Literature and Crime in Augustan EnglandRoutledge, 2020 M01 8 - 260 pages Eighteenth-century England saw an explosion of writings about deviance. In literature, in the law, and in the press, writers returned again and again to the question of crime and criminals. While the extension of the legal system formalised the power of the state to categorise and punish ‘deviance’, writers repeatedly confronted the problematic nature of legal authority and the unstable idea of ‘the criminal’. Some of this commentary was supportive, some was subversive and resistant, uncovering the complexity of issues the law sought to ignore. Originally published in 1991, Ian Bell’s masterly investigation of the diverse representations of crime and legality in the Augustan period ranges widely across the contemporary press, involving court reports, philosophical writings, periodicals, biographies, pornography and polemics. Re-assessing the canonical texts of eighteenth-century ‘Literature’, Bell situates the work of Defoe, Hogarth, Gay, Swift, Pope, Richardson and Fielding in its social and political context. |
From inside the book
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... throughout. To them, and to all the others mentioned, my heartfelt thanks. Remaining errors or inconsistencies are entirely my responsibility. Ian A. Bell Llanbadarn Fawr Aberystwyth The photographs of William Hogarth's Industry and ...
... throughout the Augustan period many traditional and previously acceptable practices were being criminalised by the introduction of new laws, and that the very rapid growth in statutes (especially in capital statutes) at the time is ...
... Throughout the century, more and more offences, including apparently trivial ones, could be punished by death, although a certain amount of discretion could be exercised in sentencing. The most notorious piece of legislation was the ...
... throughout the Augustan period, attracting the attention of theologians, philosophers, pamphleteers, poets, politicians, dramatists, novelists, and virtually everyone else with access to print. The legal system and the courts acted as ...
... throughout the eighteenth century and beyond. In fact, as has been pointed out by a number of writers, the bizarre myth of a golden age of law-abiding citizens lurking just within the reaches of memory in the recent past is an essential ...
Contents
Representing the criminal | |
The harlots progress | |
Satires rough music | |
Fielding and the discipline of fiction | |
Buttock and File | |
Other editions - View all
Literature and Crime in Augustan England Ian a Bell,Taylor & Francis Group No preview available - 2022 |