Professor John Skinner analyzes the prose narratives of Tobias George Smollett (1721-71) and their place in the development of the novel in Constructions of Smollett: A Study in Genre and Gender.

Moved by the fact that Smollett is now considered beneath the acquaintance of the common English reader and risks becoming the first major English novelist to have passed from widespread popularity to antiquarian status without an intermediate stage of critical esteem, Skinner set out to formulate a major revaluation of the writer.

Constructions of Smollett begins with a brief historical survey of critical response to the author before arguing that the author has been unfairly judged by the standards of the traditional realist novel. Chapter 1 discusses Roderick Random, using both traditional and modern approaches to autobiography, while chapter 2 considers Peregrine Pickle in the light of Bakhtinian carnival and modern games theory.

The third chapter concentrates on Smollett's fundamental importance as a satirist with particular reference to his less popular works: Ferdinand Count Fathom, Sir Launcelot Greaves, and The Life and Adventures of an Atom. After a final section which examines the various roles of the journey in Humphry Clinker and the Travels through France and Italy, the Conclusion juxtaposes issues of genre and gender through an analysis of Smollett's constructions of femininity.