50 pages • 1 hour read
Charlotte LennoxThe Female Quixote
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1752A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Volume 1, Books 1-2Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Volume 1, Book 1, Chapters 1-6 Summary
The protagonist and self-styled heroine of The Female Quixote is 17-year-old Arabella. Before she was born, her father, a Marquis, was “banished” from the Royal Court and retired to a country estate with his wife. She died in childbirth, leaving him to raise Arabella alone. He taught her to read and write, granting her a “Mind as beautiful as her Person was lovely” (6). In particular, Arabella loved her mother’s collection of French romance novels. She became convinced that the world outside was just like these novels, filled with princes, princesses, knights, duels, and great displays of love. She assumed her life would be equally full of adventure and romance. As she grew older, her beauty became apparent and she never abandoned her belief in the romantic nature of the world.
As the novel opens, she is propositioned by a gentleman named Mr. Hervey. After a flurry of misunderstood letters between Mr. Hervey and Arabella (who is working through her loyal maid, Lucy), Arabella becomes “mortally offended” by his lack of romantic sensibilities (15). She commands Mr. Hervey to die for the offense he has caused her. After Lucy intervenes with Mr. Hervey’s brother and another batch of misunderstood letters, Arabella reduces her sentence to simply ceasing contact with her.
Mr. Hervey is bemused and, in a way, fascinated by Arabella’s behavior. While she is out riding one day, he spots her and decides to approach her. Arabella orders her servants to detain him. The servants, assuming that he is a “Highwayman,” take hold of him. When Mr. Hervey explains his innocence, Arabella banishes him from her life, and he returns to London.
Volume 1, Book 1, Chapters 7-13 Summary
The Marquis’s head gardener hires a young man named Edward. Since Edward is better spoken, better mannered, and more attractive than most of his colleagues, Arabella convinces herself that he is “some Person of Quality” who has disguised himself as a gardener to win her love (22), just like a character in one of her novels. She convinces herself that Edward is plotting to declare his love to her, so decides that she must “banish him from her Presence” (23). One day, however, Edward is dismissed by the head gardener for stealing carp. When Lucy reveals this, Arabella is distraught. She assumes this is either a mistake or part of some broader noble scheme on Edward’s part.
The Marquis’s nephew, Mr. Glanville, visits the house. The Marquis has long planned for Arabella to marry him. When Mr. Glanville sees Arabella, he immediately falls in love with her, though he is confused by her references to romance stories. He blames her odd behavior on her growing up in the country. His forward manner offends Arabella’s sensibilities, and she sends him a letter addressed to “the most presumptuous Man in the World” (33), banishing him from her presence. Mr. Glanville assumes that this must be a joke, but Arabella makes clear to him that his advances are not welcome.
When the Marquis falls from his horse, Arabella sits devotedly at his bedside. Mr. Glanville, more confused than ever, resolves to return to London. When the Marquis recovers, he reveals to Arabella his plan to marry her to Mr. Glanville. At his request, she writes a stiff, insincere apology letter to Mr. Glanville, inviting him to return. Arabella permits his presence, but only on her terms, as she insists that custom is “Wholly on [her] side” (44) in such matters. Mr. Glanville cannot understand why she lives according to such “antiquated Maxims.”
Mr. Glanville adapts and behaves in a way that pleases Arabella, and they settle into a familiar routine. To help him understand her beliefs, Arabella assigns him a selection of her romance novels to read. He does not do so, and when she finds out, she is annoyed. When the Marquis hears about this, he threatens to burn her novels.
Volume 1, Book 2, Chapters 1-5 Summary
As the Marquis threatens to burn Arabella’s books, Mr. Glanville enters and suggests that he save the books, winning Arabella’s favor. Soon, however, the Marquis falls ill. He dies after two weeks of terrible illness, and Arabella enters into mourning.
Arabella’s uncle, Sir Charles, is placed in charge of the funeral arrangements and her father’s estate. When he visits, he is surprised that his son could fall in love with a woman whose head is filled with “Fairy Tales” (61). Mr. Glanville feels responsible for Arabella and defends the woman whom, his father notes, he seems arranged to marry. When Sir Charles is called back to London, however, Mr. Glanville must go with him, as remaining at the house with Arabella would be improper. He resolves to return with his cousin, Miss Glanville, and win Arabella’s heart. While she is alone, Arabella returns to her books.
Arabella tries to befriend a “fair Stranger” she spots in the nearby village. She learns that the stranger is Miss Groves, the daughter-in-law of a Duke, and invites her to stay at her house. There, Arabella quizzes Miss Groves’s servant about her employer’s “Adventures.” The servant, Mrs. Morris, explains the complicated story of Miss Groves’s past, which involves secret romances, children born out of wedlock, and a scandal involving a writing master that has caused the young woman to be sent away from London. Arabella insists that this writing master must be “some Person of Quality” in disguise (72).
