The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman is a novel written by Laurence Sterne. Released in serial form from 1759-1767, it serves as a chronology of its titular character (starting at his conception and his birth coming in its second volume). It is also an early example of stream of consciousness writing and is frequently said to be a precursor to postmodernism due to its extremely digressive narrative.
Characters[]
- Tristram Shandy
- Walter Shandy - Tristram's father
- Uncle Toby Shandy - Tristram's uncle
- Elizabeth Mollineux Shandy - Tristram's mother
- Dr. Slop - a "male-midwife"
- Corporal James "Trim" Butler - Toby's manservant
- Obadiah - one of Walter's servants
- Yorick - a parson
- Hafen Slawkenbergius - a fictional scholar who Tristram somewhat frequently quotes
- Phutatorius - a fictional priest and scholar
- Susannah - Elizabeth's chambermaid
- The Widow Wadman - a widow with whom Uncle Toby falls in love with
- Bridget - Wadman's servant, with whom Trim falls in love with
- The midwife
Publisher's summary[]
Endlessly digressive, boundlessly imaginative and unmatched in its absurd and timeless wit
Laurence Sterne's great masterpiece of bawdy humour and rich satire defies any attempt to categorize it, with a rich metafictional narrative that might classify it as the first 'postmodern' novel. Part novel, part digression, its gloriously disordered narrative interweaves the birth and life of the unfortunate 'hero' Tristram Shandy, the eccentric philosophy of his father Walter, the amours and military obsessions of Uncle Toby, and a host of other characters, including Dr Slop, Corporal Trim and the parson Yorick.
A joyful celebration of the endless possibilities of the art of fiction, Tristram Shandy is also a wry demonstration of its limitations. The text and notes of this volume are based on the acclaimed Florida Edition, with a critical introduction by Melvyn New and Christopher Ricks's introductory essay from the first Penguin Classics edition.
Full summary[]
Book I[]
According to Tristram Shandy, he was conceived to a retired Turkey merchant on the night of "the first Monday in the month of March, in the year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and eighteen". According to Tristram (and his uncle Toby), his mother and father considered their son's "misfortunes" to have began on this date. Nine months later, on the "fifth day of November, 1718", Tristram was born into the world. While ruminating on his birth, Tristram begins talking about a widow who lived in the village at the same time and then begins ruminating on Hobby-Horses.
The discussion of Hobby-Horses makes Tristram think of a parson named Yorick - making him recount a vignette about the parson's horses before recounting the character and death of Yorick. Tristram then briefly circles back to the subject of the widow (who was, presumably, his midwife) before discussing his mother's marriage-settlement - which allowed her to take a trip to London at effectively no expense. In September of 1717, Tristram's mother and father took this voyage. While his father returned home "in none of the best moods", his mother went to the countryside while pregnant.
According to Tristram, his father absolutely despised his name - even writing a paper on the evils of the name "Tristram". After briefly discussing mother non-Papist status, Tristram discusses the character of his uncle Toby, briefly digresses to talking about his aunt Diana, then returns to the character of his uncle Toby - discussing his Hobby-Horse and a war wound on Toby's groin received during the "Siege of Namur".
Book II[]
Having ended the previous book quite abruptly, Tristram opens the second book by musing on his uncle Toby once again. He remembers that his uncle was bedridden by his groin wound and, having effectively nothing else to do, tried to tell the story of how he get his wound. Before doing this, he tried to study everything about the Siege and create a map of Namur. Eventually, Toby's obsession (fueled by his manservant Corporal Trim) leads him to begin preparations for building a replica of Namur in the countryside.
While this is going on, Toby and Walter sit by the fireside and hear some noises from upstairs. This is revealed to be Mrs. Shandy giving birth. As such, two midwifes are called. The first is the previously-described midwife but the second is a "male-midwife" named Dr. Slop. While Toby and Walter argue about modesty, the servant Obadiah accidentally runs into Dr. Slop and brings him home. While doing so, the two accidentally leave behind Slop's tools. As such, Obadiah has to return to Slop's house to bring the tools.
