Name: Roxana, the Fortunate Mistress, Or, A History of the Life and Vast Variety of Fortunes of Mademoiselle de Beleau
ISBN: 9780192834591

Daniel Defoe

This book is intended for students of English Literature, especially eighteenth-century, from sixth-form up.

Afterwards Called the Countess de Wintselsheim in Germany : Being the Person Known by the Name of the Lady Roxana in the Time of Charles II

Roxana, the Fortunate Mistress, Or, A History of the Life and Vast Variety of Fortunes of Mademoiselle de Beleau

Joshua Line

Roxana (1724), Defoe's last and darkest novel, is the autobiography of a woman who has traded her virtue, at first for survival, and then for fame and fortune. Its narrator tells the story of her own `wicked' life as the mistress of rich and powerful men. The novel's drama lies not in the heroine's `vast variety of fortunes', but in her attempts to understand the sometimes bitter lessons of her life as a `Fortunate Mistress'. Defoe's achievement was to invent, in `Roxana', a gripping story-teller as well as a gripping story. This new edition features a new introduction, detailed notes, textual history, and map of contemporary London.

Roxana, the Fortunate Mistress, Or, A History of the Life and Vast Variety of Fortunes of Mademoiselle de Beleau Afterwards Called the Countess de Wintselsheim in Germany : Being the Person Known by the Name of the Lady Roxana in the Time of Charles II