ABSTRACT
If late-seventeenth- and early-eighteenth-century England's preoccupation with accounting manifested itself in novels of the time, the eighteenth century, as it progressed, saw the genre undergo a transformation in narrative style based in part on extrinsic economic factors. I'm referring here to a shift from one type, or subgenre, of novel to another; specifically, from the picaresque to what I will be calling the "novel of personality." The picaresque seems to represent an older form of narrative in that it charts the search for real property, or land, while the novel of personality charts a newer search for personal property, or material goods. Differing in structure, too, the picaresque depends on numerous interpolated and autonomous stories, while the novel of personality insists - often vehemently - on only one story. Finally, the picaresque is rarely narrated in a female voice, and its use of the first person often belies what is typically a third-person narrative. Conversely, the novel of personality tends to be narrated by a single female subjectivity. The picaresque, in other words, charts the picaro's (or orphan or bastard's) recuperation of an older conception of land-based property, while the novel of personality follows a female protagonist's acquisition of money and material goods.
