The Wanderer (1814 Novel) - Publication and Reception

Publication and Reception

The Wanderer was published in five volumes by Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown on 28 March 1814. Burney was one of the most popular novelists in Britain at the beginning of the 19th century, but she had not published a novel since 1796. The Wanderer was greatly anticipated and Longman printed a large first edition of 3,000 copies. All of these copies were sold to booksellers before the novel's actual release. Believing the novel would be a bestseller, they issued a second edition of 1,000 copies on 15 April 1814 and planned three additional ones. However, compared to Burney’s earlier novels, The Wanderer was not a success. Only 461 copies of the second edition were sold during 1814 and over the next ten years, only 74. The leftovers were pulped.

The Wanderer was translated into French by J.-B.-J. Breton de la Martinière and A.-J. Lemierre d'Argy and published in Paris in 1814; Burney described the translation as "abominable". A three-volume American edition was published in New York in 1814. No other editions were published until Pandora Press's 1988 reissue.

The Wanderer received unfavorable reviews, “with one or two quite damning”, which may have seriously affected its sales. Reviewers argued that Burney’s earlier novels had been better; The Wanderer was improbable and the language was “prolix and obscure”. They were also taken aback by its criticism of England at a time when the entire country was celebrating its victory over Napoleon. The negative reviews were published quickly (for the 19th century): two hostile reviews appeared in April 1814; a genuinely favorable review did not appear until April 1815. Critic William Hazlitt, in particular, complained in the Edinburgh Review about the novel's focus on women: “The difficulties in which involves her heroines are indeed, ‘Female Difficulties;’ – they are difficulties created out of nothing.” According to Hazlitt, women did not have problems that could be made into interesting fiction. The reviewer for the British Critic found the character of Elinor distasteful and guided readers to Hamilton's more conservative Memoirs of Modern Philosophers. Since the 1980s, The Wanderer, along with Burney’s other works, has become the focus of serious scholarship and is popular among students.