayed most movingly).

As a comparison, read Laclos' Les Liaisons Dangereuses, one of my favourite novels and one which makes one wonder why the epistolary form was abandoned. A beautifully structured, enthralling study of sexual intrigue in eighteenth-century France, it is far more exciting and the characterisation is extraordinary, exploring both good and vicious characters with great depth and achieving the rare feat of making characters at both ends of the scale human, realistic and sympathetic. One of the main differences, apart from the driven plot of Les Liaisons against the thoughtful consideration of what in Clarissa is, classically, basically an expansion of one incident, is that Laclos explored human depravity with such rigorous honesty and fascinated sympathy that he caused a great scandal and got himself banned; Richardson, on the other hand, always had an eye out for the moral lesson (he gives everyone their just deserts at the end in quite a scrupulous manner) and to my mind his portrayal of human nature is less believable, and certainly less interesting. Clarissa would have been far more likeable for a few faults (even Melanie in Gone with the Wind makes a sarcastic comment once), and the interaction with Lovelace would perhaps, I feel, have been deeper and more tragic if she had lowered her standards and communicated with him more.

Clarissa is a densely woven, lovingly detailed novel with a plot that can be summed up in one sentence, and I think that whether it appeals to you depends very much on whether or not this is to your taste. I certainly found it of great interest in relation to other literature and will no doubt dip into it again, but I couldn't face a re-read. One problem with boasting about having finished it is that even though it was much harder work than War and Peace (and twice as long), most people won't have heard of it!

Thank God this is over, 26 Sep 2008
I was so excited before I read this book. It was my first year at university and I was eager to discover the gems of 18th century literature. This is not one of them.

Both characters are revolting. The 'hero' is a failed raper of very low IQ (I blame the intramarriages of the ruling classes) as he cannot succeed to rape an unprotected 15 year old when she is in his sole care.

Pamela on the other hand seems to be considered either virtuous (by the 18th century reader) or oppressed but in my mind she only seemed as a calculating little wrench who is all too aware that in this environment her virginity is the only thing she has to invest on climbing the social ladder and she is using it ingeniously on simple minded Mr B. And that would be all wonderful (who doesn't love Becky Sharp?) if she did not exposed as to 500 pages of badly written accounts of how her sole concern is morality [yeah, right, the moment she sees the man who abhors could make her fortune by marrying her she discovers she was passionately in love with him all along].

That this type of hypocrisy or false confidence had once been presented as en example to young ladies is more interesting for the student of cultural history than literary students.

For those searching for a good read there is Fielding!

a perverse vision of love, 14 Jul 2008
This book is completely unrealistic, and it doesn't surprise me that a man wrote it!

It tells the story of a girl (Pamela) falling in love with her would-be raper...and I say: fat chance!!! (only a man could write that!)

There are shokingly clear scenes in which the guy is ready to rape her, he doesn't want her to marry anyone (while telling himself that he couldn't bear the shame of marrying her himself), almost tells her that if she falls in love with someone else, he'll rape her as violenty as possible...and she falls in love with him.
She finds him marvellous, and herself undeserving (her brain has been adled in the meantime, that's the only explanation possible).

Frankly, thank you M. Richarson for sharing this mysogynist and completly perverse vision of love with us readers!!! (irony here...)

What a waste of my time., 15 Jun 2007
It honestly shocks me that this was a best seller at the time and it caused a storm with the eighteenth century audience. Were they brain dead? It reminds me how the audience now went crazy over the Da Vinci Code, but really, it's just a load of rubbish.

Granted, it was different at the time. 'Robinson Crusoe' was also madly popular, and the public wanted more of this new 'novel' form. This book is mainly an epistolary novel (pioneering attribute in the novel) that tries to convince its readership that there is truth in the words, and that the readers should go away and think about what a good girl Pamela was, and how she was rewarded in the end. So, ladies of the eighteenth century, did you get that? Be pathetic, a lap dog and worship and love those that try to rape you and kidnap you, and you will be rewarded by marrying your kidnapper! Great one!

