The Expedition of Humphry Clinker

by Tobias Smollett

Book Overview

William Thackeray called it "the most laughable story that has ever been written since the goodly art of novel-writing began." As a group of travellers visit places in England and Scotland, they provide through satire and wit a vivid and detailed picture of the contemporary social and political scene.

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• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0199538980
• ISBN13: 9780199538980
• Release Date: April 2009
• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Length: 400 Pages
• Weight: 0.60 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 5.0" x 7.6"

Customer Reviews

A wonderfully gossipy, humourous novel!

Smollett has written a number of good stories, but this is probably his most complex of all that he's written. The book provides the reader with a hero that is memorable. Smollett provides just the right touch of madness and humour in his hero to make this a very warm, readable story. The format for this novel is letters which makes for an interesting change, and provides a unique way of developing characters. So much of a person's individuality can be found in letters and in fact, letters are a major source of historical information. But in these letters we learn all we need to know about Humphrey Clinker and his England. An unclean and brutal world it was with death, disease and decay. But there was unbelievable love and warmth too. What a journey!

Worth Taking the Time to Read Slowly

Tobias Smollett's 1771 novel, "The Expedition of Humphry Clinker," took me almost two months to read. The novel, a "sort of novel," as Dr. Johnson once said, I think of his own "Rasselas," doesn't really have a plot, which contributes to the pacing, which is slow, but highly enjoyable. From the beginning of April through the end of November, basically from the season of planting through the season of reaping, Squire Bramble, an irascible hypochondriac of a Welshman, and his family engage upon a series of travels which lead them from Wales through England to Scotland and back again. An epistolary novel, "Humphry Clinker" is no stranger in format to the eighteenth century - however, odd to me was the fact that none of the writers - Squire Bramble, his sister Tabitha, their nephew and niece Jery and Lydia Melford, and Tabitha's waiting woman Winifred - ever receives a response. The letters of the Bramble expedition encompass a wide range of topics, along a range of experience and sentiment, of interaction, which itself is a veritable buffet of later eighteenth century customs, coffeehouse culture, civil engineering, agriculture, speech, fashion, science, moral philosophy, art, and manners spanning Wales, England, and Scotland, both in countryside and cityscape.As such, the novel has a number of preoccupations - the social and political relations between different countries which comprised the then-British Empire - English-Scottish relations in particular are a focus, some 71 years after the Act of Union, and were pretty fascinating to me. There are a number of references to America, and to the Native Americans, which the Scot Cadwallader Colden had written of only a few years before in his "History of the Five Indian Nations." England's own internal politics are reflected on throughout the novel. The debate over luxury, a hot eighteenth century topic, is constantly in the background of the Bramble family's letters.The letters of Squire Bramble to his doctor-friend Lewis and Jery Melford's to his college friend Wat Phillips comprise the bulk of the novel, and as with so many epistolary novels, their letters often tell us as much about their circumstances and exploits as they do about the writers themselves. These are both heroes of sensibility, a young and an old whose ages frequently provide interesting takes on the same events. Such can be said about the other writers as well - From the Squire to Jery to Tabitha to Lydia to Winifred - we are given a wealth of perspective and language - valuable lenses all to form our own opinions of the events, such as they are, that transpire in their travels. Their various perspectives on two of the novel's minor characters, the eponymous Humphry Clinker and the combative disputant Scot Obadiah Lismahago (the most cosmopolitan figure among the recurring characters), confer substance, interest, and warmth upon characters who do not themselves write letters. As valuable and entertaining a travelogue as V

A SLICE OF 18TH CENTURY LIFE

Full of social satire. A comedy with pathos. Insightful verbal blunders. This picaresque book of travel letters is a hoot with a most satisfying conclusion as the characters get their come-uppance and rewards. I love the distinct and lively images that shine through the puns, word games, and allusions.

My favorite book ever..and I'm not kidding.

This is a book that I was obligated to purchase for an 18th century lit class. We never got to it on the syllabus, so it collected dust. When I did finally pick it up I couldn't put it down. I laughed out loud frequently. I am amazed at how well it's 18th century humor has stood the test of time. You must commit past the first 50 or so pages to get into the rhythm and style. Then you'll be hooked. Lest you think that this is just a book for English majors with a bent towards the 18th century, I should point out that my other two favorite books are Lonesome Dove and Cryptonomicon.

Time Capsule for the Eighteenth Century

his great novel, written in 1771, is one of those books that is written so much in the present moment of its own time that it becomes a valuable and fascinating time capsule for future generations. There is no more entertaining way to visit another time and place. There is no need for you to come to the novel already knowing anything about the eighteenth century, because Smollett has his sharp observant mind and all five of his senses open to his world for you--here you will read all of the sights, sounds, tastes, touches, and most memorably of all (for better and for worse) the *smells* of what surrounds him. The grumpy-old-man-with-a-heart-of-gold Matthew Bramble takes his family and assorted hangers-on for a tour of Great Britain, visiting Bath, London, and many other places along the way. For lovers of Scotland, you are in for a treat here, as Smollett writes this novel as an important "P.R." job for his homeland to his skeptical English readers. The descriptions of Edinburgh, Glasgow, and the Hebrides make you want to book your airline tickets right away; Smollett has an eye for those aspects of the Scottish landscape and Scottish people that haven't really changed in the last 250 years. This is an epistolary novel, written entirely in the form of letters with no central narrator. The strength of this format is that it allows the reader to see the same places and events from the (sometimes radically different) perspective of more than one person. As a result, you get comedy, tragedy, farce, romance, satire, and a good adventure story all in one enjoyable package. One word of caution, though: because of the epistolary format and the travelogue format, you shouldn't really approach "Humphry Clinker" with the expectations of finding a strong unified plot. This is something that we get mostly from the novels of the late eighteenth century and certainly the Victorian novels of the nineteenth century. There IS a plot--a good one--but just don't expect the plot to be the star of the show. If you read it as a series of memorable and sharply drawn sketches and characters and places, and for how well it captures what is unique to the time and place in which it is written, I think you will enjoy it a great deal.