TO DR. JOHN ELLIOTSON My Dear Doctor, Thirteen months ago, when it seemed likely that this story had come to a close, a kind friend brought you to my bedside, whence, in all probability, I never should have risen but for your constant watchfulness and skill. I like to recall your great goodness and kindness (as well as many acts of others, showing quite a surprising friendship and sympathy) at that time, when kindness and friendship were most needed and welcome. And as you would take no other fee but thanks, let me record them here in behalf of me and mine, and subscribe myself, Yours most sincerely and gratefully, W. M. THACKERAY.
Preface
If this kind of composition, of which the two years' product is now laid before the public, fail in art, as it constantly does and must, it at least has the advantage of a certain truth and honesty, which a work more elaborate might lose. In his constant communication with the reader, the writer is forced into frankness of expression, and to speak out his own mind and feelings as they urge him. Many a slip of the pen and the printer, many a word spoken in haste, he sees and would recall as he looks over his volume.
It is a sort of confidential talk between writer and reader, which must often be dull, must often flag. In the course of his volubility, the perpetual speaker must of necessity lay bare his own weaknesses, vanities, peculiarities. And as we judge of a man's character, after long frequenting his society, not by one speech, or by one mood or opinion, or by one day's talk, but by the tenor of his general bearing and conversation; so of a writer, who delivers himself up to you perforce unreservedly, you say, Is he honest? Does he tell the truth in the main? Does he seem actuated by a desire to find out and speak it? Is he a quack, who shams sentiment, or mouths for effect? Does he seek popularity by claptraps or other arts? I can no more ignore good fortune than any other chance which has befallen me. I have found many thousands more readers than I ever looked for. I have no right to say to these, You shall not find fault with my art, or fall asleep over my pages; but I ask you to believe that this person writing strives to tell the truth. If there is not that, there is nothing.
Perhaps the lovers of 'excitement' may care to know, that this book began with a very precise plan, which was entirely put aside. Ladies and gentlemen, you were to have been treated, and the writer's and the publisher's pocket benefited, by the recital of the most active horrors. What more exciting than a ruffian (with many admirable virtues) in St. Giles's, visited constantly by a young lady from Belgravia? What more stirring than the contrasts of society? the mixture of slang and fashionable language? the escapes, the battles, the murders? Nay, up to nine o'clock this very morning, my poor friend, Colonel Altamont, was doomed to execution, and the author only relented when his victim was actually at the window.
The 'exciting' plan was laid aside (with a very honourable forbearance on the part of the publishers), because, on attempting it, I found that I failed from want of experience of my subject; and never having been intimate with any convict in my life, and the manners of ruffians and gaol-birds being quite unfamiliar to me, the idea of entering into competition with M. Eugene Sue was abandoned. To describe a real rascal, you must make him so horrible that he would be too hideous to show; and unless the painter paints him fairly, I hold he has no right to show him at all.
Even the gentlemen of our age - this is an attempt to describe one of them, no better nor worse than most educated men - even these we cannot show as they are, with the notorious foibles and selfishness of their lives and their education. Since the author of Tom Jones was buried, no writer of fiction among us has been permitted to depict to his utmost power a MAN. We must drape him, and give him a certain conventional simper. Society will not tolerate the Natural in our Art. Many ladies have remonstrated and subscribers left me, because, in the course of the story, I described a young man resisting and affected by temptation.
My object was to say, that he had the passions to feel, and the manliness and generosity to overcome them. You will not hear - it is best to know it - what moves in the real world, what passes in society, in the clubs, colleges, mess-rooms,- what is the life and talk of your sons. A little more frankness than is customary has been attempted in this story; with no bad desire on the writer's part, it is hoped, and with no ill consequence to any reader. If truth is not always pleasant, at any rate truth is best, from whatever chair - from those whence graver writers or thinkers argue, as from that at which the story-teller sits as he concludes his labour, and bids his kind reader farewell.
Kensington, Nov. 26th, 1850.
Preface
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Chapter 1 Shows how First Love may interrupt Breakfast
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Chapter 2 A Pedigree and other Family Matters
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Chapter 3 In which Pendennis appears as a very young Man inde
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Chapter 4 Mrs. Haller
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Chapter 5 Mrs. Haller at Home
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Chapter 6 Contains both Love and War
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Chapter 7 In which the Major makes his Appearance
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Chapter 8 In which Pen is kept waiting at the Door, while the
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Chapter 9 In which the Major opens the Campaign
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Chapter 10 Facing the Enemy
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Chapter 11 Negotiation
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Chapter 12 In which a Shooting Match is proposed
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Chapter 13 A Crisis
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Chapter 14 In which Miss Fotheringay makes a new Engagement
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Chapter 15 The happy Village
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Chapter 16 More Storms in the Puddle
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Chapter 17 Which concludes the first Part of this History
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Chapter 18 Alma Mater
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Chapter 19 Pendennis of Boniface
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Chapter 20 Rake's Progress
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Chapter 21 Flight after Defeat
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Chapter 22 Prodigal's Return
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Chapter 23 New Faces
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Chapter 24 A Little Innocent
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Chapter 25 Contains both Love and Jealousy
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Chapter 26 A House full of Visitors
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Chapter 27 Contains some Ball-practising
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Chapter 28 Which is both Quarrelsome and Sentimental
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Chapter 29 Babylon
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Chapter 30 The Knights of the Temple
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Chapter 31 Old and new Acquaintances
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Chapter 32 In which the Printer's Devil comes to the Door
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Chapter 33 Which is passed in the Neighbourhood of Ludgate Hi
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Chapter 34 In which the History still hovers about Fleet Stre
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Chapter 35 Dinner in the Row
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Chapter 36 The Pall Mall Gazette
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Chapter 37 Where Pen appears in Town and Country
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Chapter 38 In which the Sylph reappears
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Chapter 39 Colonel Altamont appears and disappears
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