Victorian

UNIVERSITY OF EL SALVADOR
WESTERN MULTIDISCIPLINARY CAMPUS
FOREIGN LANGUAGE DEPARTMENT
LITERATURE II
THE VICTORIAN PERIOD (1837- 1901)
The literature of the Victorian period was in some aspects a
continuation of the romanticism. The romantic emphases on
individualism, liberty, natural scenery, and the emotions were all
continued, but they were chastened and subdued , short , they were
domesticated. Domesticity was the a word for the Victorian Period: it
was the great era if the home, the family, the domestic virtues( the
Family Bible, magaines such as !ousehold "ords and the "oman#s
!ome $ompanion and the Family !erald.
Victorian literature modi%es romantic feeling with a tincture of
eighteen common&sense, romantic e'uberance with a tincture of neo&
classical restraint.
(nother strong similarity between the )omantic and Victorian literary
periods was their common opposition to materialism, to the
preoccupation with material wealth and material progress. The
*ndustrial )evolution was accelerated in Victorian times , and +ngland
was growing more and more wealthy at the top and more and more
poverty&stric,en at the bottom. The chief unifying factor in Victorian
literature is the revulsion it e'presses against ugliness, arrogance,
and vulgarity bred of the new wealth. -ic,ens. sympathetic
portrayals of the poor and satirical attac,s upon the harsh employers
such as /r. 0radgrind1 Tennyson#s caustic comments on the
arrogance of the newly rich in poems such as 23oc,sley !all4 or
2/aud41 Thac,eray#s lampooning of social snobbery : all these actions
stem from the same basic dissatisfaction with the impact of the
*ndustrial )evolution upon +nglish society. *f the Victorian writers
seem rather timid and half&hearted to us in their attac,s, a little too
ready to compromise, we should recognie that they were %ghting
against an enemy far more entrenched than we can easily imagine:
the tyranny of wealth.
Victorianism was an age of snobbery, of prudery (even the legs of a
table must be referred to as limbs, lest the former word e'cite
lascivious thoughts5, and of fre6uent hypocrisy and humbug. But if we
indict the age , we should not indict the writers of the age, for they
were all almost as critical of it as we are. 7or should we forget that
Victorian society had many di8cult problems to solve, and that it
made much progress towards their solution.
There was a problem that we have already glanced at: how to ta,e
advantage of the positive e9ects of the *ndustrial )evolution and yet
to mitigate its evil e9ects of unsanitary labour conditions, ugly
factories and smo,ed&clouded towns, over&powerful employers and
under&paid employees. This problem was not altogether solved, but
certain developments did much to ma,e our more e6uable and :ust
society possible: The various (cts setting minimum wage rates and
ma'imum wor,ing hours, the successive )eform Bills e'tending the
franchise to more and more members of the population, the
+ducation (cts, of ;<=> and ;<?; e'tending free education to all,
and the growth of socialist thoughts signalied by the development of
the Fabian movement in the eighties and nineties and foundation of
the 3abour Party in ;?>>.
(nother important Victorian problem concerned religious belief, and
particularly the con@ict between religion and science. The scienti%c
e'amination of the Bible, ,nown as the !igher $riticism, made it
appear that hitherto sacred boo, had some serious inconsistencies1
-arwin#s Arigin of the Bpecies (;<CD5, suggesting that man had
evolved from ape&li,e creatures over long centuries of time, made the
0enesis of (dam and +ve loo,, li,e a fairy&tale.
(nother important Victorian problem was that of the British +mpire.
The bravery of +nglish soldiers and sailors, and the enterprise of
+nglish merchant adventurers, had built up a great overseas empireE
in (merica, *ndia, (frica and in the Paci%cE in the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries. (lready, in the (merican )evolution of ;==F&
;=<CG, one large segment of that empire had split away. *n the
Victorian period there were restlessness in $anada, *ndia, *reland and
parts of (frica. Bhould +ngland see, to hang on to the +mpire by
brute force or should she give the colonies concessions which might
6uiet them for a while but allow them eventually to drift away from
herH There were e'tremists who wanted to rule with an iron hand, and
other e'tremists that wanted to get rid of the colonies entirely. !ere
again the Victorians made a large measure of progress towards a
solution. 3ord -urham#s )eport on $anada in ;<C< and the British
7orth (merica (ct of ;<F=, set a pattern of enlightened colonial
administration by which the modern $ommonweath has gradually
developed. Bomething more admirable that the triumph of brute force
was symbolied by the pageant of *mperial splendour that mar,ed
Iueen Victoria#s -iamond Jubilee in ;<?=.
