The Power Dynamics of Surveillance

Written for my 18th Century Novels class; we were to close read both Pamela and Millenium Hall and write an analytical essay that makes an argument about both texts and what they reveal about mid-18th century British (epistolary) fiction

In 18th century Britain there was a direct correlation between sight and power. The cultural significance of colonization was that socially men felt empowered to not just explore, but to claim and take. Otherwise known as a scopic economy, the physical act of looking and surveilling became a violent act that signified ownership, especially in regard to women. For women virtue was synonymous with passivity, it was about protecting their innocence at all costs and once lost it could never be regained. This differs from the expectations of men who were to remain honorable and to keep their reputations intact. For men honor was something active that could be won back if lost and to win it back meant engaging in a duel or battle. The societal expectations of men and women at the time were in conflict and as a result wherever men were present, a woman’s virtue was being negotiated. The novel Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded by Samuel Richardson was written as a piece of conduct literature meant to serve as a moral guide, set in the perspective of a girl writing letters to her parents as she works in the home of a wealthier man. Richardson uses the power to surveil as a tool of the patriarchy where the male character, Mr. B, is in control of information and he uses that power to manipulate the titular character. By comparison, Sarah Scott’s Millenium Hall is a piece of utopian fiction where the concept of surveillance presents differently. This novel is written from the perspective of a man who is with a society of unmarried women where he observes a collective solidarity instead of a power imbalance. The power of surveillance and information is communal, while still reflecting upon the didactic, Millenium Hall separates itself from Pamela by giving some agency and power to women through the explicit right to surveil. The respective genders of Richardson, Scott, and their main characters creates an interesting dialogue regarding the scopic economy and the power of surveillance. Sarah Scott uses a male protagonist as the readers’ window into this utopia only to have him negate the societal expectations of men at the time because he does not use what he learns as a form of power to abuse. To contrast, Samuel Richardson counters these same expectations by having his female protagonist be defiant and challenging. These authors are writing characters that are of the opposite sex but the characters' actions are inline with the authors’ own sex. Scott and Richardson are in agreement that the usage of surveillance to create a power imbalance is inherently bad, that being said, they diverge in how to find a solution to the power imbalance created by this surveillance; where Richardson urges women to find power through their marriage, Scott explores surveillance as a means to find power in community.

In discussing the power of looking it is also critical to consider how characters’ are being perceived and the implications of that. In Pamela, the titular character is being pigeonholed, her parents establish early on that the worst thing she could possibly do is lose her virtue. This is inline with the thinking of the time. “If, then, you love us, if you value God's Blessing, and your own future Happiness, we both charge you to stand upon your Guard; and, if you find the least Attempt made up on your Virtue, be sure you leave every thing behind you, and come away to us; for we had rather see you all cover'd with Rags, and even follow you to the Church-yard, than have it said, a Child of ours preferr'd any worldly Conveniencies to her Virtue” (Richardson 14). In other words, her parents assert they would rather she die than lose her virtue. This extreme rationale comes from the pressures of 18th century Britain where women are to remain innocent lest they be ruined. Women were expected to be nothing short of virtuous. It is also important to clarify that women were the legal property of their fathers until marriage, when they became the property of their husbands. The perception that Richardson paints of Pamela is one where she is seen as innocent and naive, someone who can be taken advantage of. Rather, something that can be taken.

Within Pamela Mr. B uses surveillance as a weapon that he can use at will to impose upon Pamela. Early on in the novel it is revealed just what lengths he is willing to go to inorder to hold this power over the girl. “I have not been idle; but have writ from time to time how he, by sly mean Degrees, exposed his wicked Views: But somebody stole my Letter, and I know not what is become of it” (Richardson 22). This moment establishes the power dynamic happening between the two characters. Man and woman, rich and poor, boss and employee; all of these dynamics are compounding to provide insight on just how monumental the dissimilarities are between these two characters. Mr. B is holding all the cards, he is totally in control of their relationship, to Pamela’s dismay. By auditing her letters he is censoring her story in the sense that her parents cannot have a true understanding of what is going on and not even her word is her own. In reading Pamela’s letters he is claiming ownership of her writing and thus her mind.

