商品簡介
'The history of Arsaces Prince of Betlis' (1774) by the Co. Limerick-born Charles Johnstone (c.1719-c.1800) is an eastern fable, an Oriental anticipation of the bildungsroman in the manner of Johnson's 'Rasselas', though with stronger political undertones. Written in the aftermath of the Seven Years War, and during a period that witnessed growing revolutionary unrest in America as well as condemnation of British colonial hegemony in India, Johnstone's novel gestures to these contemporary developments while recounting the travels and adventures of an Eastern prince, Arsaces, song of Astyages, king of Betlis. Enclosing a series of tales within tales, Johnstone's Oriental romance offers its readers a pleasing mixture of moral reflection, political satire, and Gulliverian fantasy, played out within an expansive historical and geographical framework.
