SOURCE: Introduction to The Lives of Cleopatra and Octavia, by Sarah Fielding, edited by Christopher D. Johnson, Bucknell University Press, 1994, pp. 15–31.

Below, Johnson discusses how Fielding blends fiction and biography to create a unique narrative form in The Lives of Cleopatra and Octavia which she uses to examine women's psychological complexity while exposing the corrupting power of human institutions.

When Sarah Fielding published The Lives of Cleopatra and Octavia in 1757, she was forty-seven years old and living in Bath under the patronage of Ralph Allen.¹ Known to many of the leading intellectuals of her day, she maintained important connections with Samuel Richardson and James Harris, each of whom contributed to her works.² From her correspondence, we know that her health was uncertain.³ Few other biographical facts of this period of her life have survived. The Lives of Cleopatra and Octavia was Fielding's seventh complete work. She established her...