Internalization In The Female Quixote And David Copperfield

“Internalization in The Female Quixote and David Copperfield” The Female Quixote, or The Adventures of Arabella, by Charlotte Lennox, and David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens, are both early forms of the novel. Though written approximately 100 years apart the two novels are both influential in their respective periods of authorship. Arabella, as the novel will be referred to henceforth, is influential because of its examination of the novel as a newer form and its parody of the former popularity of romanticism. David Copperfield was, and still is, influential due to Dickens’ mastery of the novel as a genre as well as the novels acute representation of Victorian society, and its criticism of that society. Rather than focus on their contemporary influence the following will attempt to point out how the novels utilize two devices of literature, character development and social criticism, as a measure of the novel’s genre progression between the 100 years span of their authorship. The reason for analyzing these two formal devices is that as the novel genre grows character development and social criticism will become …show more content…
The difference between the two shows how much more incorporated literary devices become in the novel’s development. Dickens’ internalizes character development much better than Lennox, granted, he had 100 years evolution in the novel genre to learn from. The similarities of the novels reside with social criticism; crucial female characters represent the lack of liberty in society, and are internalized as part of the linear plot line within both novels. Despite the popularity of David Copperfield, in comparison to The Female Quixote, or, The Adventures of Arabella, both are important texts that illustrate a progression of the novel from its early stages to its middle stages, and together, establish an arc of progression that continues in many novels