How The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling drew on The Odyssey
A documented line of influence: Henry Fielding demonstrably engaged Homer’s work. The commentary below is Gröblé’s, verbatim from each work’s page.
The source
The Odyssey
Homer · c. 725 BCE
Ancient GreeceThe influenced
The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling
Henry Fielding · 1749
EnlightenmentRelevance
7/10
On The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling’s page
- Tom Jones is built on the Odyssey by design — Fielding theorized the novel as a 'comic epic poem in prose' and named Homer as his license
- Tom is a modern, comic Odysseus, wandering toward home across an 18-book epic frame; the structure echoes Fénelon's Télémaque, a prose continuation of Homer
- Read the Odyssey first and the whole shape of Fielding's road — the detours, the homecoming — shows its ancient skeleton
On The Odyssey’s page
- Fielding called his new form a 'comic epic poem in prose' and invoked Homer by name to do it — the Odyssey is the model he's working from
- Tom becomes a modern, comic Odysseus: a wandering hero on a journey home, his adventures stretched across an 18-book epic frame
- That 18-book structure runs back through Fénelon's Télémaque, itself a prose continuation of the Odyssey — Homer's architecture, two reroutings later