University of Virginia Library

III

Taking into account now the full scope of Richardson's revisions after Clarissa was first published, it should be clear that they vary enormously in their length, purpose, function and value. Many of them form patterns of one kind or another; others resist being grouped. Some elaborate with concrete vividness the implications of a brief fictional situation, breathing life into what had been only skeletal. Other changes, even some good ones, merely amplify something already done effectively in the first edition, and these need not have been made. Still others, fairly numerous, are indifferent in their aesthetic effect. These too are unnecessary, for they change single words, small phrases, even whole paragraphs, but without significantly improving (or disfiguring) the original.

There are important differences among the three revised editions. The final one is clearly unique in offering negligible evidence of revision. The second concentrates on myriad smaller refinements in the text, and it must be remembered that nearly all of these changes are retained in the third edition. The second one also contains only 11 revisions that exceed one page, whereas the third has 42 such items, and 6 of these are more than 8 pages. On the other hand, 28 footnotes

enter the second edition, 18 of which specifically evaluate Lovelace's evil and Clarissa's delicacy. They stand as vigorous warnings by an "editor" unwilling to let the narrative framework speak for itself. Two years later, only 7 footnotes were added, none of them addressed to the twin problems that troubled Richardson in 1749.

Even the individual volumes differ in the extent to which they underwent revision. Judging by the clustering of his efforts, Richardson thought his most persistent problems lay in Volumes III and IV. In 1749, he made 67 of his 102 "most material changes" in these volumes, only 35 in Vols. I and II. In 1751, of the 107 changes (of one line or more) also made in the first four volumes, 85 occur in Vols. III and IV, only 22 in I and II. This is not surprising. Volumes III and IV pit Lovelace and Clarissa in frequent close confrontation, requiring a delicate balance between revelation and suspense to keep her rape a surprise. In contrast, their encounters are rare throughout the first two volumes while Clarissa resides at Harlowe Place. After the penknife scene in Vol. V they never meet again.

Despite all the effort Richardson lavished on his two major characters, both still remain flawed in some essentials. His best changes in the heroine isolate her more decisively from her family, they rid her of certain vexing moral blemishes, and they stress her spiritual ascendancy. The least successful merely lengthen the novel, sometimes quite mechanically, with renewed testimonies of her habits, virtues and accomplishments. During more than 200 years, those who (unlike Henry Fielding) have not been moved by her plight, have perhaps wished she were more humanly attractive, e.g. at least sometimes less grave and studied, less ready to argue a point in return, amidst her trials.

Similarly, Richardson never perfectly solved his dilemma with Lovelace. His aristocratic rake stands out as one of the truly unforgettable creations in literature, but at the price of undermining one of Richardson's deepest intentions. Despite several detailed changes, Lovelace never loses his basic power to command fascinated and pleasurable attention, blunting one's sense of his underlying viciousness. The stimulating complexity of his character, and the eloquent appeal of his best traits, are too deeply imbedded in the tightly textured structure of this novel to be changed easily. The further signs of his actions and hopes supplied by Richardson's revisions do not alter their essential direction or aesthetic impact. A major overhauling of Lovelace's beguiling point of view, a thorough reshaping of his basic functions, would be necessary to achieve the delicate balance sought by Richardson between making Lovelace plausibly attractive to someone as clairvoyant

as Clarissa, and rendering him a repulsive villain who incarnates the blandishments of a ruthless world.

Revisions of other characters, taken as a whole, are also mixed in quality. One effective set consists of the touches made to etch the Harlowes' evil more deeply in their characters, and to strengthen their opposition to their daughter. However, some of the individual changes in Anna Howe and Belford merely expand roles previously well developed, and these could certainly have been omitted. On the other hand, a number of expanded scenes between Anna and her mother are finely sparked, augmenting a vein of comic relief amid the stark tone of the novel. A very good start was made in the case of Hickman, but it was never carried to completion beyond Volume II with equal skill.

