61 pages • 2 hours read
Tobias SmollettThe Expedition of Humphry Clinker
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1771A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
The Contrast Between Urban and Rural
Throughout the novel, Smollett favorably contrasts rural with urban spaces; rural spaces are associated with health, simplicity, and moral virtue, while urban spaces are associated with sickness, corruption, vanity, and superficiality. This contrast reflects a long tradition of pastoral literature; dating back to Classical times, authors have often celebrated the simplicity and purity of country life. During travels to large towns and the metropolis of London, Matthew is often dissatisfied and even disgusted by the urban world around him; he complains about “every cause of offence that fills up the measure of my aversion to this, and every crowded city” (123). His distaste for urban life is heightened because he contrasts it with his home in the countryside, which he often portrays in idealized terms, establishing a juxtaposition between “town grievances, and my country comforts” (118).
However, while Matthew operates under the traditional assumption that the country is preferable to the city, the text also subtly challenges this assumption by showing other perspectives. Matthew is not entirely reliable, as his point of view is deeply shaped by his biases and preferences; he is also somewhat conservative and grumpy, and he tends to be suspicious of change and novelty. Matthew’s distaste for urban spaces is often linked to these spaces having changed since he last encountered them: for example, he complains that Bath “is so altered, that I can scarce believe it is the same place that I frequented about thirty years ago” (34).
By contrast, younger and more vivacious characters like Lydia tend to be deeply impressed by bustling locales like London and Bath; she marvels at “the wonders of this vast metropolis” (91). Unlike her much older uncle, Lydia is open to new experiences, and not set in her ways; she looks to the future rather than clinging to the past. At the end of the novel, a newly married Lydia returns to Bath, while her bachelor uncle returns to his secluded life in the country; this conclusion might imply that urban spaces are associated with growth, fertility, and the future, while the rural represents a stubborn clinging to outdated ways. By contrasting both urban and rural spaces, and showing the different responses of different characters, Smollett explores and undermines a traditional dichotomy, implying that places can be shaped just as much by perspective as by their objective reality.
Patriarchal Control of Female Desire
Throughout the novel, female characters who openly reveal desires, either for romance and sexuality, or just for more agency over their own lives, are met with suspicion and even viewed as a threat, revealing a patriarchal social order in which men control both their families and society at large. Tabitha is continuously mocked for her flagrant desire to find a husband, and her open displays of desire are presented as immodest and inappropriate. Lydia, based on her observations of her aunt, complains that, “I believe our sex in general make it their business to ensnare the other” (259). While Tabitha is primarily presented as ridiculous for her desperate striving to find a man, she also annoys others by being assertive and opinionated, especially when it comes to the management of the Brambleton Hall estate. Jeremy refers to her as “one of those geniuses who find some diabolical enjoyment in being dreaded and detested by their fellow creatures” (61).
While Tabitha is portrayed as both embarrassingly assertive about her sexuality and generally unpleasant, Lydia is presented as a reflection of 18th-century ideals of femininity: she is modest, affectionate, and demure. Both her brother and her uncle are very fond and protective of her; however, it becomes clear that Jeremy’s affection for his sister is contingent on her maintaining standards of sexual propriety and not consorting with men from lower social classes. Jeremy coldly reports that, “If I thought her capable of carrying on any clandestine correspondence with such a fellow, I should at once discard all tenderness, and forget that she was connected with me by the ties of blood” (312). He is very happy and supportive to learn that Lydia is going to marry a likeable and well-bred young man from a comparable social class, but he also reveals that his love for his sister is contingent on his ability to control her behavior.
While the contrast between Tabitha and Lydia reveals the expectation for women to be passive rather than active about their romantic and sexual desires (Lydia was willing to give up Wilson until fate reunited them), the subplot about Mr. Baynard and his wife reveals a broader mistrust toward women who insist on the life they want. Matthew is horrified with Mrs. Baynard and blames her for all of the family’s suffering, calling her an “unreasonable woman […] who was driving on blindly to her own destruction” (296). This attitude shows that, overall, male characters are unforgiving toward assertive women.
Virtue and Integrity Amid the Lower Classes
Humphry contrasts with most of the other primary characters because he comes from a lower/working class background. When he first encounters the Bramble-Melford family, Humphry is so impoverished that “his looks denoted famine; and the rags that he wore, could hardly conceal what decency requires to be covered” (81). Despite his severe poverty, Humphry immediately and consistently distinguishes himself as kind, modest, loyal, and hard-working. He is deeply loyal to the family who employs him, to the point that he comically attempts to save Matthew’s life when he mistakenly perceives that the older man is drowning in the sea at Scarborough. Later, Humphry actually does save Matthew’s life when the latter plunges into a river during a carriage accident.
Humphry also models a high standard of exemplary behavior to other characters, including other servants, prisoners, and women. He converts female characters (Lydia, Tabitha, and Winifred) to a stricter form of Christianity, and during his time in prison, he influences the behavior of those around him. The jailor ironically complains that due to Humphry’s influence, “here has been nothing but canting and praying since the fellow entered the place […] we han’t sold a cask of beer, nor a dozen of wine” (150). Humphry specifically exercises a positive influence on groups of people who were perceived as being unruly and likely to challenge a stable social structure. Notably, his influence tends to maintain existing power structures, making those individuals more likely to be obedient, docile, and willing to submit to authority. To the middle and upper-class readers who likely would have formed Smollett’s primary audience, Humphry represents a satisfying model of key social values appearing “naturally” within an individual who has not been socialized or educated to exemplify those values.
Humphry’s depiction as a virtuous working-class character may seem to challenge 18th-century social norms that typically presented the lower-classes as potentially disruptive and unruly. However, late in the plot, he is revealed to be the biological son of Matthew Bramble; this revelation significantly complicates his class status. Even though Humphry’s biological origins are unknown to him, this discovery provides a convenient explanation for his seemingly innate nobility. It also implies that nature trumps nurture: Despite growing up without any education, Humphry has seemingly naturally modelled behaviors that would be unexpected given his class background. The representation of working-class virtue actually ends up functioning to reinforce social norms and class distinctions within the novel.
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By Tobias Smollett
