HISTORY OF NOVEL
‘The Periodical Essay’ and ‘NOVEL’ these two new genres are emerged in the 18th century Both of these forms, especially ‘Novel’, caught the spirit of the eighteenth century as the age of intellectual, sentimental and realistic plane and tried to instruct the readers. Today novel is the most dominant literary genre.
What is a Novel?
A Novel is a relatively long narrative fiction which describes intimate human experiences normally in a prose form.
The present English word ‘novel’ is derived from the Italian ‘novella’, meaning ‘new’.
Novel as a literary genre has a history of about two thousand years.
The early precursors of novel:
A collection of tales known as Greek Romances dating from the second to sixth century may top the list. Though novel in the modern era usually makes use of a literary prose the earlier threads of the genre can be found in Virgil’s Ecologues or Malory’s ‘Morte De Arthur’ or Geoffrey Chaucer’s ‘The Canterbury Tales’.
Lady Murasaki Shikibu’s ‘Tale of Genji’ (1010) – the world’s first novel.
The first European novel -‘Don Quixote’ by Spanish writer Miguel de Cervantes which was published in two parts between 1605 and 1615.
In the 18th century, the appearance of newspaper and magazines attracted a large number of readers from the middle class.
After 1740, Novel originated as the literary form in England. Increase in trade and commerce, along with the Industrial Revolution, gave rise to the middle class. A class of people had emerged to occupy an elite status. The realistic picture of everyday life and problems of common people depicted in the novels appealed to the newly educated class and was regarded by them as respectable reading material. Thus, novel as a form appeared to have been designed for both-to voice the aspirations of the middle and lower classes and meet their longings.
The advent of machines provided time to the newly formed educated middle class to indulge in reading and discussions about the books. Drama and poetry were the two literary forms that were fading away. Novel was the combination of some features of drama and poetry; some new more features were added. It became the prominent form in the eighteenth century by encompassing the social, political and cultural happenings and scientific progress.
‘The Pilgrim’s Progress’ by John Bunyan (1678) and ‘Oroonoku’ by Aphra Behn (1688) initiated the plenteous and colourful tradition of English novel and was followed by Daniel Defoe ( Robinson Crusoe, Mall Flanders), and Jonathan Swift (‘Gulliver’s Travels’ – a famous satire). Other major novelists of 18th century are Samuel Richardson, (‘Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded’ and ‘Clarissa,’ both epistolary novels), Henry Fielding, Lawrence Sterne and Tobias Smollett. The tradition was enriched by many other stalwart novelists such as Charles Dickens, Walter Scott, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Horace Walpole, Thomas Hardy, Willkie Collins and H.G. Wells. The 20th century is marked by the modern topics and innovative styles and techniques and widened angles of the views by the novelists like E.M. Forster, James Joyce, Joseph Conrad, Henry James, George Orwell, Graham Greene, D.H. Lawrence, William Golding and Anthony Burgess. They widened the circumference of the genre by writing political, social, psychological and other modern issues in their novels. There are immigrant authors like Salman Rushdie (India), V.S. Naipaul (Trinidad), Kazuo Ishigura (Japan) and many others.
The contribution of women novelists: The novel of manners ‘Evelina’ by Frances Burney, Gothic novels by Ann Radcliffe, a novel based on Science of the age ‘Frankenstein’ by Mary Shelley are landmark novels. Jane Austen has been ruling over the minds of the people through her novels. Bronte sisters Emily and Charlotte have created their own place by their incomparable works ‘The Wuthering Heights’ and ‘Jane Eyre’. Mary Ann Evans alias George Eliot wrote the novels reflecting psychological insight. Virginia Woolf is the pioneer of the Stream of Consciousness technique in English novel. Agatha Christie created her own place by writing many novels based on crime. Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple are the evergreen detectives created by her. Harper Lee, Margaret Atwood, Toni Morrison and Alice Walker have elevated the tradition further to prosperity.
Indian Scenario :
‘Rajmohan’s Wife’, by Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyaya serialized in ‘The Indian Field’ is the first novel in English written by an Indian.
Mulkraj Anand, R.K. Narayan and Raja Rao were the major trio who prevailed in the period after that.
Novelists like Anita Desai, Nayantara Sahgal and Arun Joshi and Manohar Malgaonkar uplifted and revolutionized Indian English novel through their works.
Amitav Ghosh, Vikram Seth and Upamanyu Chatterjee ameliorated the Indian novel in English by adding new features to it. Recent years have witnessed the dazzling performance by Indian novelists like Salman Rushdie, Arvind Adiga, Arundhati Roy, Kiran Desai and Kiran Nagarkar. The tradition of Indian English novel, since its inception, has registered a marked shift exhibiting global concerns.
Novella:
Novella, the word originated from the Italian word ‘novelle’, is a type of narrative prose fiction which is shorter than a full length novel and longer than a short story. It is a short narrative, often satiric or realistic in tone. It usually focuses on one incident or issue with one or two main characters and takes place at a single tradition. Some of the famous novellas in English are –
• ‘The Heart of Darkness’ by Joseph Conrad
• ‘The Turn of the Screw’ by Henry James
• ‘Billy Budd’ by Hermann Melville
• ‘Death in Venice’ by Thomas Mann
• ‘Seize The Day’ by Saul Bellow
• ‘Pearl’ by John Steinbeck
Elements of Novel/ Novella
There are six elements essential of ‘Novel’ or “Novella’.
1. Theme
2. Plot
3. Character
4. Setting
5. Conflict
6. Language / Style:
Types of Novel
1. Realistic Novel
2. Picaresque Novel:
The word ‘picaresque’ is originated from the Spanish word ‘picaro,’ which means a rogue.
3. Historical Novel:
4. Epistolary Novel:
The word ‘epistolary’ derives from the Latin word ‘epistola,’ which means a letter. The epistolary novel is that in which the writer presents the narrative through a series of correspondence or other documents.
5. Gothic Novel:
The novels that include terror, mystery, horror, thriller, supernatural, doom, death or decay or haunted buildings are called the Gothic novels.
6. Autobiographical Novel
7. Allegorical Novel
8. Utopian/ Dystopian Novel:
Utopia is an imaginary community or society possessing the ideal qualities.
9. Psychological Novel
10. Stream of Consciousness Novel:
Stream of consciousness is a phrase coined by William James in his treatise ‘Principles of Psychology.’ (1890).
11. ‘Bildungsroman’ Novel:
The German word ‘bildungsroman’ indicates growth.
In the first half of the 20th century a cult of ‘pulp magazines’ became popular in which fantastic fiction for the general entertainment of the masses was printed on the cheap pulp paper. The pulp fiction era provided a building ground for the detective novels and science fiction.
Science fiction is a genre of speculative fiction dealing with imaginative concepts such as futuristic setting, futuristic science and technology, space travel, time travel, parallel universes and extraterrestrial life. Science fiction often explores the potential consequences of scientific and other innovations. ‘Frankenstein’ by Mary Shelly (1823) is considered the first novel based on science and technology. The genre flourished in the second half of the 19th century
Detective fiction is a subgenre of crime fiction and mystery fiction in which an investigator or a detective-either professional or amateur-investigates a crime, often a murder.