8/3/2019 It is Very Rare That Early English Literature Presents Us With a Memorable Heroine

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It is very rare that early English literature presents us with a memorable heroine. With theexception of Shakespeare and a couple of others, truly exceptional female characters werefew and far between, until women themselves started writing with more frequency duringthe eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. However, Daniel Defoe's Moll Flanders presents aheroine who is intelligent, resourceful, and capable.

A Rare Literary Heroine:Moll Flanders

In many ways, Moll Flanders is very much a product of its times. When the book waspublished in 1722, it was customary for novels to preach moral values to their audiences--which were, of course, primarily women. For example, in Samuel Richardson's Pamela, ayoung servant girl finds herself pursued by her master. In refusing his sexual advances, sheis rewarded by his eventual proposal of marriage. A later example, Susannah Rowson's 1828novel,Charlotte Temple, demonstrated to young ladies what happens to those who didn'tpreserve their virtue.

Although Moll is a much more engaging character than the priggish Pamela or the insipidCharlotte,Moll Flanders does not depart much from the moralizing fiction of the era. Atalmost every new turn of Moll's fate, the heroine takes great care to point out her

wrongdoings and failings, and how she could have avoided them. She also makes sure thatthe reader is aware when she has sacrificed her own comfort by behaving rashly, and howshe could have improved her circumstances had she taken a different path. SometimesMoll's moralizing lasts only a few lines, but more frequently it continues on for paragraphs oreven pages, as she drives her point home.

Despite the sermonizing quality ofMoll Flanders, however, the heroine's narration paints acharacter of strength and humanity. Unlike Richardson's character Pamela, Moll has manyimperfections. She is so loose with her virtue that she succeeded in shocking manyeighteenth- and nineteenth-century readers. However, whereas Rowson's Charlotte ishelpless when she finds herself abandoned, and subsequently dies from the grief of losingher virtue, Moll finds an answer to every predicament she encounters--whether honest ornot.

Indeed, one of the most enduring aspects of Moll's character is her human weakness,combined with her determination to survive at all costs. The novel covers some sixty years:from Moll's birth into poverty and her subsequent separation from her mother, to therelative peace and quiet she eventually finds. During this period, her fortunes rise and fall anumber of times. She marries five men, some of them while she is still legally married toanother, has three separate lovers, and gives birth to nearly a dozen children all as aresult of her scheming to become a gentlewoman and prevent herself from falling intodestitution. During the last part of the novel, when Moll is too old to attract the attention ofmen any longer, she turns to petty theft to survive, and narrowly escapes being executedwhen she is finally caught.

An Enduring Legacy: Moll Flanders

Yet for all Moll's faults--and, according to society's standards in those days, they are many--

the reader cannot help but sympathize with her. Defoe paints a vivid picture of the plightwomen without wealth faced during those times: dependent on the protection of men, yetoften unable to interest a man except with a promise of wealth. We quickly come tounderstand that Moll has no choice but to scheme and sin in order to survive. We even cometo admire her perseverance and intelligence in the face of every new predicament.

When Daniel Defoe wrote Moll Flanders, he created a character that was rich inimperfections as well as more admirable attributes--in other words, a character that wastrue to human nature. Moll's story is both an adventure and a confession, and as such hasendeared her to readers spanning four centuries. Indeed, the endurance ofMoll

8/3/2019 It is Very Rare That Early English Literature Presents Us With a Memorable Heroine

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Flanders over the years has proven Moll's ability to survive, not just in the pages of thenovel, but also in the hearts of her readers.