Henry Fielding received some criticism for romanticizing a common criminal in his novel The History of the Life of the Late Jonathan Wild the Great. Based on the career of a well-known criminal executed earlier in the 18th century, the novel is meant to be a satire, although some readers, including Sir Walter Scott, did not see it as such.

Fielding’s shaping of Wild, with his wonderfully ironic name, as protagonist took to task society’s penchant for characterizing actions out of control as “great” or heroic, particularly those of government officials.

The real Wild, born about 1682 and executed in 1725, was not a robber in the common sense but rather a receiver of stolen goods. He would return the stolen property to its rightful owners, charging them the “ransom” he had paid. His habit of sacrificing his underlings whenever he felt in danger of the law marked him as especially despised, even by his own followers.

His execution for theft came under a law providing that those who received stolen goods were equally guilty as those who originally stole them. Fielding decried the acceptance of influence regardless of motive prevalent among society, particularly in its elected officials, with Sir Robert Walpole his real-life target.

Although the title “prime minister” did not yet exist, Walpole was later commonly considered the first prime minister of England. He solidified the Whig Party— influencing domestic and foreign policy of England through his persuasive power with Parliament, which approved of his low-taxation approach. However, his policy led to a war with Spain over trade in 1742, disgusting many of his devotees, who expressed indignation over Walpole’s own profiting through war.

Adding his usual commentary to his tale, Fielding notes that his novel is not meant to be a true history of Wild, but rather that he presents actions Wild might have taken. Almost from the moment of his baptism by Titus Oates, Wild lives up to his surname, behaving in an unacceptable manner.

He goes to work in a sponging house run by its warden, Snap, where debtors were interrogated and detained before their imprisonment. There he learns extortion as if from a schoolbook, accepting graft and exploitation as a creed.

Later, as a gang leader, Wild demands the majority of the gang’s profits, exposing any disagreeing members to the law. His unquestioned leadership leads to the gain of enormous wealth and power. Wild puts that power to use to ruin a good man, his one-time schoolmate, now a jeweler named Heartfree, characterized in contrast to Wild as foolish and “low.”

Heartfree’s name symbolizes his personality, as does his employment as a jeweler, dealing with goods whose value never vacillates. After robbing Heartfree, Wild manipulates his arrest and imprisonment as a debtor, forcing him to declare bankruptcy. He also tricks his wife into leaving the country, and then accuses Heartfree of her supposed murder when she turns up “missing.”

Wild also marries Snap’s daughter Laetitia, whose hypocrisy well matches his own. Theirs will not be a happy marriage, and they soon separate, as Wild predictably becomes unfaithful.

The novel concludes with Wild’s exposure as a criminal and Heartfree’s release, allowing Fielding’s emphasis on the difference between the eventual rewards of fabricated “greatness” versus those of true “goodness.” As Wild is escorted to his execution, the populace declares him a “great man” and their “hero,” ignoring the harm his actions have inflicted on scores of innocents. His hanging becomes the high point of a great career, martyring Wild as a man of the people.

Daniel Defoe had also written about Jonathan Wild, but not in Fielding’s satirical manner. Fielding succeeded in exposing the misconception of hypocrisy and greed as aspects of greatness. Compared to works by renowned satirist Jonathan Swift for its grave and engaging tone, the novel succeeds in demonstrating how truth can be tainted in the service of so-called great men.

Fielding not only aimed his barbs at well-known political figures of the Whig Party, for whom he had developed a deep disgust, but also at the public’s interest in books passing as pseudo-biographies about criminals, which would later be labeled Newgate Fiction, after an infamous prison.

More important, he targeted society’s tendency to find success admirable, regardless of the immorality of the individual considered successful.

Fielding detested aggrandizement and self-inflation in any individual, but especially in politicians who he felt owed their constituency a measure of honest effort. He skillfully projects this attitude in his development of the parallel between a common criminal and a popular politician.

Published as part of Fielding’s Miscellanies, Jonathan Wild predicted his extraordinary talent and brilliant writing career. Celebrated centuries later as a magnificent example of sustained irony, the novel is readily available in electronic as well as printed text.

Bibliography

Maynadier, G. H. Introduction to The History of the Life of the Late Mr. Jonathan Wild the Great, by Henry Fielding. Project Gutenberg. Available online. URL: http://ibiblio.org/gutenberg/etext04/thllm10.txt. Downloaded on August 31, 2024.

Categories: British Literature, Literature, Novel Analysis

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