A neglected but significant form of secret history, the mirror for princes, charts the process of introjection of the fantastic wish in its youthful protagonist. The supernatural elements of the oriental and the fairy tale are conjured in the secret historical versions of these genres precisely to be experienced and then dispelled leaving the newly-wise subject to rule and regulate his or her own imaginative projections. Reader and protagonist learn alongside each other not the ‘truth’ of political power but rather the fantasmatic basis of all such power. François de Salignac Fénelon composed Les Aventures de Télémaque for the seven year old duc de Bourgogne, grandson of Louis XIV in 1696. This essay focuses on two periods of flourishing of the English Telemachian secret history: first, the 1730s and those secret historical works in sympathy with the patriot opposition to George II and the ministry of Robert Walpole which lionised Frederick Prince of Wales, then in his twenties; and second, the early 1760s and the fictional works composed in the period of the accession and early reign of Frederick’s son, twenty-two year old George III. I consider the two translations by James Ralph and Eliza Stanley of Thémiseul de Saint-Hyacinthe’s History of Prince Titi (1736); Eliza Haywood’s Adventures of Eovaai (1736); John Hawkesworth’s oriental tale, Almoran and Hamet (1761) and James Ridley’s Tales of the Genii (1765). 250 words.
Key words: Fenelon, Telemaque, Eliza Haywood, James Ridley, John Hawkesworth, Prince Titi, oriental tale, fairy tale, animal fable, Zizek, fantasy
Literary Criticism
,Eighteenth century
,Secret History