While Obadiah gets the tools, the two Shandy brothers begin an argument on Stevinus which leads to Toby sending Corporal Trim to get his book of Stevinus shortly before the argument ends. Once Trim returns with the book, he finds a sermon on conscience (whose descriptions of torture greatly disturb Trim, due to his brother possibly going through the same tortures) that Trim recounts. This sermon was written by Parson Yorick.
With the debate finished and with Slop's tools returned to him by Obadiah, everyone departs for upstairs to help out in the birth. Tristram departs from the narrative for a brief moment to discuss the strands of knowledge that led to his father being convinced that a regular birth actively deformed the head, brain, and soul and that the Caesarian section was the only way truly Great Men were born. After this digression, Tristram resumes the narrative extremely briefly and then pauses it so that it can continue in the next volume.
Book III[]
Tristram resumes his narrative to show Toby's attempts to change the conversation from the c-section to his obsession with Namur and Flemish armies. Tristram briefly criticizes his father for accidentally putting a handkerchief into his right pocket with his left hand. After this brief faux pas, Walter resumes his discussion on the caesarian section (which Toby "whistles Lillabullero through"). While all this is going on, Dr. Slop notices that Obadiah has made his bag nigh-unopenable due to Obadiah tying it shut as hard as he could. While trying to open it, Dr. Slop accidentally cuts open his thumb with a penknife. Extremely angered by this, Dr. Slop tries to curse Obadiah and is handed a document of excommunication by Walter. While Dr. Slop contemplates using this curse, Walter and Toby argue over the origin of curses.
While all this is going on, the midwife falls and bruises her hip. As the baby is still not yet delivered, Dr. Slop is called upstairs. Offended at being called up by a "simple servant", Dr. Slop brandishes his newly-made forceps from his bag before demonstrating them on Toby's hand, skinning Toby's hands and knuckles. Once in the delivery room, Dr. Slop and the midwife argue over delivering the baby head-first or feet-first.
While waiting for the baby to be delivered, Walter and Toby started an argument on time and duration before falling asleep. During the lull in the narrative, Tristram inserts the preface to the narrative before his father and uncle are awakened by Corporal Trim arriving to tell the brothers that Dr. Slop is making a tiny bridge. In his somewhat drowsy state, Toby believes that Slop is making a replica of a bridge from Namur but Trim reveals that the doctor's forceps accidentally broke baby Tristram's nose. Absolutely despondent over his belief that this has greatly curtailed his son's standing in life, Walter falls onto the bed and sobs. Tristram examines the various misfortunes and scholars (including one Hafen Slawkenbergius, who wrote extensively on noses) before pausing his narrative to start another book.
Book IV[]
Before resuming his narrative, Tristram starts the fourth book by reprinting the penultimate story of Hafen Slawkenbergius' decad. This story involves the travels of a man with an incredibly large nose through Europe. Tristram then resumes his narrative with his father still lying on the bed. To negate the possible misfortunes that might come from the crushed nose, Walter decides to christen his son "Trismegistus". While his father and his uncle walk downstairs and discuss this name, Tristram ruminates over the various chapters he believes he should put in his book (such as ones on knots, whiskers, the right and wrong end of a woman, wishes, noses, and modesty).
After ruminating at the glacial pace that he is recounting at (with Tristram theorizing that he is living much faster than he can recount and is effectively losing ground), Tristram resumes his narrative somewhat later in the day. As baby Tristram has gone black in the face, Walter has to give the name in a hurry so that it doesn't die before being baptized. Unfortunately for Walter, the servant he mentions the name to only remembers the first syllable. As such, the young infant is named "Tristram" instead of "Trismegistus". Upon hearing of this the next morning, Walter does not fall onto his knees and weep but simply takes a walk around the garden. While Walter is on his walk, Toby and Trim pick apart Walter's theory of names. This discussion is interrupted by Walter's return to the house and the speech that he makes on the persecution that he believes has pervaded his infant before calling Yorick to ask about re-christening his son.
