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				First published: October 1, 2025 - Last updated: October 1, 2025
			TITLE INFORMATION 
			
			Author: Nina Elisabeth Cook
			
 Title: “A most wicked jest”
 
 Subtitle: Titillation, Rape Jokes, and the Ethics of Laughter in Pamela
 
 Journal: Studies in the Novel
 
 Volume: 57
 
 Issue: 3
 
 Year: Fall 2025
 
 Pages: 257-273
 
 pISSN: 0039-3827 - 
				Find a Library: WorldCat | 
			eISSN: 1934-1512 - 
				Find a Library: WorldCat
 
 Language: English
 
 Keywords: 
				Modern History: 
					18th Century | 
				Europen History: 
					English History | 
				Types: 
					Rape; 
				Society: 
					Rape Culture / 
						Rape Jokes; 
				Representations: 
					Literary Text / 
						Samuel Richardson
 
 FULL TEXT
 
			
			Link:
			Project MUSE (Restricted Access)
			 
 ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
 
			
			Author:
				Nina Elisabeth Cook, 
					Program in Writing and Communication, 
					Rice University - 
					
			
 Abstract: 
				»This article examines Samuel Richardson’s use of the joke as a structuring principle in Pamela. Long recognized as a “comedy” in the traditional sense of the word—a genre ending in marriage—I argue that the novel’s frequent scenes of near-rape and sexual coercion can be read as “jokes,” structurally aligned through their use of comedic reversal with the category of the rape joke. I interrogate Richardson’s use of the joke structure, attempting to identify what the ethical implications of such structurally induced laughter might be. At core, I seek to introduce a novel way of reading texts through the structural lens of the joke and to show how Pamela functions in gist as a “wicked jest,” both tantalizing and teasing its reader into an ethically problematic response.« 
				(Source: Studies in the Novel)
 
 Wikipedia: 
				History of Europe: 
					History of England / 
						History of England | 
				Feminism: 
					Feminist terminology / 
						Rape culture | 
				Literature: 
					English literature / 
						Samuel Richardson | 
				Literature: 
					Fiction about rape / 
						Pamela; or, Virtue Rewarded	| 
				Sex and the law: 
					Rape / 
						Rape in England
 |