Jacobin Novel
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Jacobin novels were written between 1780 and 1805 by British radicals who supported the ideals of the
French revolution The French Revolution ( ) was a period of radical political and societal change in France that began with the Estates General of 1789 and ended with the formation of the French Consulate in November 1799. Many of its ideas are considere ...
. The term was coined by literary scholar Gary Kelly in ''The English Jacobin Novel 1780-1805'' (1976) but drawn from the title of the ''Anti-Jacobin: or, Weekly Examiner'', a conservative periodical founded by the
Tory A Tory () is a person who holds a political philosophy known as Toryism, based on a British version of traditionalism and conservatism, which upholds the supremacy of social order as it has evolved in the English culture throughout history. Th ...
politician
George Canning George Canning (11 April 17708 August 1827) was a British Tory statesman. He held various senior cabinet positions under numerous prime ministers, including two important terms as Foreign Secretary, finally becoming Prime Minister of the Unit ...
. Canning chose to tar British reformers with the French term for the most radical revolutionaries:
Jacobin , logo = JacobinVignette03.jpg , logo_size = 180px , logo_caption = Seal of the Jacobin Club (1792–1794) , motto = "Live free or die"(french: Vivre libre ou mourir) , successor = Pa ...
. Among the Jacobin novelists were
William Godwin William Godwin (3 March 1756 – 7 April 1836) was an English journalist, political philosopher and novelist. He is considered one of the first exponents of utilitarianism and the first modern proponent of anarchism. Godwin is most famous for ...
,
Robert Bage Robert Bage (11 March 1730 – 1 September 1801) was an English businessman and novelist. Biography Born in Darley Abbey, near Derby, Bage was the son of a paper-maker who had four wives, the first of whom was Bage's mother. She died soon after ...
,
Elizabeth Inchbald Elizabeth Inchbald (née Simpson, 15 October 1753 – 1 August 1821) was an English novelist, actress, dramatist, and translator. Her two novels, '' A Simple Story'' and '' Nature and Art'', have received particular critical attention. Life Bo ...
, and
Charlotte Turner Smith Charlotte Smith (née Turner; – ) was an English novelist and poet of the School of Sensibility whose ''Elegiac Sonnets'' (1784) contributed to the revival of the form in England. She also helped to set conventions for Gothic fiction and wro ...
. The genre began in an attempt to make revolutionary thought more entertaining and easier to comprehend for the lower order. On the midst of the
French Revolution The French Revolution ( ) was a period of radical political and societal change in France that began with the Estates General of 1789 and ended with the formation of the French Consulate in November 1799. Many of its ideas are considere ...
, literacy was growing amongst the lower classes, the mass behind the revolutionaries. “A reading public had become a revolutionary public.”M. O. Grenby, ''The Anti-Jacobin Novel: British Conservatism and the French Revolution'' (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001) p.14 The
Jacobin , logo = JacobinVignette03.jpg , logo_size = 180px , logo_caption = Seal of the Jacobin Club (1792–1794) , motto = "Live free or die"(french: Vivre libre ou mourir) , successor = Pa ...
