Narrative and Ideology in Godwin’s Caleb Williams
Kenneth W. Graham, University of Guelph
Volume 2, no. 3, April 1990
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ABSTRACT
1793 and 1794 were years of growing nervousness for British radicals. After 1792 — the “annus mirahilis” that saw the founding of the London Corresponding Society and the rapid growth in membership of societies for political reform — the responses of the government and other supporters of the social order constituted a disturbing backlash. When Godwin completed his final corrections of the first edition of Political Justice in January 1793, John Reeves had founded the anti-reform Association for the Preservation of Liberty and Property against Republicans and Levellers and the gentry had begun to organize their tenants into a yeomanry for purposes of drill and propaganda … The very day that Godwin presented a copy of Political Justice to Chauvelin, the French ambassador was directed to leave the country. Soon Britain and France were at war. When Godwin finished Caleb Williams in late April 1794, the government was about to arrest the officers of the London Corresponding Society, some of whom were Godwin’s friends and all of whom were acquaintances. About this time, Godwin rewrote the ending of his novel. The texts of both endings exist and a comparison of them raises the question: Did Godwin tone down the radicalism of his novel with an ending palatable to political authorities? If not, what motivated the revision?
Other ECF articles on the Topic of “William Godwin” include:
Rewriting Radicalism: Wollstonecraft in Burney’s The Wanderer
by TARA GHOSHAL WALLACE (ECF 24.3, Spring 2012)
“An Outlandish, Foreign-Made Englishman”: Aristocratic Oppression and Ethnic Anomaly in Caleb Williams
by CHARLIE BONDHUS (ECF 23.1, Fall 2010)
“Extraordinary and dangerous powers”: Prisons, Police, and Literature in Godwin’s Caleb Williams
by QUENTIN BAILEY (ECF 22.3, Spring 2010)
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