Friendship and Allegiance in Eighteenth-Century Literature: The Politics of Private Virtue in the Age of Walpole

233 Pages·2013·2.53 MB·English

by  Emrys Jones

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Friendship and Allegiance
in Eighteenth-Century
Literature
The Politics of Private Virtue in the
Age of Walpole
Emrys D. Jones
Lecturer in English, University of Greenwich, UK
© Emrys D. Jones 2013
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Contents
Acknowledgements viii
Introduction 1
Part I Friendship in Crisis
1 Scriblerian Friendship and Public Crisis 21
2 Daniel Defoe and South Sea Friendship 38
3 Lord Hervey and the Limits of Court Whig Pragmatism 53
4 The Friendly Opposition and Public Life in Pope’s
Epistle to Bathurst 69
5 Friendship and the Patriot Prince 83
Part II Friendship by Trope
6 Friendship and Fable 109
7 Friendship and Criminality 141
Epilogue: Friendship and Rural Retreat 166
Notes 172
Bibliography 205
Index 218
vii
Acknowledgements
This book could not have been written without regular advice and
encouragement from an incredibly supportive network of eighteenth-
century scholars at the University of Cambridge. I would especially
like to thank Philip Connell and Lawrence Klein for their belief in this
project and for the generosity with which they have always shared
their time and knowledge. I should also thank many other colleagues
and mentors from Cambridge’s Faculty of English: among them Mina
Gorji, Christopher Tilmouth, Fred Parker, Jennifer Wallace, Stephen
Logan, Peter Newbon, David Taylor, Daniel Cook and Charlotte Roberts.
I am likewise very grateful to all of my colleagues at the University
of Greenwich, and to my students here. It is a true privilege to teach
eighteenth-century literature in buildings designed by Sir Christopher
Wren and alongside such devoted colleagues; this book has benefited
immeasurably from the experience.
Thanks must go to David Fairer and to Palgrave’s anonymous reviewer
for their invaluable responses to the manuscript at various stages of its
development. I am also very grateful to the series editors, Anne Mellor
and Clifford Siskin, and to the editorial team of Paula Kennedy, Ben
Doyle and Sophie Ainscough.
Much of the research upon which this book is based was made
possible by generous support from the University of Cambridge’s Jebb
Fund. I was also the recipient of grants from Peterhouse and from
Cambridge’s Faculty of English for which I am very thankful. My under-
standing of eighteenth-century literature has been enriched through
the visiting f ellowship I held at Yale’s Lewis Walpole Library in 2009; my
thanks go to Maggie Powell and all the other staff of the library for their
friendliness and support. Likewise, I must thank the staff of Cambridge
University Library, the British Library and the Bodleian Library. For
access to the Cholmondeley manuscripts, held at Cambridge University
Library, I thank the Marquess of Cholmondeley.
Chapter 5 of this book has previously appeared in a different form in
Studies in Eighteenth-Century Culture 40 (2011), 157–78. I wish to thank
the editors and reviewers of that periodical for their suggestions, and
the publisher, The Johns Hopkins University Press, for permission to
republish this research in revised form.
viii
Acknowledgements ix
Given that this book is concerned with friendship, it is more than
ordinarily appropriate to acknowledge the many debts I owe to friends
both within academia and beyond. And to the closest friends of all, my
family, I give my greatest thanks: most particularly to my parents, to my
sisters and brother, to Corinne and to this book’s dedicatee.