What is terrible about this book is the character of Pamela, who is overly pure and perfect, who takes everything that is thrown her way, is tormented by Mr B constantly, but then decides, that in fact, she loves him! So she goes back, and takes torment from his sister instead! Very good. The character is immensely unbelievable and serves only as a message to the women of the time to obey their men and be like Pamela (which they wouldn't and couldn't have been; no human being can be like Pamela).

The worst part of this novel isn't even the issues or morals it sends out, rather, it's the form and style of story telling that it uses. There is no denying that it started the epistolary trend and gave yet more forms of narrating for novel writers, but the context in which it is written in makes the story laughable. Pamela is constantly writing letters. That's right. She writes letters even when she knows no one will read them, and she writes letters as things are happening. She must be writing 20 hours a day. How does she have time to be raped and kidnapped? It's a wonder. It's just common sense. It astonishes me that an author in the time where novel writing was highly looked down upon, and so tried to make their novels seem real, adopted the very narrative that made his book ridiculous.

There is hope, however; not all eighteenth century readers were duped by this. If you do get yourself through this awful, dull and boring novel (which is about 500 pages long of nothing), you must reward yourself (you deserve to be rewarded when you torture yourself, remember?!) and read the humorous 'Shamela' and 'Joseph Andrews' by Henry Fielding who took 'Pamela' for what it was: a novel that lacked any credibility.

If you have to read this book to find out the roots of the novel, the roots of the novel is simply not worth knowing about.

Not one for sensitive feminists, 05 May 2007
Having been asked to read this for an English lit course, I was fairly unethusiastic in my approach to it. However, I did become quite interested in the book while reading it, but it was the perverse sort of interest you might get from..say...watching a puppy being kicked.

Lovers of Jane Austen looking for something new, beware - this is not a book whose plot you can become embroiled in and gripped by. It is not a pleasure to read. It is NOT romantic (!!??). Richardson's writing style is as lamentable as the novel's [...] - not only does it make the book a hard and frankly dull read for the most part, it also manages to undermine the moral message he was attempting to convey.

The book's worth comes with its illustration of some shockingly derogative eighteenth century attitudes toward women. What I was most nauseated by was not the attempted rapes, kidnapping, and all that; but a much more profound, ingrained in the social unconscious, type of [...]. Mainly this is prevalent in the (excrutiatingly dull and unnecessary) second part, where Pamela becomes the said puppy, repeatedly booted up the backside by male oppression.

The issues of class politics and morality would have held more interest for contemporary readers than today's, but will certainly merit consideration to those interested by such things. And for historical interest this obviously holds particular value not only as being one of the first English novels but also for its pioneering form. Richardson's idea of 'writing to the moment' was undeniably transgressional in a time when many writers were alarmed by the arrogance of an omniscient authorial narrative.

How anyone can take actual enjoyment from reading this is beyond me, unless you like to be reminded of the advantages of our wonderful modern society compared to ye olde days.

A Long Hard Journey, but Worth it, 18 Jul 2005
Pamela is a novel written in the form of letters and, as in the case of many other stories, is essentially about overwhelming good overcoming evil despite boundaries in class, strength and power.

Pamela is the heroine of the novel and the waffly chatterbox writer of these letters, an extraordinarily beautiful girl of 15, with maturity of mind, a humble heart and a good soul. Throughout the first half of the novel Pamela grapples with her Master known as Mr B, who, bewitched by her beauty, and visibly torn between his pride and dignity as a member of the upper class, and his infatuation with her, attempts to destroy her chastity, using all of his power and status to siege her. The second volume in the novel is more like a traditional romance.

The novel is surprisingly readable considering it's format, in letters, and it is easy to get emotionally caught up in the plot, feeling sympathy for Pamela who at times appears to be a damsel in distress without a trusty handsome prince to save her from her tormentors. Most of the other characters in the novel are very likeable too as Richardson does an excellent job in making his characters very human.

When reading the novel, at points, it felt like it would make a great television series, due to the fact that the movement is very slow throughout the novel and the action seems to occur in isolated incidents. However this can make this read less riveting as often you will need to work at reading this novel, and at over 500 pages long this novel can sometimes be a hard slog.

