Nicholas Hudson – författare

Although there are many books on Johnson's moral and religious thought, none has provided a detailed analysis of his relationship with the ethics and theology of the eighteenth century. This study fills the gap, examining the background to Johnson's views on a wide range of issues debated by the philosophers and divines of his age. Avoiding deceptive generalizations concerning the overall character of the century, Nicholas Hudson emphasizes the ambivalence and contradiction inherent in the orthodoxy which Johnson espoused. Yet this book also challenges the assumption that Johnson's religious beliefs were unstable and filled with anxiety. Whatever the weakness of his positions, he gleaned strength and confidence from the belief that he upheld an eminent tradition in Christian philosophy.

The Long Rise of the British Novel, 1660–1800 offers a fresh interpretation of how the novel in Britain evolved from the Civil War to the end of the eighteenth century. It argues that we must examine the entirety of this period in order to understand the development of the realist novel in its modern form. According to Ian Watt in The Rise of the Novel (1957) and many subsequent critics, the first realist novel was Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe (1719). This book argues instead that the realist novel began to emerge long before in the 1670s and 1680s among novelists such as Alexander Oldys and Richard Gibbs who were influenced by the French counter-romance works of Paul Scarron and Antoine Furtière. Nonetheless, the true founder of modern realist fiction was Frances Burney, particularly in Cecilia (1782) and Camilla (1796). Burney's achievement was to combine the subjectivity of Samuel Richardson with the social purview of Henry Fielding, creating a fictional style that set individuals in a fully imagined social context. Heralded by her contemporaries as founding a "new era" in novel writing, Burney's only acknowledged peer was Charlotte Smith, who was widely admired during her career as Burney's co-creator of "the new species of writing." This volume argues that Smith's contribution to the development of the realist novel has been underrated, for her fiction established the basic form of the Condition of England novel of the Victorian period. Unfortunately, Burney's and Smith's importance as co-creators of the realist novel was eclipsed by the “great forgetting” of woman novelists during the nineteenth century. Only Jane Austen was spared from this great forgetting, yet she was indebted to the work of Burney and Smith. The Long Rise of the British Novel, 1660–1800 traces the emergence of realist fiction decade by decade across the long eighteenth century through the lens of contemporary commentary in literary journals and other sources. The book concludes with discussion of how the techniques of the realist novel, as pioneered in the late eighteenth century, were carried on by major novelists from the Victorian period to the present.

The history of dining is a story that cannot be told without archaeology. Surviving texts describe the opulent banquets of Rome’s wealthy elite but give little attention to the simpler, more intimate social gatherings of domestic invitation dinners. The lower classes, in particular, are largely ignored by literary sources. We can, however, find the voices of the underprivileged by turning to the material detritus of ancient cultures that reflects their social history. Dining at the End of Antiquity brings together the material culture and literary traditions of Romans at the table to reimagine dining culture as an integral part of Roman social order. Through a careful analysis of the tools and equipment of dining, Nicholas Hudson uncovers significant changes to the way different classes came together to share food and wine between the fourth and sixth centuries. Reconstructing the practices of Roman dining culture, Hudson explores the depths of new social distances between the powerful and the dependent at the end of antiquity.

Writing and European Thought 1600-1830 argues for the central importance of writing to conceptions of language, technological progress, and Western civilization during the early modern era. Attitudes to the written language changed radically between the late Renaissance and Romanticism, and Nicholas Hudson traces the development of thought about language during this period, challenging some central assumptions of modern historical scholarship. He asserts that European thinkers have not been uniformly 'logocentric', and he questions the assumption that the rise of print and literacy produced a more visually oriented culture. Through detailed readings of major writers, Hudson shows how writing became the emblem of the superiority of European culture, and how, with the expansion of print culture, European intellectuals became more aware of the virtues of 'orality' and the deficiencies of literate society.

Samuel Johnson, one of the most renowned authors of the eighteenth century, became virtually a symbol of English national identity in the century following his death in 1784. In Samuel Johnson and the Making of Modern England Nicholas Hudson argues that Johnson not only came to personify English cultural identity but did much to shape it. Hudson examines his contribution to the creation of the modern English identity, approaching Johnson's writing and conversation from scarcely explored directions of cultural criticism - class politics, feminism, party politics, the public sphere, nationalism and imperialism. Hudson charts the career of an author who rose from obscurity to fame during precisely the period that England became the dominant ideological force in the Western world. In exploring the relations between Johnson's career and the development of England's modern national identity, Hudson develops provocative arguments concerning both Johnson's literary achievement and the nature of English Nationhood.

As the greatest satirist in the English language, Jonathan Swift was both admired and feared in his own time for the power of his writing, and hugely influential on writers who followed him. Swift transformed models such as utopian writing, political pamphleteering and social critique with his dark and uncompromising vision of the human condition, deepening the outlook of contemporaries such as Alexander Pope, and leaving a legacy of Swiftian satire in the work of Hogarth, Fielding, Austen and Beckett, among others. This collection of essays, with its distinguished list of international contributors, centres on Swift, the genres and authors who influenced him, and his impact on satire and satirists from his own time to the twentieth century.