Furthermore, Mr. B exposes the level of power 18th century British men ascertained through surveillance and how they prioritized their wants above all else. It is established within the novel that Mr. B was a rake, he was promiscuous and did not behave like a gentleman to or around women. Bowlby writes that, “Yet both men, the rake and the paragon of moral rectitude, stick to the same object of desire; and both get it, in the end, on terms which alter the conditions of their former wishes and imagined powers” (247). This is important because while Mr. B becomes a reformed rake, he first goes through tremendous lengths to wear down Pamela. More than that, it is in the same house where she is held prisoner that they get married. This demonstrates that no matter what Mr. B was going to get his way and the burden of remaining virtuous for both of them resides solely on Pamela and her resilience. When Pamela requests to go home Mr. B seemingly complies, in reality, this is a farce and he intends to hold her captive at another one of his homes. Women of the time were known to have anxieties over this constant surveillance by men, and that is evident through this novel. Pamela fears she has been duped and given Mr. B’s prior attempts to ‘ruin’ her, she is anxious that this is another attempt. On page 102 Richardson writes, “Hey-day! Thinks I, to drive this strange Pace, and to be so long a-going little more than twenty Miles, is very odd!”. This cements Mr. B’s use of surveillance to gain knowledge to manipulate Pamela as well as exemplifying Pamela’s anxieties surrounding her current predicament. He knows that she is meant to be going home yet he instructs the driver and attendants of the Lincolnshire estate to hold her there no matter what. This act is a deliberate choice to do as he pleases instead of attending to her wants or needs because as 18th century society predicates, a man does not need to be attentive to the whims of women.

Moreover, by claiming Pamela in such a way Mr. B would be stripping her of her virtue and his methodology for this is violent and almost duel-like. As if Pamela’s resistance to him is a challenge to his honor. When in reality his persistence and sexual aggressions are challenges to her virtue which is the only status she has. This weight wears on Pamela steadily through the novel. By page 171 Pamela is in a dark place. She manages to escape from her room and runs outside. By the pond, in this brief moment of privacy, Pamela is saturated by her current state of affairs and contemplates suicide. This is important because it highlights how significantly impacted she was by the extreme circumstances, her imprisonment, and the pressure of societal expectations. With Mr. B reading her letters and Pamela being held captive (her only company being somewhat of an enemy) she has been totally isolated. “By religious teaching and her physical bruises she is finally deterred from her sinful suicidal inclinations and seeks ‘shelter’ – from her own urges as from the threat which the ‘outside’ poses to her” (Puschmann-Nalenz 156). This highlights just how impactful the power of looking was in this time period. Finally free from the pervasive gaze of Mr. B she is overwhelmed by her circumstances and moved to a place of total despair. Pamela was written as a piece of conduct literature for young men and women of the time on how to remain honorable or virtuous. In this moment the only thing that prevents an actual suicide attempt by Pamela is the author using this text to be a moral guide. So Pamela disparages the thought of suicide because that is not morally correct under the guiding principles of Christianity.

Far from a singular instance, Richardson also imposes his male perspective on the narrative through Pamela’s characterization. Pamela’s personality is not highly representative of teenaged girls because Richardson was never a teenage girl. The actuality of Pamela’s character is not so docile; she has a tremendous wit and uses it to outsmart Mr. B on several occasions. She is conscientious of when she activates this power because she does not want her captor/suitor to catch onto her. This cleverness and the boldness enacted to confront Mr. B is not necessarily in line with the expected gender norms of the time. “Richardson’s authorial mind adopts the hypothetical perspective of the male aristocrat as imagined by Pamela and alternatively that of the female servant herself. Fictional cross-dressing regarding class and gender is strikingly present on the story level as on the level of narrative production” (Puschmann-Nalenz 154). That is to say, because Pamela’s actions and patterns of thought do not read as a teenage girl how surveillance is used within the novel to explore themes of gender, honor, and virtue coalesce and create a greater sense of a power imbalance in 18th century Britain.

