“A Libament to Your Palate”narrative Form, History and Gender in Eliana. A New Romance

Abstract

Eliana. A New Romance (1661), attributed to Samuel Pordage, not only failed to appeal to its contemporary readership, but also remains one of the most neglected romances of the early Restoration period. In 2007, Amelia Zurcher rescued it from oblivion by exploring the notion of ‘interest’ in two stories within this “more rather than less conventional” romance. In order to introduce it further and, in the process, suggest some of its “less conventional” aspects, this essay will focus, among other issues, on the diegetic and readerly structures, the strategies to reinforce the reliability of both the intradiegetic narrators and the extradiegetic voice, the remarkable combination of fiction and ancient history, the male relationships in the homosocial-homosexual spectrum, and the extolling of friendship as the ideal prototype of love. This essay may ultimately show some of the ways in which young Pordage tried to modernise the art of fiction.