In Conclusion, however, this is well worth a read, with good morals, a feel-good plot and human, likeable characters, but do not expect this book to read itself. It needs some work, but it's a rewarding read.

I wish it were longer!, 19 Jun 2007
What an epic novel. Thoroughly engrossing from the first letter of Anna Howe to Clarissa Harlowe until the conclusion penned by the reformed Jack Belford, I loved every minute of it. Even at the last couple of pages I had my heart in my mouth awaiting the outcome of a long awaited encounter between two of the characters. I feel quite satisfied at having seen this book through to its conclusion, and was rewarded duly. One of my best reads for a very long time. (Unabridged Penguin Classics Version)

Stick with it, it's worth it!, 30 Aug 2006
This copy is the abridged version but it is well worth reading the full text - if you don't enjoy it at least you can feel proud that you've read a book bigger than 'War and Peace'! I found the correspondence between Anna and Clarissa amazing, Anna is such a modern girl. 'Clarissa' tells the age old story of a woman who thinks she can tame a bad boy. The scene describing Anna by Clarissa's coffin is very moving and worth sticking with the novel for.

Perhaps inadvertent feminist classic, 04 Jan 2006
Well, I've just finished all 1499 pages of the unabridged version (ISBN 0-140-43215-9) based upon the first edition and not by any means the longest. The fact that I've finished it attests partly to its quality, partly to my vanity. For me, it is pleasant to see how conscious the Georgians were of the unfairness (as we would see of it) of the marriage articles and the treatment of women by men generally. I can't really be sure exactly where Richardson stood but in the character of Anne Howe you have have a very plain speaking and intelligent feminist, surely... albeit that the author has her marry a man she doesn't fancy, apparently against her inclination. Indeed, one of the novel's many problems is it's improbabilities. I personally think that the characterisation of Lovelace is quite crude, the novel suffers from a lack of humour, the heroine dies of we know not quite what..On the other hand, the novel is still a major narrative achievement that makes good use of its length to render an often more realistic portrayal of life in many details. For anyone genuinely interested in reading the "classics" this is one that perhaps shouldn't be too far down the list. And in the first third of the book I simply couldn't help but be amused by the comic barbarity of the parents. Their unreasonableness in contrast to their beforehand reasonableness to her is another glaring inconsistency but it doesn't spoil the novel.

Excellent book - but don't you want the non abridged version, 09 Apr 2005
I just thought i'd point out to other buyers that the edition shown here is not in fact the whole book - it's abridged which i don't think is made clear. i only found out when i ordered it having read a library copy of the non abridged version which i can't recommend enough!

Caveat before tackling this great but weighty novel, 15 Aug 2000
I have to confess to reading this novel partly out of guilt, since I kept coming across references to it elsewhere. While I did enjoy it, it was largely this literary conscience that kept me going. It is indeed a superb novel, and you can read the other reviews to see why, but it is very slow and I think I'm not the only one who found it quite a slog, or got frustrated from time to time by Clarissa's unspeakable virtuousness (although her distraught state after the rape is portrayed most movingly).

As a comparison, read Laclos' Les Liaisons Dangereuses, one of my favourite novels and one which makes one wonder why the epistolary form was abandoned. A beautifully structured, enthralling study of sexual intrigue in eighteenth-century France, it is far more exciting and the characterisation is extraordinary, exploring both good and vicious characters with great depth and achieving the rare feat of making characters at both ends of the scale human, realistic and sympathetic. One of the main differences, apart from the driven plot of Les Liaisons against the thoughtful consideration of what in Clarissa is, classically, basically an expansion of one incident, is that Laclos explored human depravity with such rigorous honesty and fascinated sympathy that he caused a great scandal and got himself banned; Richardson, on the other hand, always had an eye out for the moral lesson (he gives everyone their just deserts at the end in quite a scrupulous manner) and to my mind his portrayal of human nature is less believable, and certainly less interesting. Clarissa would have been far more likeable for a few faults (even Melanie in Gone with the Wind makes a sarcastic comment once), and the interaction with Lovelace would perhaps, I feel, have been deeper and more tragic if she had lowered her standards and communicated with him more.

