Read Aloud the Text Content
This audio was created by Woord's Text to Speech service by content creators from all around the world.
Text Content or SSML code:
Although Sophia and Harriet appear to be making a normal journey to London, they are in fact both fleeing. This vacillation between incarceration and escape is one of the most important themes of the novel—Sophia's existence fluctuates between being locked up and regaining her liberty. Harriet's history, which takes Book XI away from the chief narrative to a secondary plot, likewise tells the story of a woman locked up—albeit by her husband—who manages to escape. Hand in hand with the idea of escape is the idea of pursuit. It is no accident that Western is literally a hunter. The novel also revolves around the pursuit of money. Although Fielding characterizes the lower classes with more leeway and affection than he does the upper classes, he idealizes neither. The landlord in Chapter II of Book XI has so little political integrity that he is willing to defect from being an anti- Jacobite to being a Jacobite in order to earn a financial reward. This motivation is not unlike the motivation of most of the servants in the novel: Captain Blifil falls down dead while musing on how much money he will make out of Allworthy; Black George steals Tom's five hundred pounds; Mrs. Honour deliberates whether or not to accompany Sophia by weighing up the pecuniary advantages; and Partridge becomes Tom's servant in the hopes of being financially rewarded. Fielding does not exempt the upper class characters from this critique, and even criticizes them more for their greed in coveting more money than they already possess.