Making the Novel - by Brean Hammond & Shaun Regan

Book Synopsis

This book advances a new cultural reading of the formation of the British novel. Rejecting a teleological narrative of the genre's 'rise' and through close analysis of key texts, the authors present a dynamic picture of the emergence of the novel, which focuses upon formal innovation, social engagement, and artistic and commercial competition.

Review Quotes

"What a fine book this is! Something like this is surely needed; most books aimed at undergraduates are broader than the eighteenth-century novel; most books on the eighteenth-century novel are inaccessible to undergraduates. And few works for either audience combine an introduction to the theory of the novel with a set of specific readings of novels. It touches on most of the major canonical figures, but also includes some less well-known works and authors. All of which is to say that it fills a need. The book is not only well-conceived; it's also well written. It keeps up a lively pace, and it provides plentiful examples that make the authors' points well. Perhaps best of all...it also has genuinely new things to say."--Jack Lynch, Rutgers University

About the Author

BREAN HAMMOND is Professor of English at the University of Nottingham, UK. He is the author of numerous books and articles on seventeenth- and eighteenth-century writing, including Professional Imaginative Writing in England 1670-1740 (1997). He is a former President of the British Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies.

SHAUN REGAN is Lecturer in Eighteenth-Century and Romantic Literature at Queen's University Belfast, UK. He has published articles on Sterne, print culture, and the culture of politeness. He was formerly a Post-Doctoral Research Fellow at University College Dublin.
BREAN HAMMOND is Professor of English at the University of Nottingham, UK. He is the author of numerous books and articles on seventeenth- and eighteenth-century writing, including Professional Imaginative Writing in England 1670-1740 (1997). He is a former President of the British Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies.

SHAUN REGAN is Lecturer in Eighteenth-Century and Romantic Literature at Queen's University Belfast, UK. He has published articles on Sterne, print culture, and the culture of politeness. He was formerly a Post-Doctoral Research Fellow at University College Dublin.