One asset of the third edition is its improved prose. Philip Stevick recognizes this advantage, but he nonetheless argues that the stylistic confusions of the first edition imitate real letters more authentically: "Writers of letters do not always make their pronoun antecedents perfectly clear. Letters are written in haste, to people one knows. And thus it may be that, although the revised text is better prose, the text in the first edition produces far more successfully the illusion of authentic letters unmediated by a controlling author."[29] The illusion of epistolary spontaneity is undoubtedly achieved by many factors, not the least of which is the author's ability to select and control his material with such precision that only those effects he wants will be secured and others will be excluded. Even though careless haste is sought as an artistic effect, it is not necessarily well imitated by mere carelessness on an author's part, for this is precisely that fine line where art and nature part company.

George Sherburn noted in 1962 that most texts of Clarissa have passages eclectically conflated from different editions, and "Richardson's more complicated sentences seem at times to have influenced even the pressman to attempt clarification by verbal changes."[30] One distinction shared by all the editions revised by Richardson is that some of his most troublesome and puzzling syntax structures are smoothed out. One only regrets that he did not do more, and do it consistently better.

Close study of two versions of one passage from the novel's early pages illustrates in a microcosm many of the typical smaller patterns of change that permeate the novel. The italics are mine:

By adding new prepositions and relative pronouns, and by using conjunctions differently, Richardson achieves much more control of his fiction. The pronoun "him," introduced in the phrase "him and them," unequivocally differentiates Lovelace from the uncles; and the three substitutions of "Mr. Lovelace" for pronouns emphasize his unique identity and association with the speaker (Clarissa) early in the first volume. The exchange of "Mother"-"Father" for the intimate terms of endearment "Mamma"-"Papa" establishes a more formal relationship between Clarissa and her parents, preparing us for the developing rift between them.

The restructuring of the sentences in the paragraph reflects small shifts in the way character and event are unfolded. One motive for Lovelace's decision to remain in the room (his desire to see Clarissa) is deleted from the second edition, leaving only his heated demand for reparation from Clarissa's uncles. This delays disclosure of his concern for her until the dramatic last line, when he abruptly departs upon learning of her illness. The setting is now specified concretely as "the great parlour," and the scene between the struggling parents is more vividly developed.

With respect to the question of Richardson's final intentions, I do not agree with Kinkead-Weekes that the third edition does not represent them accurately, allegedly because it was revised to answer charges from a hostile audience. Clearly some important changes were spurred by critics after the first and second installments of his first edition came out. One can safely put in this category the editorial footnotes which unmask Lovelace and defend Clarissa, as well as certain other changes discussed by the author himself in his expanded Postscript to

the third edition, e.g. those concerning Hickman. Important as they are however, they constitute only a fraction of his extensive attempts to reshape Clarissa.

Nor can we be sure that even the most heavy-handed revisions were not part of Richardson's initial scheme (i.e. integral to his original intentions for this novel), whether or not they are aesthetically satisfying. Eaves and Kimpel claim that Richardson was already at work blackening his rake in the manuscript stage.[31] This is confirmed by a letter he wrote to Aaron Hill on October 29, 1746, a full year and 3 months before publication of the first two volumes: "Lovelace's Character I intend to be unamiable, as I hinted: I once read to a young Lady Part of his Character, and then his End; and upon her pitying him and wishing he had been rather made a Penitent, than to be killed, I made him still more and more odious, by his heighten'd Arrogance and Triumph, as well as by vile Actions, leaving only some Qualities in him, laudable enough to justify her first liking."[32]

Clearly the author tested the effects of his novel inductively, and he altered it as discoveries emerged, long before any publication. Apparently he also cut out many other original passages, for Eaves and Kimpel have concluded "that there were a good many more of Lovelace's and Clarissa's letters given in full in the earlier version than in the final one . . ."[33] though they are careful to point out that only three passages can be identified with any certainty as restored in 1751 from any manuscript antedating the first edition.[34] Of the three restorations they establish, at least two are notably poor in art: one letter from Lovelace, planning to abduct and rape Anna and Mrs. Howe—a scheme so wild and gross that it seems far-fetched even for him; two letters from Elias Brand that become tedious due to their excessive length, defeating their comic intent.