Yorick and Walter then travel to a "visitation at ****" in a coach - in a chapter that Tristram flat out refuses to have printed into his narrative, believing it would overturn the careful balance of quality in his book. After explaining his reasonings for this, Tristram resumes his narrative at a dinner of esteemed scholars which Yorick is at. During the dinner, a priest-scholar named Phutatorius drops a roasted chestnut onto his crotch and burns himself. As Yorick grabbed the chestnut after finding it on the floor, Phutatorius believes that Yorick placed the chestnut onto his seat as a juvenile prank but says nothing about it as he tends to his burns. With this snafu out of the way, the esteemed scholars weigh in on the matter of undoing a christening but come to the conclusion that parents are actually unrelated to their children instead of anything actually about rechristening.
Upon returning home, Walter briefly thinks about his misfortunes before receiving a letter that reveals that he has been left a thousand pounds by a dead aunt. Walter is unsure about how to spend the money and thinks about sending his son Bobby on a Grand Tour through Europe. Unfortunately, this Tour is sunk before it can even begin as Walter also gets a letter revealing that Bobby has died. Tristram pauses the narrative at this point as he is nearing the end of the fourth book in his volume and is also somewhat ill. He ruminates over what chapters will follow in the next volumes before ending the fourth volume.
Book V[]
After briefly discussing plagiarism and producing a fragment of his chapter on whiskers, Tristram resumes his narrative by discussing the immediate aftermath of Bobby's death. Stricken by grief, Walter begins listing various famous figures who lost a child. Unbeknownst to him, his wife is nearby and (upon hearing him say the word "wife") begins listening in to this recital. Presumably while Elizabeth is listening, Corporal Toby gives a speech on death which makes the servants Obadiah and Susannah think about their work. Once Corporal Toby finishes his speech, Walter begins pontificating on Socrates and his children - all while his wife listens from behind the door.
While still somewhat despondent over his son's death, Walter decides to write a "Tristra-pedia" on his surviving son's education. This actually dwarfs Walter's attention for his son's education and causes him to neglect actually working to educate young Tristram.
Having devoted most of the book beforehand to what came immediately before his birth, Tristram skips five years into his life, when he accidentally circumcized himself with a windowsill. While Tristram claims it was "nothing", this causes mass chaos in the Shandy household. The maid Susannah flees when she hears Tristram's screams of absolute agony and Trim blames himself for this accident (for he dismantled all of the window-sills several days beforehand as part of the Namur reconstruction) and launches a defense of Susannah before Trim and Susannah (accompanied by Toby and Yorick) travel to Shandy Hall to tell the somewhat eccentric Walter about his son's accidental circumcision.
While Susannah fled, Tristram's mother hears the screams of her son and finds her son while Susannah flees. Walter soon finds out about his son's circumcision and takes out a volume on Jewish circumcision rites and speaks them over with Yorick. Walter then reads from his Trista-paedia, leading to a heated discussion over "radical heat and radical moisture" between Toby, Trim, and Walter that briefly fizzles out once Dr. Slop arrives to look over Tristram but then returns. The debate ends with Walter saying that he will pause reciting from the volume for a year and then discussing the use of auxiliary verbs.
Book VI[]
After briefly ruminating on the prevalence of "jackasses" in the world, Tristram resumes his narrative. While Dr. Slop and Susannah were dressing young Tristram's wound, Walter looked over his Trista-paedia and began to think about hiring a governor to look over his son and make sure that his education was properly maintained. While speaking with Toby about who to hire, Toby recommended the son of a man named Le Fever.
