novel

Extended fictional prose narrative, usually between 30,000 and 100,000 words in length, that deals imaginatively with human experience through the psychological development of the central characters and their relationship with a broader world. The modern novel took its name and inspiration from the Italian novella, the short tale of varied character which became popular in the late 13th century. As the main form of narrative fiction in the 20th century, the novel is frequently classified according to genres and subgenres such as the historical novel, detective fiction, fantasy, and science fiction.

Origins
The European novel is said to have originated in Greece in the 2nd century BC. Ancient Greek examples include the Daphnis and Chloë of Longus; almost the only surviving Latin work that could be called a novel is the Golden Ass of Apuleius (late 2nd century), based on a Greek model. There is a similar, but (until the 19th century) independent, tradition of prose narrative including psychological development in the Far East, notably in Japan, with, for example, the 11th-century Tale of Genji by Murasaki Shikibu.

Development
A major period of the novel's development came during the late Italian Renaissance, when the stimulus of foreign travel, increased wealth, and changing social patterns produced a greater interest in the events of everyday life, as opposed to religious teaching, legends of the past, or fictional fantasy. The works of the Italian writers Boccaccio and Matteo Bandello were translated into English in such collections as William Painter's Palace of Pleasure (1566–67). These inspired the Elizabethan English novelists, including John Lyly, Philip Sidney, Thomas Nashe, and Thomas Lodge.

Although the 17th century was dominated by the French romances of Gauthier de Costes de la Calprenède (1614–1663) and Madelaine de Scudéry, in Spain, Cervantes' Don Quixote (1604) contributed to the development of the novel through its translation into other European languages, and Grimmelshausen, whose Simplicissimus series (1669–72) was one of the earliest examples of the German novel, provided a satirical social commentary on the Thirty Years War. The English novel continued its development through the works of William Congreve and Aphra Behn. With the growth of literacy and cheaper book production, the novel rapidly developed from the 18th century to become, in the 20th century, the major literary form.