novelists used this literacy to swell their radical beliefs throughout the lower classes. The Jacobin novelists adapted the romance novel structure into radical political subjects. The Jacobins cleverly blended their revolutionary principles into engaging, fantastical tales of honor, cruelty, and power. The Jacobin novelists were able to reach a massive non-intellectual demographic, which was generally apolitical, through this new genre. The Jacobin novel, most quintessentially represented in
William Godwin William Godwin (3 March 1756 – 7 April 1836) was an English journalist, political philosopher and novelist. He is considered one of the first exponents of utilitarianism and the first modern proponent of anarchism. Godwin is most famous for ...
’s ''
Caleb Williams Caleb Williams (born November 18, 2001) is an American football quarterback for the USC Trojans. Williams played for the Oklahoma Sooners in 2021 before transferring to USC as a sophomore in 2022, where he won several player of the year awards, i ...
'' (1794), attacked the established social and political order. Along with William Godwin, some of the major Jacobin novelists include
Elizabeth Inchbald Elizabeth Inchbald (née Simpson, 15 October 1753 – 1 August 1821) was an English novelist, actress, dramatist, and translator. Her two novels, '' A Simple Story'' and '' Nature and Art'', have received particular critical attention. Life Bo ...
,
Thomas Holcroft Thomas Holcroft (10 December 174523 March 1809) was an English dramatist, miscellanist, poet and translator. He was sympathetic to the early ideas of the French Revolution and helped Thomas Paine to publish the first part of ''The Rights of Man ...
, and the earliest,
Robert Bage Robert Bage (11 March 1730 – 1 September 1801) was an English businessman and novelist. Biography Born in Darley Abbey, near Derby, Bage was the son of a paper-maker who had four wives, the first of whom was Bage's mother. She died soon after ...
. Of all these authors, Godwin was the most effective and outstanding. Almost all of the Jacobin novels reflect theories and principles of Godwin’s '' Enquiry Concerning Political Justice''. Although it is not a novel, it is the foundation that the goals of the Jacobin novelists’ are based upon. In Godwin's novel, Caleb Williams, the
protagonist A protagonist () is the main character of a story. The protagonist makes key decisions that affect the plot, primarily influencing the story and propelling it forward, and is often the character who faces the most significant obstacles. If a st ...
is a devoutly honorable man who is cast into a “theater of calamity” by unforeseen circumstances. Throughout Caleb's entire journey, whenever he comes in contact with any forms of government or institutions of law he is cruelly and wrongfully castigated. Godwin's novel is an illustration of the effects of an abusive and tyrannical government, it reveals the devastating effects that established power can result in. The Jacobin novel was especially significant because its audience was the masses. The Jacobins’ message, although superficially simple, was very complex, and in the opinion of the conservatives, too complex for the lower order to understand. The reactionaries believed that the Jacobin novels were incredibly dangerous because they put ideas of revolution in the minds of those who couldn't fully understand the concept. The Jacobin novel led to a great anxiety by the government and the middle and upper classes. At one point there was even a suggestion to create a new tax on books in order to discourage literacy among the poor. In order to defend against these revolutionaries another genre was born, the anti-Jacobin novel.