Clarissa is a densely woven, lovingly detailed novel with a plot that can be summed up in one sentence, and I think that whether it appeals to you depends very much on whether or not this is to your taste. I certainly found it of great interest in relation to other literature and will no doubt dip into it again, but I couldn't face a re-read. One problem with boasting about having finished it is that even though it was much harder work than War and Peace (and twice as long), most people won't have heard of it!

I wish it were longer!, 19 Jun 2007
What an epic novel. Thoroughly engrossing from the first letter of Anna Howe to Clarissa Harlowe until the conclusion penned by the reformed Jack Belford, I loved every minute of it. Even at the last couple of pages I had my heart in my mouth awaiting the outcome of a long awaited encounter between two of the characters. I feel quite satisfied at having seen this book through to its conclusion, and was rewarded duly. One of my best reads for a very long time. (Unabridged Penguin Classics Version)

Stick with it, it's worth it!, 30 Aug 2006
This copy is the abridged version but it is well worth reading the full text - if you don't enjoy it at least you can feel proud that you've read a book bigger than 'War and Peace'! I found the correspondence between Anna and Clarissa amazing, Anna is such a modern girl. 'Clarissa' tells the age old story of a woman who thinks she can tame a bad boy. The scene describing Anna by Clarissa's coffin is very moving and worth sticking with the novel for.

Perhaps inadvertent feminist classic, 04 Jan 2006
Well, I've just finished all 1499 pages of the unabridged version (ISBN 0-140-43215-9) based upon the first edition and not by any means the longest. The fact that I've finished it attests partly to its quality, partly to my vanity. For me, it is pleasant to see how conscious the Georgians were of the unfairness (as we would see of it) of the marriage articles and the treatment of women by men generally. I can't really be sure exactly where Richardson stood but in the character of Anne Howe you have have a very plain speaking and intelligent feminist, surely... albeit that the author has her marry a man she doesn't fancy, apparently against her inclination. Indeed, one of the novel's many problems is it's improbabilities. I personally think that the characterisation of Lovelace is quite crude, the novel suffers from a lack of humour, the heroine dies of we know not quite what..On the other hand, the novel is still a major narrative achievement that makes good use of its length to render an often more realistic portrayal of life in many details. For anyone genuinely interested in reading the "classics" this is one that perhaps shouldn't be too far down the list. And in the first third of the book I simply couldn't help but be amused by the comic barbarity of the parents. Their unreasonableness in contrast to their beforehand reasonableness to her is another glaring inconsistency but it doesn't spoil the novel.

Excellent book - but don't you want the non abridged version, 09 Apr 2005
I just thought i'd point out to other buyers that the edition shown here is not in fact the whole book - it's abridged which i don't think is made clear. i only found out when i ordered it having read a library copy of the non abridged version which i can't recommend enough!

Caveat before tackling this great but weighty novel, 15 Aug 2000
I have to confess to reading this novel partly out of guilt, since I kept coming across references to it elsewhere. While I did enjoy it, it was largely this literary conscience that kept me going. It is indeed a superb novel, and you can read the other reviews to see why, but it is very slow and I think I'm not the only one who found it quite a slog, or got frustrated from time to time by Clarissa's unspeakable virtuousness (although her distraught state after the rape is portrayed most movingly).

As a comparison, read Laclos' Les Liaisons Dangereuses, one of my favourite novels and one which makes one wonder why the epistolary form was abandoned. A beautifully structured, enthralling study of sexual intrigue in eighteenth-century France, it is far more exciting and the characterisation is extraordinary, exploring both good and vicious characters with great depth and achieving the rare feat of making characters at both ends of the scale human, realistic and sympathetic. One of the main differences, apart from the driven plot of Les Liaisons against the thoughtful consideration of what in Clarissa is, classically, basically an expansion of one incident, is that Laclos explored human depravity with such rigorous honesty and fascinated sympathy that he caused a great scandal and got himself banned; Richardson, on the other hand, always had an eye out for the moral lesson (he gives everyone their just deserts at the end in quite a scrupulous manner) and to my mind his portrayal of human nature is less believable, and certainly less interesting. Clarissa would have been far more likeable for a few faults (even Melanie in Gone with the Wind makes a sarcastic comment once), and the interaction with Lovelace would perhaps, I feel, have been deeper and more tragic if she had lowered her standards and communicated with him more.