Continuously, Richardson promotes power through marriage by having Pamela directly engage in the defiant act of looking back in her own marriage to Mr. B. In his proviso, Mr. B has provided Pamela with a list of rules for their marriage. Without any hesitancy, under the security of their marriage, she rebuts his first point. “1. That I must not, when he is in great Wrath with any body, break in upon him, without his Leave. —Well, I’ll remember it, I warrant. But yet I fansy this Rule is almost peculiar to himself” (Richardson 448). This moment highlights how Pamela may pose as the picture of innocence but in reality she has a fair amount of gall to her. She is being pushed by Mr. B to bend to his wills and she promptly makes clear that she will do as she pleases. Richardson’s response as Pamela is quite masculine in how it challenges Mr. B. Her nitpicking his proviso is a sharp and direct statement, so sharp that it has the same effect as drawing a sword in a duel.

In the reverse fashion, Mr. Lamont, who could be described as nothing short of a rake, embodies the masculine notion of individualism and how there is a correlation between surveillance and power. In the history of Miss Mansel and Mrs. Morgan, Mr. Lamont expresses his utter confusion, “'I am surprised,' interrupted Lamont, 'to hear ladies, who seclude themselves from the world in this solitary though beautiful place, so strongly plead for society” (Scott 111). In this moment, Scott establishes how Mr. Lamont perceives the world and colors how the reader perceives Mr. Lamont. He views their lack of men as reclusion and cannot comprehend the safety and closeness that these women must feel. While this is not a moment of pure chauvinism it does reveal that Scott does not believe that men with no honor understand women.

The “fictional cross-dressing” also applies to Millenium Hall, as a didactic work, this novel is meant to legitimize the independence of women in the eyes of both men and women. Scott assumes the voice of a male narrator and his male companion, which provides a ‘credible’ voice in this fight. Mr. Lamont becomes a reformed rake by the end of the novel and he shows a genuine appreciation for the way of life at Millenium Hall. “'I have nothing left me to say,' answered Lamont, 'than that your doctrine must be true and your lives are happy; but may I without impertinence observe that I should imagine your extensive charities require an immense fortune'” (Scott 247). Here we see Lamont no longer baffled by the women of Millenium Hall, rather he is inspired by them and sees the value in their way of life. So much so that he begins reading the bible and sets out on a spiritual journey because of his discussions at Millenium Hall. This reformation allows Scott to portray a man as a woman would want him to be rather than the actuality of male behavior in 18th century Britain.

Moreover, in Millenium Hall the power to surveil is not rooted in creating some sort of discrepancy or establishing a hierarchy. Within Millenium Hall the power of surveillance and information is communal and breaks from the 18th century conventions and expectations of women. Knowledge has always been a form of power and that is omnipresent in 18th century Britain. Surveillance is a tool that generates knowledge, and that knowledge is shared within the community of Millenium Hall. This collaborative approach to life strikes the narrator as strange. He is intrigued by the way of life but does not seek to impose himself on the women. This becomes apparent as soon as they get to Millenium Hall, “Some of these persons, I imagine, perceived us; for immediately after they entered, came out a woman, who by her air and manner of address, we guessed to be the house-keeper, and desired us to walk into the house till the storm was over” (Scott 58). Immediately, the male narrator is struck by how the women welcomed them with such warmth and compassion. The housekeeper gains knowledge of their arrival and does not report it to anyone or try to keep them out. Instead, she welcomes them in and offers shelter from the storm. This is a prime example of being attentive to the wants and needs of others, unlike in Pamela where those are cast aside in favor of individual needs, here those are brought to the forefront. In the mid-18th century the concept of marrying for love was rare. In other words, most marriages were the product of some other business or were born out of convenience and the women within them were often begrudging at best. All of that alloted for men to hold a looming power over the women around them. The absence of male power in Millenium Hall is crucial in establishing this place as a utopia as compared to the standard conventions of the rest of the world. Thus, Scott poses the concept of community as the counterpoint to a scopic economy. Furthermore, the power of looking as a tool to form community is then cemented by the form of the novel itself. Like Pamela this is an epistolary novel, however the letters within Millenium Hall are written histories of the women of the Hall. With the male narrator learning about their lives in great detail he removes himself from imposing any agenda or self fulfilling goal on the women. For that, he is embraced and treated as warmly as anyone else within their community.

