<P> Joseph Andrews , or The History of the Adventures of Joseph Andrews and of his Friend Mr. Abraham Adams , was the first published full - length novel of the English author Henry Fielding , and indeed among the first novels in the English language . Published in 1742 and defined by Fielding as a `` comic epic poem in prose '' , it is the story of a good - natured footman 's adventures on the road home from London with his friend and mentor , the absent - minded parson Abraham Adams . The novel represents the coming together of the two competing aesthetics of 18th - century literature : the mock - heroic and neoclassical ( and , by extension , aristocratic ) approach of Augustans such as Alexander Pope and Jonathan Swift ; and the popular , domestic prose fiction of novelists such as Daniel Defoe and Samuel Richardson . </P>
<P> Joseph Andrews , or The History of the Adventures of Joseph Andrews and of his Friend Mr. Abraham Adams , was the first published full - length novel of the English author Henry Fielding , and indeed among the first novels in the English language . Published in 1742 and defined by Fielding as a `` comic epic poem in prose '' , it is the story of a good - natured footman 's adventures on the road home from London with his friend and mentor , the absent - minded parson Abraham Adams . The novel represents the coming together of the two competing aesthetics of 18th - century literature : the mock - heroic and neoclassical ( and , by extension , aristocratic ) approach of Augustans such as Alexander Pope and Jonathan Swift ; and the popular , domestic prose fiction of novelists such as Daniel Defoe and Samuel Richardson . </P>
who defined novel as comic epic poem in prose
who defined novel as comic epic poem in prose
Henry Fielding
Henry Fielding