Clarissa is a densely woven, lovingly detailed novel with a plot that can be summed up in one sentence, and I think that whether it appeals to you depends very much on whether or not this is to your taste. I certainly found it of great interest in relation to other literature and will no doubt dip into it again, but I couldn't face a re-read. One problem with boasting about having finished it is that even though it was much harder work than War and Peace (and twice as long), most people won't have heard of it!

I wish it were longer!, 19 Jun 2007
What an epic novel. Thoroughly engrossing from the first letter of Anna Howe to Clarissa Harlowe until the conclusion penned by the reformed Jack Belford, I loved every minute of it. Even at the last couple of pages I had my heart in my mouth awaiting the outcome of a long awaited encounter between two of the characters. I feel quite satisfied at having seen this book through to its conclusion, and was rewarded duly. One of my best reads for a very long time. (Unabridged Penguin Classics Version)

Stick with it, it's worth it!, 30 Aug 2006
This copy is the abridged version but it is well worth reading the full text - if you don't enjoy it at least you can feel proud that you've read a book bigger than 'War and Peace'! I found the correspondence between Anna and Clarissa amazing, Anna is such a modern girl. 'Clarissa' tells the age old story of a woman who thinks she can tame a bad boy. The scene describing Anna by Clarissa's coffin is very moving and worth sticking with the novel for.

Perhaps inadvertent feminist classic, 04 Jan 2006
Well, I've just finished all 1499 pages of the unabridged version (ISBN 0-140-43215-9) based upon the first edition and not by any means the longest. The fact that I've finished it attests partly to its quality, partly to my vanity. For me, it is pleasant to see how conscious the Georgians were of the unfairness (as we would see of it) of the marriage articles and the treatment of women by men generally. I can't really be sure exactly where Richardson stood but in the character of Anne Howe you have have a very plain speaking and intelligent feminist, surely... albeit that the author has her marry a man she doesn't fancy, apparently against her inclination. Indeed, one of the novel's many problems is it's improbabilities. I personally think that the characterisation of Lovelace is quite crude, the novel suffers from a lack of humour, the heroine dies of we know not quite what..On the other hand, the novel is still a major narrative achievement that makes good use of its length to render an often more realistic portrayal of life in many details. For anyone genuinely interested in reading the "classics" this is one that perhaps shouldn't be too far down the list. And in the first third of the book I simply couldn't help but be amused by the comic barbarity of the parents. Their unreasonableness in contrast to their beforehand reasonableness to her is another glaring inconsistency but it doesn't spoil the novel.

Excellent book - but don't you want the non abridged version, 09 Apr 2005
I just thought i'd point out to other buyers that the edition shown here is not in fact the whole book - it's abridged which i don't think is made clear. i only found out when i ordered it having read a library copy of the non abridged version which i can't recommend enough!

Caveat before tackling this great but weighty novel, 15 Aug 2000
I have to confess to reading this novel partly out of guilt, since I kept coming across references to it elsewhere. While I did enjoy it, it was largely this literary conscience that kept me going. It is indeed a superb novel, and you can read the other reviews to see why, but it is very slow and I think I'm not the only one who found it quite a slog, or got frustrated from time to time by Clarissa's unspeakable virtuousness (although her distraught state after the rape is portrayed most movingly).

