The Adventures of Roderick Random
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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"‘All night long my imagination formed a thousand ridiculous expectations: there was so much of knight-errantry in this gentleman’s coming to the relief of a damsel in distress, with whom he immediately became enamoured, that all I had read of love and chivalry recurred to my fancy; and I looked upon myself as a princess in some region of romance, who being delivered from the power of some brutal giant or satyr, by a generous Oroondates, was bound in gratitude, as well as led by inclination, to yield up my affections to him without reserve. In vain did I endeavour to chastise these foolish conceits by reflections more reasonable and severe: the amusing images took full possession of my mind, and my dreams represented my hero sighing at my feet, in the language of a despairing lover."--The Adventures of Roderick Random (1748) by Tobias Smollett |
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The Adventures of Roderick Random (1748) is a picaresque novel by Tobias Smollett. It is partially based on Smollett's experience as a naval-surgeon’s mate in the British Navy, especially during Battle of Cartagena de Indias in 1741. In the preface, Smollett acknowledges the connections of his novel to the two satirical picaresque works he translated into English: Cervantes’ Don Quixote (1605-15) and Alain-René Lesage’s Gil Blas (1715-47)
