5.1–Introduction

What is a novel? The question is always harder to answer than you might think. Is it a long book? Is it fiction? Does it have pictures? The most common definition of a novel is that it is a long work of prose fiction in which the characters have complex inner lives. In other words, a novel:

• tells an imaginary story that is longer than a novella or short story
• isn’t written in verse like a poem or in a script like a play,
• presents characters who have their own thoughts and feelings.

Novels tell larger, more complex stories, delve more deeply into their characters, and develop more detailed and realistic worlds than any other written form. The beauty of the novel is that writers have the space to really see their ideas through to the end.

A Brief History of the Western Novel

As early as first-century Greece, writers were composing long works of prose fiction. These Ancient Greek stories, such as Longus’s Daphnis et Chloe (~1000 AD), were about grand legendary events like national conquests, epic romances, and slaying monsters. However, those stories, though they were long and fictional (and though they are sometimes called Ancient Greek Novels), aren’t really considered to be true novels as we use the word today because of how the characters are portrayed. Those heroes and heroines are brave and strong and beautiful, designed to inspire readers to admire and emulate them. Yet their stories aren’t considered novels because the authors only tell us what the characters do, not what they think and feel; remember, one of the defining characteristics of the novel is that the characters have complex inner lives.^[1] Instead, most scholars agree that the first true novel was Don Quixote (1615) by Miguel de Cervantes because of its interesting, flawed characters, whose personalities and motivations Cervantes explores in depth. Novels are focused on the individuality of their characters, and though they may often tell stories just as wild and fantastical as an Ancient Greek legend, they strive for verisimilitude (which means an appearance of reality) in how they represent their characters.^[2]

A number of factors came together to help the novel take off as a genre in the early eighteenth century. Before this time, most people could not read or write, writing supplies were expensive and hard to find, and it was difficult to produce a large number of copies of the same book. However, with the arrival of the Industrial Revolution, there was a gradual rise in the standard of living and a growing interest in public education. Furthermore, widespread use of the printing press made it easier and cheaper to print multiple copies of books. Consequently, people were learning to read and write in larger numbers than ever before, and it was now possible for a broad section of the public to purchase the kinds of things they wanted to read. Many of these people wanted to read novels. By the early 1700s, the novel was here to stay. Some famous examples of eighteenth-century novels include Pamela; or Virtue Rewarded (1740) by Samuel Richardson, and Robinson Crusoe (1719) by Daniel Defoe.

In the 19th century, the novel became even easier and cheaper for working people to purchase when writers like Charles Dickens began to publish periodicals such as Household Words. This magazine not only included news stories, educational nonfiction, advertisements, jokes, and poems, but also individual chapters of whatever novels either Dickens himself or his literary acquaintances were writing. Every week, subscribers would eagerly go to pick up their copy of Household Words so they could read the next chapter. Often, families would gather around in the evening and read the chapters aloud together. Novels that were published in this form are called serial novels, and some famous examples include Dickens’s A Tale of Two Cities (1859), Elizabeth Gaskell’s Cranford (1851–1853), and Krupabai Satthianadhan’s Kamala: a Story of Hindu Life (1894), which you will read for this chapter.

In the late 1800s, wood pulp paper (much cheaper than paper made of recycled rags) was invented, and in the early 1900s, new innovations in printing made it easy to produce as many copies of books as customers demanded. A wide variety of genres of novel began to proliferate, including the twentieth-century pulp novel, named after the pulp paper it was printed on. Pulp novels were often serialized in publications like All-Story. If a novel was successful, it could then be reprinted in mass-market paperback form. Early mass-market paperback pulp novels costed ten cents, featured colorful and sensational covers to attract buyers’ attention, and were cut to be the exact size that would fit into the compartments of a cigarette rack, so that potential readers who were waiting at the bus stop or shopping at the convenience store could casually pick one up. The pulp genre has often been looked down upon, but some of the most enduring stories of the twentieth century originated in pulp magazines, such as Edgar Rice Burroughs’s Tarzan of the Apes (1912).

By the mid-twentieth century, print novels began to look essentially like they do today. The widespread use of the internet created new opportunities to expand forms novels can take and distribute books cheaply. For example, in 1971, Michael S. Hart founded Project Gutenberg, an enormous repository of online books in the public domain. The version of Jane Eyre linked to this OER was digitized and made available by this project. Later digital innovations included the invention of the e-reader. The first ever e-reader, the Rocket eBook, never gained widespread popularity, but Amazon was able to successfully introduce their Kindle in 2007. The novel has survived for a long time, and it will undoubtedly continue to change to fit the needs of its readers.

How to Read a Novel for a Class

Though the prose of a novel is often easier for a reader to follow than the verse of a poem or the script of a play, the length of these works can make them challenging to read, particularly in the context of an English class where there are set deadlines. In fact, when the class begins reading a novel, it is not uncommon for the reading assignments to be much longer than they have been for other parts of the course, so be aware that you may have to take more time than you’re used to to get the homework done for your class. However, that doesn’t mean you can’t do it! The key is to plan ahead. Since you know the novel will take longer to read than other works, set aside time in your day to do it. Learn what your personal reading pace is, and don’t sweat it if it’s slower than you would like. A faster reading pace comes with practice.

In addition to the length, another thing that can pose some difficulty to reading a novel for a class is that there are generally a lot more characters than there are in a poem, play, or short story, and you may need to remember them to be able to participate in class discussion or to answer questions on a quiz. If you’re reading a print copy of a book that you purchased, turn to the back blank page (called a flyleaf), and write down the name of each new character and a word or two that remind you of who they are. If you’re reading an eBook or an online resource, jot them down in a notebook or in a document on your device.