Значение слова RICHARDSON в Литературной энциклопедии

SAMUEL (1689-1761).-Novelist, _s._ of a joiner, was _b._ at Derby. His _f._ had intended him for the Church, but means failed, and at the age of 17 he went to London, and was apprenticed to a printer. Careful and diligent, he prospered in business, became printer of the Journals of the House of Commons, and in the year before his death purchased the moiety of the patent of King's Printer. He was twice _m._, and each of his wives brought him six children, of whom, however, only four daughters were living at his death. R., who was the originator of the modern novel, did not take seriously to literature until he was past 50 when, in 1740, _Pamela_ appeared. It originated in a proposal by two printers that R. should write a collection of model letters for the use of persons unaccustomed to correspondence, but it soon developed in his hands into a novel in which the story is carried on in the form of a correspondence. With faults and absurdities, it struck a true note of sentiment, and exploded the prevalent idea that dukes and princesses were the only suitable heroes and heroines (Pamela was a maid-servant), and it won immediate and phenomenal popularity. In 1748 _Clarissa Harlow_, his masterpiece, was _pub._, and in 1753 _Sir Charles Grandison_, in which the author embodies his ideal of a Christian gentleman. All these surfer from an elaboration of detail which often becomes tedious; but in deep acquaintance with the motives of conduct, and especially of the workings of the female heart, they are almost unrivalled; their pathos also is genuine and deep. R. had an unusual faculty as the platonic friend and counsellor of women, and was the centre of an admiring circle of the sex, who ministered to a vanity which became somewhat excessive. R. has also the distinction of evoking the genius of Fielding, whose first novel, _Joseph Andrews_, was begun as a skit or parody upon _Pamela_. R. is described as "a stout, rosy, vain, prosy little man." _Life_ by Sir W. Scott in Ballantyne's _Novelists Library_. _Works_ with preface by L. Stephen (12 vols., 1883), etc.