As a comparison, read Laclos' Les Liaisons Dangereuses, one of my favourite novels and one which makes one wonder why the epistolary form was abandoned. A beautifully structured, enthralling study of sexual intrigue in eighteenth-century France, it is far more exciting and the characterisation is extraordinary, exploring both good and vicious characters with great depth and achieving the rare feat of making characters at both ends of the scale human, realistic and sympathetic. One of the main differences, apart from the driven plot of Les Liaisons against the thoughtful consideration of what in Clarissa is, classically, basically an expansion of one incident, is that Laclos explored human depravity with such rigorous honesty and fascinated sympathy that he caused a great scandal and got himself banned; Richardson, on the other hand, always had an eye out for the moral lesson (he gives everyone their just deserts at the end in quite a scrupulous manner) and to my mind his portrayal of human nature is less believable, and certainly less interesting. Clarissa would have been far more likeable for a few faults (even Melanie in Gone with the Wind makes a sarcastic comment once), and the interaction with Lovelace would perhaps, I feel, have been deeper and more tragic if she had lowered her standards and communicated with him more.

Clarissa is a densely woven, lovingly detailed novel with a plot that can be summed up in one sentence, and I think that whether it appeals to you depends very much on whether or not this is to your taste. I certainly found it of great interest in relation to other literature and will no doubt dip into it again, but I couldn't face a re-read. One problem with boasting about having finished it is that even though it was much harder work than War and Peace (and twice as long), most people won't have heard of it!

Thank God this is over, 26 Sep 2008
I was so excited before I read this book. It was my first year at university and I was eager to discover the gems of 18th century literature. This is not one of them.

Both characters are revolting. The 'hero' is a failed raper of very low IQ (I blame the intramarriages of the ruling classes) as he cannot succeed to rape an unprotected 15 year old when she is in his sole care.

Pamela on the other hand seems to be considered either virtuous (by the 18th century reader) or oppressed but in my mind she only seemed as a calculating little wrench who is all too aware that in this environment her virginity is the only thing she has to invest on climbing the social ladder and she is using it ingeniously on simple minded Mr B. And that would be all wonderful (who doesn't love Becky Sharp?) if she did not exposed as to 500 pages of badly written accounts of how her sole concern is morality [yeah, right, the moment she sees the man who abhors could make her fortune by marrying her she discovers she was passionately in love with him all along].

That this type of hypocrisy or false confidence had once been presented as en example to young ladies is more interesting for the student of cultural history than literary students.

For those searching for a good read there is Fielding!

a perverse vision of love, 14 Jul 2008
This book is completely unrealistic, and it doesn't surprise me that a man wrote it!

It tells the story of a girl (Pamela) falling in love with her would-be raper...and I say: fat chance!!! (only a man could write that!)

There are shokingly clear scenes in which the guy is ready to rape her, he doesn't want her to marry anyone (while telling himself that he couldn't bear the shame of marrying her himself), almost tells her that if she falls in love with someone else, he'll rape her as violenty as possible...and she falls in love with him.
She finds him marvellous, and herself undeserving (her brain has been adled in the meantime, that's the only explanation possible).

Frankly, thank you M. Richarson for sharing this mysogynist and completly perverse vision of love with us readers!!! (irony here...)

What a waste of my time., 15 Jun 2007
It honestly shocks me that this was a best seller at the time and it caused a storm with the eighteenth century audience. Were they brain dead? It reminds me how the audience now went crazy over the Da Vinci Code, but really, it's just a load of rubbish.

Granted, it was different at the time. 'Robinson Crusoe' was also madly popular, and the public wanted more of this new 'novel' form. This book is mainly an epistolary novel (pioneering attribute in the novel) that tries to convince its readership that there is truth in the words, and that the readers should go away and think about what a good girl Pamela was, and how she was rewarded in the end. So, ladies of the eighteenth century, did you get that? Be pathetic, a lap dog and worship and love those that try to rape you and kidnap you, and you will be rewarded by marrying your kidnapper! Great one!

What is terrible about this book is the character of Pamela, who is overly pure and perfect, who takes everything that is thrown her way, is tormented by Mr B constantly, but then decides, that in fact, she loves him! So she goes back, and takes torment from his sister instead! Very good. The character is immensely unbelievable and serves only as a message to the women of the time to obey their men and be like Pamela (which they wouldn't and couldn't have been; no human being can be like Pamela).

