Joseph Andrews

In writing these comic novels Henry Fielding took aim at the conventional morals and mores found in the novels of his contemporary, Samuel Richardson. Joseph Andrews, Fielding s first full-length novel, can be seen as a response to Richardson, as the lascivious Lady Booby sets out to seduce her comically chaste servant Joseph (himself in love with the much-put-upon Fanny Goodwill). As in Tom Jones, Fielding takes a huge cast of characters out on the road and exposes them to many colorful and often hilarious adventures. Yet at the heart of the book is Parson Abraham Adams, a man often duped and humiliated by those more crafty than him, but still a model of Christian charity, learned, generous, friendly, and brave.Shamela is a brilliant parody of Richardson s Pamela, in which a virtuous servant girl long resists-her master s advances and is eventually rewarded with marriage. Fielding s far more spirited and sexually honest heroine, by contrast, merely uses coyness and mock modesty, as techniques to catch a rich husband.