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Book 3, Chapter 6
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Joseph Andrews, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Hypocrisy
Lust vs. Chastity
Social Class
Religion and Charity
Summary
Analysis
The squire is a bachelor who is about 40 years old, and so he wants Fanny at his table. She, however, prefers to stay with Joseph Andrews, and Abraham Adams agrees that the two of them should remain together. The squire then orders his servants to get Joseph and Adams drunk.
The squire is one of many characters in the story who is corrupted by lust. If he can’t woo Fanny traditionally, he is willing to be manipulative about it.
Themes
Everyone has a drunken dinner; people fall out of chairs, and a poet improvises some verses about Abraham Adams. Another man dances in imitation of Adams. Adams gets a little insulted and starts a long speech about manners. The squire tries to encourage Adams to fight, but eventually Adams makes peace with the other men.
The people at the dinner are making fun of Adams. Adams doesn’t seem to mind, perhaps in part because he has such a high opinion of himself that he eventually comes to see their imitation as flattery. The squire senses that Adams isn’t the peaceful clergyman he appears to be, and so he encourages Adams to fight, perhaps hoping to cause enough chaos for him to claim Fanny when no one else is looking.
Themes
A doctor at the dinner party mentions that Socrates used to perform a ritual by a throne at parties. Abraham Adams is happy to reenact this ritual, playing the part of Socrates. As it turns out, the “throne” is just a tub of water with a blanket over it. Adams tries to sit on the “throne,” but the blanket collapses, and he gets wet. Adams grabs the squire and pulls him into the tub as revenge, then he gets out of the tub and leaves.
Adams’s dip into the tub is a fitting prank to play on him, since as a parson, he would be involved with baptisms. When the roles are reversed, and Adams is the one being dunked in water, he finds that he doesn’t like it so much. Although Adams held back his temper earlier, he reveals some of his fighting spirit when he manages to drag the squire into the tub with him.
Themes
