Volume 37, Number 18 · November 22, 1990
Rogue Genius
By Derek Jarrett
Henry Fielding: A Life
by Martin C. Battestin, with Ruthe R. Battestin
Routledge, 738 pp., $45.00
New Essays by Henry Fielding: His Contributions to the Craftsman (1734–1739) and Other Early Journalism
by Martin C. Battestin
University Press of Virginia, 604 pp., $50.00
'No man but a blockhead ever wrote, except for money,' said Dr. Johnson. Few men exemplified the dictum better than Henry Fielding. He was a great writer, a hard-working journalist, and a prolific playwright as well as perhaps the first and greatest of English novelists, but he was certainly not a great letter writer. On the rare occasions when his friends did receive missives from him they were expected to cherish them since each was 'a certain Token of a violent Affection,' since the writing of them was 'an Exercise…I so much detest, that I believe it is not in the Power of three Persons to expose my epistolary Correspondence.' Even though he was born into one of the great ages of English letter writing he seldom put pen to paper except to earn money, ask for money, or explain why he could not repay money. Other kinds of correspondence were not only wasteful, taking up time and energy that could be put to more profitable use, but also dangerous: they might well put it into the recipients' power to make public things that were better kept private.
Review, 5393 words
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