While passing through the village that Toby and Trim lived in, Lieutenant Le Fever fell gravely ill. The two men tried to heal Le Fever but he passed away - leaving Toby as the executor of his estate and the guardian of his son Billy. At some point, Billy entered into the army and only returned to England due to poor health and finances. Though Billy had not yet returned home, Toby recommended him for the governorship.
illustration by George Cruikshank
After Dr. Slop defames the Shandies by greatly exaggerating young Tristram's injury, Walter begins trying to make breeches for his son. Before doing so, Walter asks his wife what design he should pick while in bed with her. As his wife is largely uninterested in conversation, she agrees with basically every design Walter chooses. With this discussion over, Walter looks through his library to learn as much as he can about breeches from the ancient scholars. Tristram then shifts his focus to his uncle Toby's replica of Namur as a way to condemn his uncle. Throughout Tristram's early childhood, Toby worked tirelessly at his replica - even using tobacco to make tiny cannons. While ruminating over the replica of Namur, Tristram recounts his uncle's more humane nature and provides an apology (or defense) written by Toby himself about his actions and the necessity of war.
Though Toby and Corporal Trim are able to finish building the town and are ready to besiege it, they are delayed by the Treaty of Utrecht. During this lull, Toby is caught in the "amorous designs" of the widow of a man named Wadman. The two fall in love and soon (somewhat to Toby's surprise) begin making plans to get married. After briefly examining the track of the books of his life, Tristram closes the fifth book with this potential union.
Book VII[]
Before resuming his narrative, Tristram takes part in a European voyage and begins documenting this voyage. He departs from Dover and has a somewhat rough venture to the continent before landing in Calais (which he writes a chapter on, though he does this somewhat begrudgingly - believing himself to not be a true travel-writer) and then travels to Boulogne, which he stays in only briefly before (complaining about his transport is constantly breaking down all the way) he arrives in Montreuil. While in this town, he focuses most of his attention on an inn-keeper's daughter named Janatone (saying of her that "thou carriest the principles of change within thy frame").
As Tristram details his travels, it becomes clear that he believes that death is pursuing him throughout his travels. He briefly stays in Abbeville (writing about his great disdain for the hotel he lodged in) before hopping across various French towns and villages before arriving in Paris. He quickly surveys the city (and apologizes for not giving a proper travelogue for this stay) before returning to his travels. While bemoaning the speed of his transportation, Tristram recounts a story about an abbess and her company being stranded and having to say obscenities to get their mules to move.
Tristram next travels through Fontainebleau, Sens, Joigny, and Auxerre, which reminds him of a trip the family (minus Tristram's mother, who had stayed behind to make breeches) took through Europe when Tristram was a young boy. Tristram remembers his father's somewhat eccentric character almost completely defining this trip. Shortly after this remembrance, Tristram's coach breaks apart while he is in Lyons and he encounters "vexation upon vexation", which leads to him accidentally losing some of his notes.
Tristram quickly gets over these vexations upon vexations as he enters into the south of France, where he is sure that the specter of death has finally passed him by. As he passes through the pastoral countryside of Languedoc, Tristram gives a sample of his "Plain Stories" before briefly discussing returning to the narrative of his childhood. Tristram closes his narrative by reminiscing wistfully over a village maid he met while in the countryside.
Book VIII[]
Having spent the previous book recounting his trip through France, Tristram resumes his narrative with the story of Widow Wadman and his uncle Toby's affair. Though he has one false start, Tristram is soon able to begin these recollections with Toby and Trim's return to their estate. Upon returning, they find the Shandy estate completely unfurnished and as such they are forced to stay in the Wadman affair. The Widow Wadman lives with Toby for only three days but falls in love with him at the end of those days. Unfortunately, Toby resumes his work on the mock-battlements and becomes so engrossed in them that it takes just over a decade for him to even notice Widow Wadman.
