---
product_id: 5737193
title: "Roxana: The Fortunate Mistress (Oxford World's Classics) Paperback – Illustrated, September 1, 2008"
brand: "daniel defoejohn mullan"
price: "4015 kr"
currency: ISK
in_stock: true
reviews_count: 13
url: https://www.desertcart.is/products/5737193-roxana-the-fortunate-mistress-oxford-worlds-classics-paperback-illustrated-september
store_origin: IS
region: Iceland
---

# Roxana: The Fortunate Mistress (Oxford World's Classics) Paperback – Illustrated, September 1, 2008

**Brand:** daniel defoejohn mullan
**Price:** 4015 kr
**Availability:** ✅ In Stock

## Quick Answers

- **What is this?** Roxana: The Fortunate Mistress (Oxford World's Classics) Paperback – Illustrated, September 1, 2008 by daniel defoejohn mullan
- **How much does it cost?** 4015 kr with free shipping
- **Is it available?** Yes, in stock and ready to ship
- **Where can I buy it?** [www.desertcart.is](https://www.desertcart.is/products/5737193-roxana-the-fortunate-mistress-oxford-worlds-classics-paperback-illustrated-september)

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## Customer Reviews

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐ 







  
  
    Oxford Press is likely the best way to read Roxana
  

*by R***Z on Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on March 9, 2018*

This work could easily deserve five stars depending on your taste and desire, but I've given it four simply because Defoe can at times be cumbersome and pedantic.Roxana serves as a novel that is more interesting to analyze than breeze through in my opinion. It deals with many intriguing themes and ideas, some which were certainly at least somewhat novel at the time of publication in 1724, such as: the desperation of poverty, the value and status of female virtue, the feared Master/Slave dichotomy of marriage, the all consuming nature of avarice, lust, vanity, and pride, and the whether repentance can be genuine or meaningful.There are a fair amount of similarities between Roxana and Moll Flanders, but Roxana deals more with the escape from poverty and marriage into what may be considered an equally morally dangerous, albeit less dismal, realm of riches and desires.A few quotes:"...that's a hard thing too, that we should judge a Man to be wicked because he's charitable; and vicious because he's kind: O Madam, says Amy, there's abundance of Charity begins in that Vice, and he is not so unacquainted with things, as not to know, that Poverty is the strongest Incentive; a Temptation, against which no Virtue is powerful enough to stand out...""In things we wish, 'tis easie to deceive;What we would have, we willingly believe.""So possible is it for us to roll ourselves up in Wickedness, till we grow invulnerable by Conscience; and that Centinel once doz'd, sleeps fast, not to be awaken'd while the Tide of Pleasure continues to flow, or till something dark and dreadful brings us to ourselves again.""That the very Nature of the Marriage-Contract was in short, nothing but giving up Liberty, Estate, Authority, and every-thing, to the Man, and the Woman was indeed, a meer Woman ever after, that is to say, a Slave. [...] I added that whoever the Woman was, that had an Estate, and would give it up to be the slave of a Great Man, that Woman was a Fool, and must be fit for nothing but a Beggar; that it was my opinion, a Woman was as fit to govern and enjoy her own Estate, without a man, as a Man was, without a woman; and that if she had a-mind to gratifie herself as to Sexes, she might entertain a Man, as a Man does a Misstress; that while she was thus single, she was her own, and if she gave away that power, she merited to be as miserable as it was possible that any Creature cou'd be.""This, however, shews us with what faint Excuses, and with what Trifles we pretend to satisfie ourselves, and suppress the Attempts of Conscience in the Pursuit of agreeable Crime, and in the possessing those Pleasures which we are loth to part with."As you can tell, the Oxford text is a facsimilie presentation of the original work down to the period-specific spelling. This does make the book harder to read at pace, but I actually enjoyed seeing the oddities and relics of written language.

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐ 







  
  
    Great view of life from another time via an old story.
  

*by H***T on Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on June 30, 2021*

You will like this book if you enjoy learning about history and different cultures across time.You might not like this book if you only read fast-paced pageturner stories.

### ⭐⭐⭐ 







  
  
    Roxana: The Unfortunate Mistress
  

*by J***E on Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on April 12, 2014*

Roxana is the young and beautiful wife of a foolish man who, after losing his business and money that he inherited from his father, abandons her with five children. For a woman in this situation in the early 18th century there are not many choices, but Roxana falls into one of the least desirable, that of a mistress. While she is quite successful, in terms of gaining a succession of wealthy benefactors, her own personal wealth and securing her financial future, it is at the expense of her relationship with her children, and their happiness as in order to embark on her career she has to first palm them off to relatives with limited resources.Defoe describes well the limited choices, and the consequences, faced by women who are abandoned and expected to make a living to survive with no employment opportunities, or help from family, the government or charity.  When she manages to amass a tidy fortune and has an honourable offer of marriage, which she can accept as she understands her husband is dead, she baulks at the thought of having to give over her funds to her husband and risk being placed in the same penniless situation again and so rejects the offer.She is unable to reunite with her children and shows little interest in doing so. Through her relationships she has three or four more children and they are suitably cared for, but do not know their parents. She does not seem to regret this and while this may seem strange to our modern view it possibly reflects the high child mortality rate of the time and the author being a man rather than a mother.The book gives an insight into the difficulties faced by women and their marriages. Defoe's views on marriage come through in the narrative as well as his views on poverty and its effects on moral choices. Roxana is a strong and likeable character who makes the best she can out of her circumstances but is not sensible enough, due to vanity and greed, to change her course when given the opportunity to do so. Ultimately she regrets her choices and ends her life in misery. Roxana is an early example of a literary tragedy.

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*Product available on Desertcart Iceland*
*Store origin: IS*
*Last updated: 2026-02-22*