As Millenium Hall is didactic, Scott's lesson to the reader is that selfishness and the inability to care for others is a key marker to indicate someone with insidious values. The relationship between individualism and community in mid-18th century Britain is one that is difficult to navigate for women in particular. “The narrative demonstrates the emerging freedom of the individual, male or female, with constant negotiations between individuality and Pamela’s relationality through filial, religious, marital, parental and social duties” (Puschmann-Nalenz 164). With this in mind, it is clear to see how surveillance and the observation of others in Millenium Hall is used to protect the community. Gossip in the 18th century was key to the safety of women, by letting other women know discreetly who was dangerous and who was not there was a sense of protection. The impact of community being an extension of surveillance can be seen in how other characters are perceived. Mr. Hinton, for example, is the guardian of Louisa who then seeks to take advantage of her and becomes predatory. In describing him from the history of Miss Mancel and Mrs. Morgan the narrator writes that, “He lived entirely in the country and seemed to be totally insensible to the pleasure of contributing to the happiness of others. All his tenderness was confined within the narrow circle of himself” (Scott 155). His reclusive nature and selfish behavior was noted and will forever be an indication of his character. He is not someone they think of fondly and his self-centeredness outlasts his memory. His observed actions proved him to be honor-less and the women navigated around him in a way that protected them (as a collective) as much as possible.

In conclusion, Millenium Hall and Pamela are in conversation with each other as well as the concept of the scopic economy because they both consider how the power of looking can be used to gain knowledge. From which they can use that ability to leverage power, or not, against those around them. The concept of converting surveillance into power presents itself differently in each of these novels. Richardson uses the power against his female protagonist to uphold the individual whims of a masculine figure until they get married. Within Pamela the reader experiences how through marriage a woman can find a voice of her own and the surveillance of other men becomes negated by her own power. Scott, on the other hand, subverts classic patriarchal individualism in favor of a form of surveillance that empowers and nurtures a safe environment for women without matrimonial involvement. Within Millenium Hall it is explored how if women are able to be wholly independent they can then establish community and support each other in place of individualized power. In the 21st century, the nuances of both of these arguments can be seen, where women are free to choose either option and are afforded all the same rights regardless of marital status. Both novels posture themselves as being conduct literature meant to inform and guide young men and women. The larger picture that these novels paint of 18th century Britain is one that is in conflict with how to get to a place of gender equity but is in agreement that there is work to be done on that front. These works utilize surveillance as a tool wherein women can be seen regardless of whether or not they want to be. There is a clear display of how the person surveilling them gains knowledge and can then choose whether or not to weaponize that power. This serves as a direct commentary of mid-18th century Britain where the power of looking is so strong that anxious women wear vizards to negate it.

Works Cited

Baker, John, et al. Writing and Constructing the Self in Great Britain in the Long Eighteenth Century. Manchester University Press, 2019, pp. 151–169. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctv18b5nx4.

Bowlby, Rachel. ““Speech Creatures”: New Men in Pamela and Pride and Prejudice.” Paragraph, vol. 32, no. 2, July 2009, pp. 240–251, https://doi.org/10.3366/e026483340900056x. Accessed 6 Apr. 2025.

Richardson, Samuel. Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded. 1740. Oxford, Oxford Univ. Press, 2008.

Scott, Sarah. Millenium Hall. Broadview Press, 3 Oct. 1995.