The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia

by Samuel Johnson

Overview

Telling how Rasselas and his companions escape from the bland pleasures of their perfectly happy valley in Abissinia to Egypt, to study how people live, the book is a parable and a pilgrimage in which all manner of subjects are discussed--flying machines, poetry, marriage, madness.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781420966626
Publisher:	Digireads.com Publishing
Publication date:	02/10/2020
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	3 MB

About the Author

Jessica Richard is Associate Professor of English at Wake Forest University.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements
Introduction
Samuel Johnson: A Brief Chronology
A Note on the Text

The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia

Appendix A: Other Writing by Samuel Johnson

1. From Father Jerome Lobo, A Voyage to Abyssinia, translated by Samuel Johnson (1735)
2. The Vanity of Human Wishes (1749)
3. Rambler no. 4 (1750)
4. Rambler no. 204 (1752)
5. Rambler no. 205 (1752)

Appendix B: Contemporary Responses to Rasselas

1. From the Monthly Review (1759)
2. From Sir John Hawkins, The Life of Samuel Johnson, L.L.D. 2nd ed. (1787)
3. From James Boswell, The Life of Samuel Johnson (1791)
4. From Ellis Cornelia Knight, Dinarbas (1790)
5. Elizabeth Pope Whately, The Second Part of the History of Rasselas (1835)

Appendix C: Orientalism in the Eighteenth Century

1. Joseph Addison, The Spectator no. 159 (1711)
2. From Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, The Turkish Embassy Letters (1763)

Select Bibliography

Editorial Reviews

Jessica Richard’s engaging new edition of Rasselas for Broadview provides everything needed to bring into focus the paradoxical nature of Samuel Johnson’s achievement in that slender masterpiece. As this edition makes clear, Johnson penned, against the cultural grain, a willfully anti-exotic ‘Oriental tale.’ Richard highlights the insouciance of such an Oriental tale in which the main characters—Coptic Christians in Africa—reflect with aplomb on the accidental happenstance of northwest Europe’s global ascendance. Through her well-chosen contextual materials, Richard both establishes a background for Rasselas in the conventions of eighteenth-century literary Orientalism and clarifies the manifest singularity of Johnson’s classic novella.” — Clement Hawes, Pennsylvania State University

“The globalization of literary studies has produced fascinating insights into the cultural interactions between Europe and the East, and Europe and the Americas during the eighteenth century. Jessica Richard’s enterprising edition of Johnson’s Rasselas brings out the global interests of this popular tale by placing it firmly in the context of enlightenment Orientalism. It highlights Johnson’s cosmopolitan universalism, for while embracing cultural difference he reverses the Oriental gaze, and uses the conventions of the Oriental tale to historicize his exploration of human desire and happiness. This new Broadview edition offers an excellent introduction to Johnson’s global status.” — Greg Clingham, Bucknell University

From the Publisher

"The globalization of literary studies has produced fascinating insights into the cultural interactions between Europe and the East, and Europe and the Americas during the eighteenth century. Jessica Richard's enterprising edition of Johnson's Rasselas brings out the global interests of this popular tale by placing it firmly in the context of enlightenment Orientalism. It highlights Johnson's cosmopolitan universalism, for while embracing cultural difference he reverses the Oriental gaze, and uses the conventions of the Oriental tale to historicize his exploration of human desire and happiness. This new Broadview edition offers an excellent introduction to Johnson's global status."

Greg Clingham Bucknell University

"Jessica Richard's engaging new edition of Rasselas for Broadview provides everything needed to bring into focus the paradoxical nature of Samuel Johnson's achievement in that slender masterpiece. As this edition makes clear, Johnson penned, against the cultural grain, a willfully anti-exotic 'Oriental tale.' Richard highlights the insouciance of such an Oriental tale in which the main characters—Coptic Christians in Africa—reflect with aplomb on the accidental happenstance of northwest Europe's global ascendance. Through her well-chosen contextual materials, Richard both establishes a background for Rasselas in the conventions of eighteenth-century literary Orientalism and clarifies the manifest singularity of Johnson's classic novella."

Clement Hawes Pennsylvania State University