British literature a genre which developed during the second half of the 18th century. Among the most famous sentimental novels in English are Samuel Richardson's "Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded" (1740), Oliver Goldsmith's "The Vicar of Wakefield" (1766), and Laurence Sterne's "Tristram Shandy" (1759 – 67). Another novel genre also developed in this period. In 1778, Frances Burney (1752–1840) wrote "Evelina", one of the first novels of manners. Fanny Burney's novels' indeed "were enjoyed and admired by Jane Austen". The graveyard poets were a number of pre-Romantic English poets, writing in the 1740s and later, whose works are characterised by their gloomy meditations
The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman instance, are reminiscent of the works of the metaphysical poets of the 17th century, and the novel as a whole, with its focus on the problems of language, has constant regard to John Locke's theories in "An Essay Concerning Human Understanding". Arthur Schopenhauer cited "Tristram Shandy" as one of the greatest novels ever written. As its title suggests, the book is ostensibly Tristram's narration of his life story. But it is one of the central jokes of the novel that he cannot explain anything simply, that he must make explanatory diversions to add context and colour to his tale, to