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Concept
Traitté de l'origine des romans
Summary
Pierre Daniel Huet's Trai[t]té de l'origine des Romans (Treatise on the Origin of Novels, or Romances) can claim to be the first history of fiction. It was originally published in 1670 as preface to Marie de la Fayette's novel Zayde. The following will give extended excerpts from the English translation by Stephen Lewis published in 1715. The title page reads:
THE| HISTORY| OF| ROMANCES.| AN| Enquiry into their Original| Instructions for Composing them;| AN| Account of the most Eminent| AUTHORS;| With Characters, and Curious Observations| upon the Best Performances of that Kind.| [rule]| Written in Latin by HUETIUS;| Made English by STEPHEN LEWIS.| [rule]| —juvat integros accedere fontes,| Atque haurire. Lucr.| [rule]| LONDON:| Printed for J. HOOKE, at the Flower-de-luce, and| T. CALDECOTT, at the Sun; both against St.| Dunstan'''s Church in Fleetstreet. 1715.
Pages i-xi gave a preface by Lewis, p.[xii] added “Corrigenda”, p. 1-149 offered the translation under the short title “Original of Romances”.
The excerpt is extensive and it will mainly serve students of literature interested in the scope of questions and the method of arguing the early historian of literature showed—Huet was a modern cultural historian, one could say. (The German parallel page :de:Traitté de l'origine des romans offers a summary of the plot with selected quotes and might be more comprehensive):
TOC
'THERE is not any Speculation, which affords a more agreeable Pleasure to the Mind, than that of beholding from what Obscure and Mean Beginnings, the most Polite and Entertaining Arts have| risen to be the Admiration and Delight of Mankind. To pursue them up to the most abstruse Fountains, and then to view by what Steps they arise to Perfection; does not only excite an Amazement at their Increase; but an Impatient Desire of Inventing some New Subject, to be improv'd and advanc'd by Posterity.
The first Occasion of introducing ROMANCE into the World, was, without Dispute to mollify the Rigour of Precepts, by the Allurements of Example.
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