CT> The first novel actually came some time after that.  From what
 CT> I remember, (which is always suspect) the first novel was
 CT> named "PAMELA" and was written in England in the 1800's.  I
 CT> think it was the first non-poetic attempt to tell a story
 CT> using events, etc. that didn't actually happen.  I do remember
 CT> being amazed that it happened so late in history.  Again,
 CT> don't quote me on this one, because the memory is vague at
 CT> best.  I remember the title because of Pamela Dean.
_Pamela or Virtue Rewarded_, a novel by S. Richardson, published
1740-1.
The first of Richardson's three novels, _Pamela_ consists, like
them, entirely of letters and journals, of which Richardson presents
himself as the 'editor'. He believed he had hit upon 'a new species
of writing' but he was not the inventor of the epistolary novel,
several of which already existed in English and French. He did
however raise the form to a level hitherto unknown and transformed
it to display his own particular skills.
        --The Oxford Companion to English Literature, ed. Margaret
          Drabble, fifth editon
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