Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Pamela, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
The Value of Virtue
Class and Morality
Religion and Marriage
Sexual Politics
Summary
Analysis
Pamela writes to her father and mother about a recent dinner that several ladies and gentlemen attended. Some of the guests mentioned to Mr. B that they heard he had one of prettiest servants in the country, but Mr. B told them she was just an average beauty. After dinner, some of the ladies went to Mrs. Jervis, hoping to see Pamela in person. Pamela was in the closet, but Mrs. Jervis made her come out.
Once again, Mr. B struggles to influence people around him. As much as Mr. B wants to make Pamela feel powerless and indebted to him, he can’t stop her from having a significant influence on other people simply by behaving virtuously and acting like a role model.
Themes
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Pamela continues her letter. After she left the closet, she writes, all the ladies complimented her on her good looks. Pamela, however, insisted she wasn’t worthy of their high praise. When the ladies left, they relayed all their praises to Mr. B, who seemed annoyed by it.
Many characters in the story connect Pamela’s virtue to her good looks. This raises questions about how the characters would react to Pamela if she weren’t good looking, but the novel doesn’t necessarily explore this idea, instead just taking it for granted that, while a good-looking person may not always be virtuous, a person who’s virtuous on the inside is more likely to appear attractive on the outside.
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Now, as Pamela writes, it’s Thursday morning, and she hopes to come back home within a week. She muses about how love and hate can sometimes seem similar. In a postscript, Pamela writes that she still doesn’t know how she’ll get home, but she supposes maybe someday she could ride with John.
Pamela’s confusion about love and hate suggests the extent to which Mr. B has gotten inside her thoughts and made her question things that she previously took for granted.
Themes
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