George Sherburn

I love this book. I don't care what anyone says. I love Pamela, too, and was thoroughly angry at Shamela. (I read & own the condensed version of Clarissa, for time's sake, although I read the first four books of the long version - does that matter?)

Clarissa is a far cry from Pamela's moralizing moral morality, that's for damn sure. The characters are dark & intense: Clarissa's vile family, Lovelace's obsession and desire and - I believe it - love; even Anna Howe seems a little too show more interested in her friend's abduction and seduction.
Clarissa herself is amazing - not nearly as pure and ladylike as she imagines herself to be - she takes huge risks and brushes them off quickly - apparently unable to face herself. Her mourning and moaning is overdone because she is totally obsessed with her own guilt - and - possibly - her own desires.

... there are so many veins going on beneath the skin of this book, it's hard to remember them all. The most under-rated (and possibly most brilliant) is the friendship between Lovelace and Belford. Belford! Who condemns Lovelace, admires Clarissa, and yet - yet ... in one of the final episodes, after Lovelace calls him a "monkey", he admits: "I do love him."
The complexity of friendship is great.

I must compare Clarissa to Les Liaisons Dangereuses, because they are the only two books of this sort that I know: and, although de Laclos is by far the better author, the compliment is not undeserved. show less

Well. It's better than Pamela, at least. I suppose we can be grateful that the author learned something from the backlash he received from writing Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded.

This book is twice as long as Pamela, but the story is much more believable. Pamela had a huge case of Stockholm Syndrome, and the ending was one huge cliche, but Clarissa is more tragic and believable. Don't get me wrong - it can be frustrating. This is 2017, almost 300 years after this book was written, and things for show more women have changed since, thankfully. Had Clarissa had the same options as a modern-day woman, her story could have ended up better. show less

This was just way too drawn out. I read the abridged version, and I still thought 2/3 of it was way too wordy. If building suspense was the plan, they overdid it and took it into "I don't care anymore" instead. But, the middle third of the book was good!

what a slog!