23 https://doi.org/10.1080/00138398.2010.536363 English eng Bell, Nigel Contributor <p data-start="467" data-end="897">The article <span data-start="479" data-end="526" style="">“The Egoist and Meredith’s Essay on Comedy”</span> explores how <em data-start="540" data-end="559" style="">George Meredith’s</em> ideas about comedy influenced the modernist journal <em data-start="612" data-end="624" style="">The Egoist</em> and its writers, including <em data-start="652" data-end="666" style="">Dora Marsden</em> and <em data-start="671" data-end="677" style="">H.D.</em> (Hilda Doolittle). Meredith’s <em data-start="708" data-end="725" style="">Essay on Comedy</em> argues that true comedy exposes human folly through intellectual wit rather than emotional sentiment, serving as a “social corrective” that refines thought and behavior.</p><p> </p><p data-start="899" data-end="1370">The essay traces Meredith’s vision of the “comic spirit” — a detached, rational perspective that mocks vanity and pretension — and shows how <em data-start="1040" data-end="1052" style="">The Egoist</em> adopted this attitude in its modernist critique of Victorian morality, sentimentality, and conventional gender roles. The article suggests that both Meredith and <em data-start="1215" data-end="1227" style="">The Egoist</em> share a concern with <span data-start="1249" data-end="1308" style="">individual consciousness, irony, and moral intelligence</span>, using comedy as a means of liberation from social hypocrisy.</p> Taylor & Francis. 2010 pdf ISSN 0013-8398 Literary Studies The Egoist and Meredith’s Essay on Comedy mixed material Taylor & Francis.