In addition to the definitive UVA text of Brown's seminal novel, this edition includes an introduction setting the work in its historical, literary, and intellectual contexts. Selections from William Godwin's Enquiry Concerning Political Justice (1793), Erasmus Darwin's Zoonomia; or,The Laws of Organic Life (1794), Benjamin Franklin's "A Narrative of the Late Massacres" (1764), and Thomas Barton's "The conduct of the Paxton-men" (1764) are included here, as are several of Brown's lesser-known but revealing writings on such subjects as somnambulism and the uses of history in fiction.