Moll Flanders: Introduction by John Mullan

This is the spirited story of a survivor whose racy anecdotes and shady dealings only underline her essential warmth and goodness. But there is nothing sentimental about Moll, who presents herself warts and all. Though her adventures take her abroad, she remains the vivid creation of London.

Moll Flanders, pickpocket and prostitute–a mercantile genius trading in the oldest human commodity–has been for the past three centuries an enduring representative of reckless vitality combined with unsh...