A Chronology and Selected Bibliography are included.ABOUF TIlE SEIRIES:This Norton Critical Edition of Thackeray's acclaimed novel is based upon the text approved by the Modern Language Association. The text is fully annotated and is accompanied bv all of the author's orieinal illustrations as well as a textual appendix.

This Norton Critical Edition of Thackeray's acclaimed novel is based upon the text approved by the Modern Language Association. The text is fully annotated and is accompanied bv all of the author's orieinal illustrations as well as a textual appendix.

"Backgrounds and Contexts" is arranged under three headings."Composition and Publication l listory" combines modern scholarship with contemporary materials to elucidate the novel's composition and publication history and to highlight different aspects of Thackeray's life and work. "Reception" reprints ten contemporary reviews, both published and unpublished, which suggest Vanit Fair's initial reception."Contexts" includes materials relating to governesses, historical novels,the Battle of Waterloo and the military; bankruptcy, regency fashions,and the London landscape, all of which figure prominently in the novel.

"Criticism" collects nine wide-ranging essays that reveal the developing response to Vanitv Fair C. Brownell, David Cecil, G. Armour Craig, John Loofbourow, Peter K. Garrett, Richard Barickman,Susan MacDonald, Myra Stark, Ina Ferris, Catherine Peters, and James Phelan provide their varied perspectives.

A Chronology and Selected Bibliography are included.ABOUF TIlE SEIRIES: Each Norton Critical Edition includes an authoritative text,contextual and source materials, and a wide range of interpretations--from contemporaU perspectives to the most current critical theory--as well as a bibliography and, in many cases, a chronology of the author's life and work.

Preface

The Text of Vanity Fair

Engraved vignette title page

Appendix: Composition and Revision of Chapter VI

Backgrounds and Contexts

 COMPOSITION AND PRODUCTION

 William Makepeace Thackeray·Selected Letters

 To Mrs. Carmichael-Smyth, July 2, 1847

 To the Duke of Devonshire, May 1, 1848

 To Miss Smith, June 6, 1848

 Anne Thackeray Ritchie·[Introduction to Vanity Vair]

 Gordon Ray·[Originals]

 Edgar E Harden·The Discipline and Significance

 of Form in Vanity Fair

 Geoffrey Tillotson·[Philosophy and Narrative

 Technique]

 Peter L. Shillingsburg·The "Trade" of Literature

 RECEPTION

 Robert A. Colby·[Reception Summary]

 [Abraham Hayward]·Thackeray's Writings

 Charlotte Bronte·Selected Letters

 To W. S. Williams, March 29, 1848

 To W. S. Williams, August 14, 1848

 William Makepeace Thackeray·Letter to George Henry

 Lews, March 6, 1848

 [George Henry Lewes]·Review

 [Robert Bell]·Review

 William Makepeace Thackeray·Letter to Robert Bell

 September 3, 1848

 Charlotte Brontfi·Preface to the Second Edition of

 Jane Eyre

 [Elizabeth Rigby]·Review

 CONTEXTS

 A Pretty Fellow·Wanted a Governess, on Handsome

 Terms

 Maria Edgeworth·Female Accomplishments, Etc

 Kathleen Tillotson·[Propriety and the Novel]

 Joan Stevens·Vanity Fair and the London Skyline

 Robert A. Colby·[Victor Cousin and the Foundation

 for an "Edifice of Humanity"]

Criticism

 William C. Brownell·William Makepeace Thackeray

 David Cecil·[A Criticism of Life]

 G. Armour Craig·On the Style of Vanity Fair

 John Loofbourow·Neo-Classical Conventions

 Peter K. Garrett·[Dialogic Form]

 Richard Barickman, Susan MacDonald, and

 Myra Stark·[Politics of Sexuality]

 Ina Ferris·The Narrator of Vanity Fair

 Catherine Peters·[Didacticism]

 James Phelan·Vanity Fair: Listening as a Rhetorician--and a Feminist

CHRONOLOGY

SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY