William Chaigneau’s only novel was first published, in London and Dublin, in 1752. Highly praised by Ralph Griffith in
The Monthly Review(June 1752),
Jack Connorwent into second London and Dublin editions in 1753, with revisions by the author, with a further Dublin edition following in 1766. A sentimental picaresque fiction, it reveals, sometimes explicitly, the high regard in which Chaigneau held such recent fiction as Alain-René Lesage’s
Gil Blas(1715-47), Tobias Smollett’s
Roderick Random(1748) and, especially, Henry Fielding’s
Tom Jones(1749).
Jack Connor, though,
looks forward as well as backwards. The novel has two formal features particularly worthy of remark. It is perhaps the only novel in English to bear two different titles on the title-pages of its two volumes:…
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Citation: Ross, Ian Campbell. "The History of Jack Connor". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 16 July 2014 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=35471, accessed 23 November 2024.]