According to Tristram, Widow Wadman's subsequent advances were almost military in nature - sneaking up on Toby and plying him with secretive advances. While hearing Uncle Toby and Trim discusses the story of a Bohemian king (or, as the both of them become distracted, the story of past lascivious adventures) the Widow begins these secretive advances. To do this, she lures Toby into the sentry-box and makes him look into her eyes by telling him that there is a speck in one of them. Upon looking into Wadman's eye, Toby is entranced with its beauty.
Thus, Toby falls in love with the Widow Wadman and begins planning a counterassault on Wadman's military conquest of his heart with Toby (who plans to take the heart of Wadman's servant Bridget in this counterattack). Shortly before this counterassault, Toby's brother writes a letter to the suitor on how to treat women and love in general. Before the assault can take place, Tristram closes this volume and promises to resume the story in the next volume.
Book IX[]
After providing a brief dedication, Tristram resumes his narrative by discussing his mother watching his father through the keyhole before resuming the story of Toby and Wadman's amours. While preparing for the pursuit of Wadman's heart, Trim tries to get into some of Toby's old clothes and finds some difficulty in doing this (though the goodness of his character shines through his somewhat shabby clothing) before the two depart. Upon reaching the Widow Wadman's door, Trim discusses (at length) the tale of his brother Tom's marriage to a Jewish woman and his subsequent imprisonment and torture by the Spanish Inquisition. This is watched by Walter and his wife.
After digressing for a moment about the balance of his narrative and on various charges of indecency that have been levelled against it, Tristram returns to his uncle as he knocks on the door after briefly hesitating. Tristram then cuts off his narrative by actually putting two blank chapters in his book. The following chapter shows Wadman observing Toby's old war-wound. Tristram then discusses a tale from Slawkenbergius that relates to this wound and then calls upon the powers of his literary hero Cervantes before finally giving the reader the blank pages.
In these blank chapters, Toby declares his love to Wadman - who questions him about children. Confused by this, tries to hide this by proposing marriage. This, eventually, leads to the episode of the war-wound - which Wadman asks about. This leads Toby to ask Trim to bring his map of Namur into the room. While doing this, Trim strikes up a conversation with Wadman's servant Bridget - who does not pick up the conversation and instead asks if Toby's wound has made him "unable to serve". Trim denies this and is then able to seduce Bridget, with the two romances continuing roughly at the same time. Toby believes that Wadman is interested in his wound as she truly cares for her but has this shattered by Trim when he reveals Wadman's fears. While Walter is somewhat indignant over this, he soon has other concerns - namely a story of a cock and a bull which ends this volume and the narrative as a whole.
See also[]
| Title | Author | Release date | Significance |
|---|---|---|---|
| The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling | Henry Fielding | 1749 | A long novel from the Early Modern era |
| The Adventures of Roderick Random | Tobias Smollett | 1748 | A similarly picaresque and comedic novel released around the same time |
| Don Quixote | Miguel de Cervantes | 1605-1615 | A long novel from the Early Modern era frequently considered to be a precursor to postmodernism |
| The Anatomy of Melancholy | Robert Burton | 1621 | A book whose prose is placed into this novel in rearranged form and that this novel possibly serves as a satire of |
| Gil Blas | Alain-René Lesage | 1715-1735 | A similarly picaresque novel released around the same time |
| Gravity's Rainbow | Thomas Pynchon | 1973 | A long postmodernist novel with frequent digressions |
| Gargantua and Pantagruel | François Rabelais | 1532-1564 | A long novel from the Early Modern era frequently considered to be a precursor to postmodernism |
| Ulysses | James Joyce | 1922 | A long novel from the Modernist era with frequent digressions |
| Sartor Resartus | Thomas Carlyle | 1833-1834 | A novel from the Romanticist era frequently considered to be a precursor to postmodernism. Inspired by Tristram Shandy. |
| The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner | James Hogg | 1824 | A novel from the Romanticist era frequently considered to be a precursor to postmodernism. |
Sources[]
- Wikipedia
- Goodreads