Richardson's decision to restore certain passages probably only reaffirmed his earlier judgments that they belonged there in the first place, and that he had erred in removing them to scale down his novel's burgeoning length. It is almost impossible to tell from internal evidence alone which additions were newly written in 1751, and which ones were truly restored as part of his original conception. In summary, Richardson's original and final intentions, and the sensitivity of his contemporaries, may not be entirely at odds. His critics may well have

convinced him that his initial instincts regarding Lovelace were sound, and that only a very evil genius could powerfully test Clarissa's soul. From this perspective, the problem of final intentions is more subtle than is suggested by Kinkead-Weekes' argument on behalf of the first edition.

If the third edition, with all its gains and losses, does represent its author's final intentions, why consider any other as the basis for a new printing? The answer to this question will depend upon the nature of the audience to be served. Since the fourth edition contributes almost nothing to the novel, and the second consists of only the first four volumes, an editor choosing a copy text has only two basic options: between the original and the third editions. Unfortunately, each compromises some desirable features of the other, and the length of Clarissa makes it impractical to preserve both of them completely in a double column version.

Intertwined with the difficult problem of a definitive text is another very fundamental question arising from our basic reason for reading Clarissa at all, namely, which edition is aesthetically more satisfying? One advantage of the first edition is that it is a whole volume shorter. A certain magnitude or length is necessary to make us feel pained by Clarissa's suffering, and to dispose us to value her death as more desirable than continued life. But it is doubtful whether the general quality of the new material outweighs the drawback of prolonging a novel that needs pruning more than amplification. Secondly, while it is true that the writing is more pointed and polished in the third edition, more sublime as befits the novel's tragic end, one can exaggerate even this gain in a work as dense as Clarissa. There may well be some loss in freshness too, though this is hard to estimate. For many, the third edition is distressing in its more obvious didacticism, whereas the first reduces the instances where this occurs. Unhappily, it is not possible to accomplish such reduction without sacrificing something worthwhile, unless one puts together an eclectic text. This last seems to be Kinkead-Weekes' conclusion, though he backs off from stating it emphatically.

An eclectic text would not necessarily give scholars the best of Richardson. It would risk losing both the purity of the first edition and the completeness of the third, replacing each with something that has the merits of neither. Too many important decisions would depend upon the critical assumptions and taste of a modern editor, even a very good one. Moreover it is difficult to anticipate how future generations might value certain passages. For example will the lines judged to be unacceptable today displease tomorrow? Even if one did excise the

passages which blacken Lovelace the most (e.g. the editorial footnotes), what about all those hundreds of other changes, both large and small, that are neither good nor bad, yet belong to the total canon of Richardson's revisions?

For those who consider the third edition too didactic for a popular version, the first still offers a genuine alternative. It should be available for anyone who wishes to use it, bringing Clarissa to readers in its most original printed form. It is a well printed text, and it possesses some other attractive features of its own. There now is an abridged version of it on the market; it would be useful to have a complete one available.

Nonetheless scholars should never be satisfied with anything less than a complete record of Richardson's art. His efforts to revise Clarissa are so varied and voluminous, so reflective of his inventive strengths and weaknesses, so much a part of his own peculiar genius for delving into the heart's recesses in homage to moral norms, they deserve detailed attention. Any critical edition which excluded all this testimony from an apparatus would deprive scholars of one of the richest sources of evidence that can stimulate a more exact understanding of this novel, of Richardson's creative talent, and of his role in the development of the novel form. No matter how ambivalent one might feel about the exact merit of certain revisions or patterns of revision, it would be a disservice to deprive future generations of the opportunity to judge Richardson's art fully and afresh.