The English novel began in the 18th century. Peter Sabor reminds us that Richardson’s Clarissa was a hit with Johnson and other contemporary shapers of literary taste; Burney said it “had the deepest tragic powers that the pen can address to the heart”. It is certainly a remarkable work whose two leading characters, Clarissa and Lovelace, are exceptionally vivid creations. It is also, as Sabor does not say, almost unreadable these days. Not only is it the longest novel in English (1,500 close-typed pages), the epistolary mode makes it tough to navigate. Here Leavis’s judgment that “it’s no use pretending that Richardson can ever be made a current classic again”, seems not narrowly elitist, but one that takes proper account of the common reader. Similarly, Melvyn New’s essay on Sterne quotes Leavis’s stern dismissal of Tristram Shandy as “irresponsible (and nasty) trifling”. This is excessive but, again, you can see his point.