WORDS BY Lara Tokar
Today, when someone says they like to read, the first assumption is that they mean novels. Even though non-fiction, poetry, journalism, memoirs, and even plays are still widely read, the primary expectation from a self-proclaimed “reader” is that they read novels. Novels come in all genres and styles. Some are more respected than others; a war novel must be more poignant and intellectually stimulating than a romance, right?
Well, about 300 years ago, this was not the case. The novel was a completely new form. It was indeed popular, but no version of it–romantic, political, historical, satirical–was respected. People would not have openly admitted that they enjoyed reading novels, and if they did, it would not have gathered much regard. Compared to essays, travel writing, epic or lyrical poetry, the novel was simply lowbrow entertainment.
Yet, the novel emerged as a form in the 18th century, grew in popularity, later gained respectability, and took up the cultural position in society as we know it today. I, amongst many other English students, studied the emergence of the novel at university. I took a class I greatly enjoyed, titled ‘Epic into Novel’ which mapped out the shift from epic poetry to the novel in literary dominance in a satisfyingly linear narrative. I was taught Henry Fielding’s Tom Jones as the first fully-realised English novel. The Hidden Histories podcast also highlights Daniel Defoe and Samuel Richardson as other names most commonly associated with the rise of the novel in English classes.¹
I knew that the novel was not respected as a form, and I knew the name of Henry Fielding, who was trying to elevate the novel by comparing it to the epic. An ambitious, respectable goal. What I did not know, however, were the names of the female novelists, who outnumbered by a wide margin their male counterparts. The majority of eighteenth-century novels were written by women. The novel was perceived as a feminine genre (and was therefore disreputable) yet, still, when we tell this story, women are the ones who are left out.
The Art of Printing Emblematically Displayed, a satirical and anonymous print published in the Grub Street Journal on 26th October, 1732.
I did not know that Aphra Behn is credited with writing the first complete English novel, Oronooko, which tells the story of an African prince sold into slavery, handling subject matter that was not “feminine” by the eighteenth-century definition. I had never heard of the name Frances Burney, one of the most successful novelists of the 18th century, an influence on Jane Austen who first wrote the phrase “pride and prejudice” in her second novel Cecilia². I did not know that Eliza Haywood wrote over 50 novels, and edited several periodicals, including The Female Spectator, which was the first periodical written by women for a predominantly female audience³. I did not know that Jane West was the first historical novelist. I had never heard of Hestor Thale, Elizabeth Carter, or Catherine Macauley.
These were all women writing with real ambition and talent, with passion and purpose. They were writing to support their families, to make a name for themselves, to tackle and unpack heavy topics. And this is without mentioning women from lower social classes, of different races and backgrounds, who were not given the chance to take up space in public consciousness as their privileged, white peers were. Or the many who chose to publish anonymously that we have not yet been able to give names to.
From the title page of The Female Spectator, volume 1, 1744. The British Library/Robana via Getty Images
Of course, for those of you familiar with the subject, this may be old news. In the past couple of decades, a lot of work has been done to uncover these forgotten names. To the point where the phenomenon, the systematic erasure of women from the English canon, has a name, ‘The Great Forgetting’, coined by Charles Siskin. Even so, a quick Google search for the English canon, or a quick peruse through the average university or secondary school curriculum, still leaves out these 18th century novelists, who contributed to the birth and the rise of the novel, shaping it into what we know today.
Charles Dickens and William Wordsworth were inspired by Charlotte Smith, yet her works, novels or poetry, are never found next to theirs in popular book stores – there are no Penguin Classics editions of any of her novels, a neglect repeated across many of her female contemporaries’ work. Walter Scott is often recognised as the first historical novelist, despite the many historical novels published by women predating his work, using much of the same names, themes, and images as him. The Hidden Histories podcast puts it eloquently, that men have “built on a foundation of female intellect and female labour.” Similarly, Virginia Woolf once said “all women together ought to let flowers fall upon the tomb of Aphra Behn … for it was she who earned them the right to speak their minds”⁴ highlighting that “masterpieces are not single and solitary births.” Indeed, it is wonderful that eighteenth-century female authorship has inspired other great works, whether written by men or women, but regrettable that these names are rarely acknowledged as major contributors to the rise of the form.
Jane Austen is the one anomaly. With regard to the eighteenth century, the English canon largely makes an exception for Austen. In fact, when researching ‘The Great Forgetting’, many an article is titled with a reference to her, ‘Who were the novelists who really inspired Jane Austen?’ or ‘Mothers of the Novel: The 100 Great Women Writers Before Austen,’ or even the Hidden Histories podcast, whose full title is ‘The Great Forgetting: women writers before Austen.’⁵ Her name, far from being forgotten, is often the one name-dropped with star power. Austen’s admission to the literary canon is reminiscent of what Katha Pollitt called “the Smurfette principle”, the presence of a single female figure in media where the rest of the cast are men, presenting the woman as the anomaly where the men are the norm⁶. Austen is allowed to be remembered as the first and the greatest when the hundreds who have come before her are forgotten. To maintain the status quo, one woman must be permitted in, standing next to all the great men, serving as a reminder that they are the standard and it is unlikely for a woman to be so exceptional. She is included to maintain a structural exclusion, while the names that inspired her or she referenced in her work, such as Ann Radcliffe or Elizabeth Inchbald, are forgotten.
What’s in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other word would smell as sweet
Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, Act II Scene II, lines 43–44
Shakespeare famously asks this in Romeo and Juliet, reminding us that something's essence does not depend on its name. What happens, though, when the name is not changed, only forgotten? When the scent of the rose perfumes the garden air, but we can no longer remember with which flower it started? This is the paradox at the heart of the literary canon; female writers have shaped it, scented it, nourished it. It is thanks to them that we get to breathe it in, but if we do not take the time to search, we do not know who we have to thank for it. Leaving earlier women out of our literary lineage, who were pillars many of the greats stood on, distorts how we understand English literature itself.
The existence of what we call ‘the canon’ today depends on forgetting the female literary ecosystem that made it possible. In fact, calling it ‘forgetting’ is too gentle; it makes it seem too accidental, not to mention calling it ‘the great’ makes it sound complete, even though academics are still doing everything they can to recover what was erased. The truth is, a lot of work is still to be done. As readers, we need to question the canon and read outside it. We need to challenge it. And that begins with naming. Learning the names that were lost. Only then can we begin to let flowers fall on their tomb for shaping English literature as we know it today.
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Lara Tokar holds a BA in English Literature from the University of Warwick and an M.Phil. from Trinity College Dublin. A lifelong reader, she likes to read, annotate, and discuss literature spanning many centuries, genres, and styles. When not reading and writing, she spends her spare time attending concerts and theatre events, following popular culture news, and going on active adventures.