Writing and European Thought 1600-1830 argues for the central importance of writing to conceptions of language, technological progress, and Western civilization during the early modern era. Attitudes to the written language changed radically between the late Renaissance and Romanticism, and Nicholas Hudson traces the development of thought about language during this period, challenging some central assumptions of modern historical scholarship. He asserts that European thinkers have not been uniformly 'logocentric', and he questions the assumption that the rise of print and literacy produced a more visually oriented culture. Through detailed readings of major writers, Hudson shows how writing became the emblem of the superiority of European culture, and how, with the expansion of print culture, European intellectuals became more aware of the virtues of 'orality' and the deficiencies of literate society.

Samuel Johnson, one of the most renowned authors of the eighteenth century, became virtually a symbol of English national identity in the century following his death in 1784. In Samuel Johnson and the Making of Modern England Nicholas Hudson argues that Johnson not only came to personify English cultural identity but did much to shape it. Hudson examines his contribution to the creation of the modern English identity, approaching Johnson's writing and conversation from scarcely explored directions of cultural criticism - class politics, feminism, party politics, the public sphere, nationalism and imperialism. Hudson charts the career of an author who rose from obscurity to fame during precisely the period that England became the dominant ideological force in the Western world. In exploring the relations between Johnson's career and the development of England's modern national identity, Hudson develops provocative arguments concerning both Johnson's literary achievement and the nature of English Nationhood.

As the greatest satirist in the English language, Jonathan Swift was both admired and feared in his own time for the power of his writing, and hugely influential on writers who followed him. Swift transformed models such as utopian writing, political pamphleteering and social critique with his dark and uncompromising vision of the human condition, deepening the outlook of contemporaries such as Alexander Pope, and leaving a legacy of Swiftian satire in the work of Hogarth, Fielding, Austen and Beckett, among others. This collection of essays, with its distinguished list of international contributors, centres on Swift, the genres and authors who influenced him, and his impact on satire and satirists from his own time to the twentieth century.

Johnson rose from obscure origins to become a major literary figure of the eighteenth century. Through a detailed survey of his major works and political journalism, Hudson constructs a complex picture of Johnson as a moralist forced to accept the realistic nature of politics during an era of revolutionary transition.

The period between the 16th and 18th centuries witnessed the expansion of European travel, trade and colonization around the globe, resulting in greatly increased contact between Westerners and peoples throughout the rest of the world. With the rise of print and the commercial book market, Europeans avidly consumed reports of the outside world and its various peoples, often in distorted or fictional forms. With the consolidation of new empirical science and taxonomy, prejudice against peoples of different colours and cultures during the 16th and 17th centuries became more systematic, giving rise to the doctrines of race ‘science.’ Although humanitarianism and the idea of human rights also flourished, inspiring the campaign to abolish the slave trade, this movement did not hinder imperialist expansion and the belief that humans could be ranked in a hierarchy that authorized White domination. The essays in this volume trace the complex pattern of intellectual and cultural change from popular bigotry in the Age of Shakespeare to the racial categories developed in the works of Buffon and Kant. These essays also link changes in racial thinking to other trends during this age. The development of modern ideas of race corresponded with emerging conceptions of the nation state; new acceptance of religious diversity became linked with speculations on racial diversity; transforming ideologies of gender and sexuality overlapped in crucial ways with developing racial attitudes. In many ways, the period between the Reformation and Enlightenment laid the foundations for modern racial thinking, generating issues and conflicts that still haunt us today.

The period between the 16th and 18th centuries witnessed the expansion of European travel, trade and colonization around the globe, resulting in greatly increased contact between Westerners and peoples throughout the rest of the world. With the rise of print and the commercial book market, Europeans avidly consumed reports of the outside world and its various peoples, often in distorted or fictional forms. With the consolidation of new empirical science and taxonomy, prejudice against peoples of different colours and cultures during the 16th and 17th centuries became more systematic, giving rise to the doctrines of race ‘science.’ Although humanitarianism and the idea of human rights also flourished, inspiring the campaign to abolish the slave trade, this movement did not hinder imperialist expansion and the belief that humans could be ranked in a hierarchy that authorized White domination. The essays in this volume trace the complex pattern of intellectual and cultural change from popular bigotry in the Age of Shakespeare to the racial categories developed in the works of Buffon and Kant. These essays also link changes in racial thinking to other trends during this age. The development of modern ideas of race corresponded with emerging conceptions of the nation state; new acceptance of religious diversity became linked with speculations on racial diversity; transforming ideologies of gender and sexuality overlapped in crucial ways with developing racial attitudes. In many ways, the period between the Reformation and Enlightenment laid the foundations for modern racial thinking, generating issues and conflicts that still haunt us today.