Forbes Great Books selection. What a fascinating book – we had a great discussion, and it’s one of the most memorable titles we’ve read.
Defoe starts by saying that “there is not a wicked action in any part of it, but is first and last rendered unhappy and unfortunate” but what comes through is the focus on money, on survival, whatever it takes. “I am giving an account of what was, not of what ought or ought not to be.” “The vice came in always at the door of necessity, not at the door of inclination.” Moll’s self-interest makes her emotional responses of guilt wear off quickly. Useful warnings to the reader against being too trusting. It also emphasizes how fabric was so valuable – a bundle of lace was worth 300 pounds in money of the time!
- “all I understood by being a gentlewoman was to be able to work for myself, and get enough to keep me without that terrible bugbear going to service, whereas they meant to live great, rich and high, and I know not what”
- Old governess comforting her: “to sink under the Weight, was but to encrease the Weight”
- Transportation: “we should live as new People in a new World”
it was requisite to a whore to be handsome, well-shaped, have a good mien and a graceful behaviour; but that for a wife, no deformity would shock the fancy, no ill qualities the judgment; the money was the thing; the portion was neither crooked nor monstrous, but the money was always agreeable, whatever the wife was.
I’d love to find out more about this: “A Garbling Office has been established in London in the fifteenth century to inspect several Sorts of Goods, more particularly subject to Frauds, Mixtures and false Package, in order to cleanse them, and make them Merchantable)” (Review, iv 635, 17 Feb 1708)