Editing The Luck of Barry Lyndon (section)

===The second publication in England===
When republished in 1865,<ref group="N">However, a pirated edition was published in the United States in 1852.</ref> along with several other stories, in a book titled ''Miscellanies'';<ref>{{harvsp|Stephen|1856|pp=ii, 26, 783–785}}.</ref> the novel became ''The Memoirs of Barry Lyndon, Esq., By Himself'', the publisher's initiative followed by a plethora of pompous mentions emphasizing the grandiose destiny of the scoundrel.<ref>{{harvsp|Ray|1952|p=131}}, note 60.</ref>

This version contains some modifications: the first two chapters were merged into one; in the second part, the beginning of chapter XVII was deleted; and a long passage from the conclusion dealing with immanent justice was deleted. Original, Thackeray wrote, that this justice is absent from this world, with villains remaining rich while honest people are just as poor; and further insisting a little later "Justice, great God! Does human life show justice in this way? Do the good always ride in a gilded carriage and the wicked go to the hospice? Is the charlatan never preferred to the capable? Does the world always reward merit, never fall for verbiage, never rush to hear some ass bray from his pulpit?". In addition, some of the digressions written in the third person, actually intrusions by the author, are reinserted, but in the first person, that is, placed this time in Barry's mouth. Finally, the pseudonym Fitz-Boodle is abandoned, and ''Miscellanies'' in its entirety is signed by [[William Makepeace Thackeray]].

Although the book was harshly judged during its serialization, the tone changed considerably upon its publication in volumes. By 1856, Thackeray was recognized as one of the masters of the English novel, and his works were appreciated with greater consideration. The influential ''[[Saturday Review (London newspaper)|Saturday Review]]'', founded by [[Alexander Beresford Hope]] in 1855, considered Barry Lyndon to be the most characteristic and successful of Thackeray's works. Several of the author's colleagues emphasized the tour de force represented by this novel, particularly Trollope, who proclaimed that "if Dickens revealed the best of his creative power early in life, Thackeray showed himself to have a superior intellect. Never has the strength of his mind been raised higher than in Barry Lyndon, and I know of no storyteller whose intellectual faculties can surpass this prodigious enterprise." American writer William Dean Howells, who read the novel as early as 1852, wrote that it was "the most perfect creation [...] a fabulous feat of pure irony." Finally, Anne Thackeray Ritchie, the novelist's daughter, after recounting the anecdote in which her father advised her against reading the book, wrote: "Certainly, it is a difficult book to love, but one admires it for its consummate power and art."