The worst part of this novel isn't even the issues or morals it sends out, rather, it's the form and style of story telling that it uses. There is no denying that it started the epistolary trend and gave yet more forms of narrating for novel writers, but the context in which it is written in makes the story laughable. Pamela is constantly writing letters. That's right. She writes letters even when she knows no one will read them, and she writes letters as things are happening. She must be writing 20 hours a day. How does she have time to be raped and kidnapped? It's a wonder. It's just common sense. It astonishes me that an author in the time where novel writing was highly looked down upon, and so tried to make their novels seem real, adopted the very narrative that made his book ridiculous.

There is hope, however; not all eighteenth century readers were duped by this. If you do get yourself through this awful, dull and boring novel (which is about 500 pages long of nothing), you must reward yourself (you deserve to be rewarded when you torture yourself, remember?!) and read the humorous 'Shamela' and 'Joseph Andrews' by Henry Fielding who took 'Pamela' for what it was: a novel that lacked any credibility.

If you have to read this book to find out the roots of the novel, the roots of the novel is simply not worth knowing about.

Not one for sensitive feminists, 05 May 2007
Having been asked to read this for an English lit course, I was fairly unethusiastic in my approach to it. However, I did become quite interested in the book while reading it, but it was the perverse sort of interest you might get from..say...watching a puppy being kicked.

Lovers of Jane Austen looking for something new, beware - this is not a book whose plot you can become embroiled in and gripped by. It is not a pleasure to read. It is NOT romantic (!!??). Richardson's writing style is as lamentable as the novel's [...] - not only does it make the book a hard and frankly dull read for the most part, it also manages to undermine the moral message he was attempting to convey.

The book's worth comes with its illustration of some shockingly derogative eighteenth century attitudes toward women. What I was most nauseated by was not the attempted rapes, kidnapping, and all that; but a much more profound, ingrained in the social unconscious, type of [...]. Mainly this is prevalent in the (excrutiatingly dull and unnecessary) second part, where Pamela becomes the said puppy, repeatedly booted up the backside by male oppression.

The issues of class politics and morality would have held more interest for contemporary readers than today's, but will certainly merit consideration to those interested by such things. And for historical interest this obviously holds particular value not only as being one of the first English novels but also for its pioneering form. Richardson's idea of 'writing to the moment' was undeniably transgressional in a time when many writers were alarmed by the arrogance of an omniscient authorial narrative.

How anyone can take actual enjoyment from reading this is beyond me, unless you like to be reminded of the advantages of our wonderful modern society compared to ye olde days.

A Long Hard Journey, but Worth it, 18 Jul 2005
Pamela is a novel written in the form of letters and, as in the case of many other stories, is essentially about overwhelming good overcoming evil despite boundaries in class, strength and power.

Pamela is the heroine of the novel and the waffly chatterbox writer of these letters, an extraordinarily beautiful girl of 15, with maturity of mind, a humble heart and a good soul. Throughout the first half of the novel Pamela grapples with her Master known as Mr B, who, bewitched by her beauty, and visibly torn between his pride and dignity as a member of the upper class, and his infatuation with her, attempts to destroy her chastity, using all of his power and status to siege her. The second volume in the novel is more like a traditional romance.

The novel is surprisingly readable considering it's format, in letters, and it is easy to get emotionally caught up in the plot, feeling sympathy for Pamela who at times appears to be a damsel in distress without a trusty handsome prince to save her from her tormentors. Most of the other characters in the novel are very likeable too as Richardson does an excellent job in making his characters very human.

When reading the novel, at points, it felt like it would make a great television series, due to the fact that the movement is very slow throughout the novel and the action seems to occur in isolated incidents. However this can make this read less riveting as often you will need to work at reading this novel, and at over 500 pages long this novel can sometimes be a hard slog.

In Conclusion, however, this is well worth a read, with good morals, a feel-good plot and human, likeable characters, but do not expect this book to read itself. It needs some work, but it's a rewarding read.