Anti-Jacobin novel

Although the Jacobin novelists are contemporarily more popular, the anti-Jacobin novel overtook it across the 1790s and into the early 19th century. The anti-Jacobin novel became immensely popular around the late 1790s (bolstered by
the Terror The Reign of Terror (french: link=no, la Terreur) was a period of the French Revolution when, following the creation of the First Republic, a series of massacres and numerous public executions took place in response to revolutionary fervour, ...
), although they began to appear in the middle of the decade. The genre itself is neither original nor impulsive, without the Jacobin novel it would not exist. Anti-revolutionaries saw these Jacobin novelists as corrupting the ignorant lower classes by disguising fiction as reason. These reactionaries saw this blend of political thought into the fiction novel as radical, even anarchistic, propaganda that the Jacobins were tricking the non-intellectual lower order into supporting. In
Thomas James Mathias Thomas James Mathias, FRS (c.1754 – August 1835) was a British satirist and scholar. Life Mathias was educated in Kingston upon Thames and Trinity College, Cambridge. He held some minor appointments in the royal household (sub-treasurer, 1782 a ...
's '' The Pursuits of Literature'' (1794), he states, “Government and Literature are now more than ever intimately connected.” What Matias goes on to clarify is that in order to defeat the radicals, conservative writers must change their approach in order to capture the audience. To defend
King King is the title given to a male monarch in a variety of contexts. The female equivalent is queen, which title is also given to the consort of a king. *In the context of prehistory, antiquity and contemporary indigenous peoples, the tit ...
and country, conservatives decided the best way to attack the radicals was through the same medium. The conservatives’ goal became, paradoxically, to take up the fiction that they had denounced and write their own fictional satires of the Jacobin novels, for the same audience. By adopting the Jacobins’
propaganda Propaganda is communication that is primarily used to influence or persuade an audience to further an agenda, which may not be objective and may be selectively presenting facts to encourage a particular synthesis or perception, or using loaded ...
conveyance, the anti-Jacobins were able to captivate the lower order in the same way but with the opposite message. Among dozens of the anti-Jacobin novels,
George Walker George Walker may refer to: Arts and letters * George Walker (chess player) (1803–1879), English chess player and writer *George Walker (composer) (1922–2018), American composer * George Walker (illustrator) (1781–1856), author of ''The Co ...
's '' The Vagabond'' has been called the most effectual. ''The Vagabond'' points to flaws of revolutionary philosophy and suggests it would be disastrous if ever put into practice. The novel includes numerous direct quotations of Godwin's doctrine and illustrates its application, with satirically dreadful results. The book is a blatant attack on Godwin, and the Jacobin novel. Along with Walker there were Elizabeth Hamilton,
Robert Bisset Robert Bisset (c. 1759 – 14 May 1805) was a Scottish writer, best known as the biographer of Edmund Burke and of Joseph Addison, Richard Steele and other contributors to ''The Spectator''. Life Robert Bisset was the son of Rev. Dr. Bisset, minis ...
,
Henry James Pye Henry James Pye (; 20 February 1745 – 11 August 1813) was an English poet, and Poet Laureate from 1790 until his death. His appointment owed nothing to poetic achievement, and was probably a reward for political favours. Pye was merely a ...
, Charles Lloyd,
Jane West Jane West (born Iliffe, 1758–1852), was an English novelist who published as Prudentia Homespun and Mrs. West. She also wrote conduct literature, poetry and educational tracts. Life Jane West was born to Jane and John Iliffe in London, but th ...
, and Edward Dubois. These anti-Jacobin novelists combined history and fiction through
satire Satire is a genre of the visual, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, often with the intent of shaming ...
. Walker clarifies this goal in his dedication of The Vagabond, “Romances are only Histories which we do not believe to be true, and Histories are Romances we do believe to be true.” Although the anti-Jacobins despised the Jacobins’
radical Radical may refer to: Politics and ideology Politics *Radical politics, the political intent of fundamental societal change *Radicalism (historical), the Radical Movement that began in late 18th century Britain and spread to continental Europe and ...
adaptations of the romance structures of the novel, they also realized how effective it could be among the impressionable and naïve lower order. Consequently, the anti-Jacobins decided to fight fire with fire. In the anti-Jacobins’ opinions, the Jacobin novelists placed more importance on the romance of the novel than on truth and history. To differentiate themselves from this the anti-Jacobins strove to emphasize truth and historical precedents. Simply put, the goal of the anti-Jacobins was to defeat radicalism by challenging the blend of
political treatise ''Tractatus politicus'' (''TP'') or ''Political Treatise'' was the last treatise written by Baruch Spinoza. It was written in 1675–76 and published posthumously in 1677. This paper has the subtitle, "''In quo demonstratur, quomodo Societas, ub ...
and romance while maintaining the importance of truth and history. The formula of the anti-Jacobin novel usually includes a satirical interpretation of revolutionaries or revolutionary supporters who accept the power of romance over reason, Jacobin protagonists whose principles are egotistical and/or criminal, verbatim invocations of Godwin's texts, and a failure of revolutionary philosophy put into place. Many of the novels illustrate the danger of politics in a novel and the susceptibility of the naïve to corruption through the novel. The irony of a novel telling the reader the danger of novels was not missed by the reader and worked to precipitate the relative failure of the genre.


Notes


References

#Faulker, Peter. The Modern Language Review 74.2 (1979). Web. #Grenby, M. O. The Anti-Jacobin Novel: British Conservatism and the French Revolution. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2001. Print. #Harvey, A. D. "George Walker and the Anti-Revolutionary Novel." Oxford University Press 28.111 (1977). Web. #Kelly, Gary. The English Jacobin Novel. Oxford sw. Clarendon Pr., 1976. Print. #Mee, Jon. "Review: Anti-Jacobin Novels: Representation and Revolution." Huntington Library Quarterly 69.4 (2006). Web. {{DEFAULTSORT:Jacobin Novel * Literary genres