Tom Jones: De Lotgevallen Van Een Vondeling

The first great English novel, and still one of the funniest. Henry Fielding's masterpiece follows Tom Jones, a foundling raised by the wealthy and virtuous Mr. Allworthy, as he tumbles through every layer of 18th-century English society. Tom is generous, hot-headed, and sexually prolific; he's also, we come to realize, genuinely good in ways that his respectable critics are not. Fielding gives us a sprawling picaresque adventure: a road trip through Georgian England populated by roguish squires, scheming parsons, seduced milkmaids, and insufferable bluestockings. The comedy is bawdy and sharp, but beneath it lies a serious question: what makes a person virtuous, and does it matter more than birth or breeding? This is a book that invented the English novel and still reads like a revelation.