Volume 1, Book 2, Chapters 6-11 Summary
After hearing the story of Miss Groves’s past, Arabella assures her guest that she is “extremely sensible” to her plight. Miss Groves, astonished and offended by her host’s words, leaves. Mr. Glanville returns, accompanied by his sister, Miss Glanville. Miss Glanville does not take kindly to Arabella, and she is soon conspiring to return to London. Mr. Glanville placates his sister with a promise of a trip to the horse races. Arabella, who has never attended the races, assumes that they must be something like a knightly tournament, centered on “Glory.” She compares it to the classical Olympic games, which confuses her guests. They attend the races, and Arabella speaks favorably of a certain jockey and causes amusement for others.
A friend of Mr. Glanville’s named Sir George spots Arabella at the races and falls in love with her. Arabella misunderstands Miss Glanville’s barbed comments and does not comprehend Sir George’s attraction to her. Miss Glanville, who has fallen in love with Sir George herself, conspires to win his favor.
During this time, the gardener, Edward, returns. Arabella is horrified, assuming that he has come to “steal her away” (92). When Arabella spots him from her horse, she flees. She becomes lost, and Sir George helps her. While Mr. Glanville searches for her, Arabella blames him for not finding her soon enough. Edward appears at the house and explains himself, and he is pardoned by Arabella. He leaves, and the other characters are astonished by Arabella’s “unaccountable Behavior.”
Volume 1, Books 1-2 Analysis
The Female Quixote is a parody novel with many comedic flourishes, but the opening chapters establish Arabella as a character whose life has been mired in tragedy. The two defining moments of her early life are the public scandal that caused her father to be banished from court (leading to her being raised in the countryside) and her mother dying shortly after giving birth, leaving her father to raise her in an isolated environment. Arabella’s love for French romantic novels is not a joke; rather, she loves these novels because they provide her with a way to escape from life’s traumas. This establishes the theme of The Danger and Allure of Escapism. Arabella copes with her grief and loneliness by retreating into a false reality, but her child’s mind cannot comprehend why she must suffer so much. This is illustrated further in Arabella’s adulthood; whenever she is faced with any difficulties, she immediately thinks about her novels. She either references them, reads them, or wishes to read them, showing how she uses these ideas to avoid her pain. Whether she is struggling to make friends with Miss Groves or trying to process her father’s death, Arabella immerses herself in her delusions to comfort herself. At least in these novels, she tells herself, everything seems to make sense.
The Marquis plays a formative role in Arabella’s life as her sole parent. Though he tries to protect her from the wild world of novels, he cannot deny his library to her. He knows that such novels might not be suitable for a young girl, but as a disgraced member of the court and a widower, he has little in the way of a support network to help him raise his child. Arabella loves her father, perhaps more than anyone else in the novel, which is one of the reasons she is so alienated from the social institutions of her contemporary society. Any court that banished as good a man as her father cannot be legitimate, she reasons, and thus cannot compare to the fantastical courts she reads about in her novels. She does not have any faith in institutions that are not guided by romantic principles, because they have caused so much damage to her father. When he dies, this feeling is compounded, and Arabella maintains an unprocessed and unacknowledged resentment toward the administrative institutions that let her father down.
Amid the suitors who approach Arabella in the early chapters, Mr. Glanville stands apart. He is unique in that he is bound to her by blood, but also because her father has always hoped for the cousins to marry. Once the Marquis dies, Mr. Glanville feels a sense of duty to Arabella, which means he cannot abandon her—his obligation, contrasted with Arabella’s romantic notions, illustrates that Chivalry Is Dead, but Duty Is Not. Whereas Mr. Hervey and Edward are keen to slip away as quickly as possible, Mr. Glanville is invested in Arabella the person. He genuinely loves and wants to help her, even though her delusions frustrate him. His father, Sir Charles, feels a similar sense of duty to the memory of his dead brother, meaning that they cannot just abandon Arabella, even after she accuses them of dishonorable behavior. Importantly, Mr. Glanville is one of the few characters who shows a willingness to engage with Arabella on her own terms, illustrating Language’s Ability to Connect and Separate. He understands the importance of her books, and when her father threatens to burn them, he understands the symbolic importance of returning them to her. Doing so makes him a hero in her eyes; despite his resistance to her worldview, he adopts one of its archetypes by taking on the role of Arabella’s knight in shining armor, protecting her most treasured possessions from a terrible fate. From this moment on, he is more privileged than her other suitors. In keeping with romance archetypes and typical plotlines, this situates Mr. Glanville as the story’s romantic hero and Arabella’s true love.
