While reading Shamela, I keep returning to the idea of context. It is hard to relate to Pamela’s idea of virtue as an ideal to be preserved but, then again, it is difficult relating to my mother on the same issue and she is only one generation removed. Shamela is enjoyable as a satire, a relief after the long and repetitive letters of Pamela. Fielding plays well on the stylized writing of Richardson and turns Pamela’s qualities of virtue into shameless plays at advancement. The twist on the peripheral characters is entertaining. However, Shamela is portrayed as one-dimensional and all those around her as brainless twits. Fielding attempts to make Pamela appear as an unrealistic character, but Shamela is much more improbable. Even when disagreeing or not understanding Pamela’s motivations, the reader must acknowledge the depth and complexity of the forces that drive her. Most of what compels her to act is subconscious and, this alone, makes it more realistic. The motives that drive most people are veiled.
A parent in my neighborhood went to Thailand on business and brought his two-year-old son and wife. On three separate occasions, while pushing his son in his stroller, concerned strangers asked him what was wrong with his son’s legs. The idea of a child of that age needing to be assisted in moving around was unfamiliar. In our culture, whether for the parent’s convenience or the belief that a small child is incapable, it is perfectly acceptable to roll a two year old from place to place. This story keeps coming to mind as I consider the Pamela/Shamela conundrum. It is a story that serves to remind me how humans process information differently based on many abstract factors. I enjoyed the satire of Shamela but I found the emotional intricacy of Pamela affords a more compelling journey.
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I agree with you that the characters in Shamela were all one-dimensional. It was this reason that I prefer Pamela. There is so much complexity in her character, and so much in what she says (and doesn't say) to her parents.
What you say about context and complexity are very on point, but brings another point to mind: we especially value that complexity; that complexity is at the heart of the appeal of the British novel. Richardson deserves huge credit for creating such complex characters and creating an audience that valued them. THAT BEING SAID, Richardson himself was conflicted over where the value in his novels lay, and that conflict plays out in their reception, as we saw from the way he edited Pamela to make her seem more genteel. Many readers would have said the only possible value of the books was as a moral lesson. In revising all of his books, Richardson tended to cut out those moments when his heroines seem especially conflicted, in order to make them seem more like moral paragons. He was justified to a degree because hostile readers like Fielding tended to take those moments of conflict as evidence of their hypocrisy. In terms of Pamela, the question is: is the final third of the novel compatible with what came before or does he take away with one hand what he gave with the other?
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