ABSTRACT
an important early precursor to the novel. Essentially autobiographical, Rivella's story is narrated by Sir Charles Lovemore to a Chevalier d'Aumont, who is an admiring Rivella reader. Like many later novels, the central character is presented as an innocent victim of circumstances-mainly financial-and of prejudice against women. Manley is particularly exercised by the double standard: "If she had been a Man, she had been without Fault: But the Charter of that Sex being much more confin'd than ours, what is not a Crime in Men is scandalous and unpardonable in Woman." In addition to a feminist perspective, the work expresses a kind of cynicism reminiscent of Le Rochefoucauld (whom, indeed, Rivella reads) that contributes to the growing tradition of realism in literature. The world is portrayed as a decidedly unromantic jungle where people operate primarily according to self-interest.
