Recognizing the Romantic Novel

The field of literature changed dramatically at the end of the eighteenth century, as under the shadow of Romanticism the novel became the most important literary genre of its day. Often neglected, the novels of the Romantic era puzzle critics yet are much more concerned with the unexpected, the unconventional, and the uncanny than their immediate predecessors or successors, and their authors include some of the most important novelists of British literary history—Jane Austen, Fanny Burney, James Hogg, Mary Shelley, and Sir Walter Scott, among them. Featuring contributions from distinguished scholars in the field, this timely volume evaluates the vibrancy and centrality of the Romantic novel, showing it can hold its own in the canon of literary scholarship.