This development of +nglish civiliation abroad, of course, meant that
+nglish literature was no longer con%ned to +ngland. The (merican
colonies had had the beginnings of literature well before the
revolution 1 early in the nineteenth century "ashington *rving, by
tales such as 2The 3egend of Bleepy !allow4 and 2)ip Van "in,le4
had won international audience.
*n the Victorian literature the romantic emphases on individualism,
natural scenery , and emotion are uppermost 1 the problems of an
industrial society are re@ected in -ic,ens and (rnold1 for all there is
the issue of religious belief in a scienti%c age1 for all there is the
problem of controlling material pride in a period of rapid material
e'pansion.
The early poems of (lfred, 3ord Tennyson were much criticied, but in
his later boo,s he rewrote some and omitted others altogether. !is
Poems, $hie@y 3yrical (;<C>5 and Poems5 (;<CC5 were an
improvement though they were still the wor, of a young man. The
music is there already, but the thought is not deep. 2The 3otus
+aster4, a poem on the wandering of Klysses and his men, gives a
taste of the rhythm of which Tennyson was a master. Tennyson ,new
well that more thought was needed in great wor,, and in ;<GL he
published two boo,s of poems which are serious and thoughtful as
well as musical. The rhythm is still there, and Fitgerald thought that
Tennyson never wrote better poems than these1 but today many
people prefer The *dylls of the Ming.
Tennyson had become a very careful artist, choosing each word and
its e'act place with close attention. *n 2/orte -#(rthur4 he put
/alory#s story in blan, verse in which the magic voice may clearly be
heard. The *dylls of the Ming included this short poem and others on
the same story: 2+nid4, 2Vivien4,4 +laine4, and 20uinevere4 appeared
in ;<F?, ;<=;&L and ;<<D. 2The Passing of (rthur4 describes at the
end how Bir Bedivere, in sorrow because of the end of the )ound Table
and the death of the other ,nights.
Tennyson used many metres and made e'periments with new ones.
!e tried he'ameters, and he was fond of the four&line stana rhyming
abba:
Net waftO me from the harbour mouth Oblow
"ild wind , * see, a warmer s,y
(nd * will see before * die
The palms and temples of the south
This is also the metre that he used for his long poem *n /emoriam
(;<CC&D>5, an elegy for his friend !allam, who died in Vienna at the
early age of LL.. Though the poem has its %ne 6ualities, it is too long
for a discussion of death alone, and the sorrow for the loss of a friend
gradually changes into an e'pression of a wider love of 0od and man.
*n general Tennyson#s shorter poems are better. 2Klysses4 (;<GL5
e'presses in %ne lines the leader#s decision to4 sail beyond the sunset
and the baths Af all the western stars until die4.
Tennyson#s plays are not important. The best is Bec,et (;<<G5 on the
sub:ect of a 6uarrel between Ming !enry ** and Thomas P Bec,et, who
was murdered at $anterbury in ;;=>. Tennyson#s in@uence in his own
time was immense. !e re@ected the changing ideas of his age in his
various poems.
)obert Browning was unli,e Tennyson. For Browning the intellect was,
from the beginning more important than the music. This made him
popular in universities after his death he did not re@ect very much of
the ideas of his time1 he did not go to an ancient university. !is
immense ,nowledge came from his studies in 3ondon, his travels and
his own wor,. !e was hopeful by nature and often attempted poems
beyond his powers. *n ;<GF he married +liabeth Barret, one of
+ngland#s ma:or poetesses, against her father#s wishes and in spite of
her bad health. They went to live in *taly at Florence, a place which
in@uenced the wor, of both.
Browning#s 2Pauline4 (;<CC5, containing more than ;,>>> lines, is only
part of a much longer poem that he planned but never wrote.
2Bordello4(;<G>5 is his most di8cult poem. *t is a story of events in
;L>> and its details are complicated. Ane of his successful dramatic
poems is 2Pippa Passes4 (;<G;5. *n this a girl, Pippa, wanders through
the town singing, and her song in@uences people who ( un,nown to
her5 hear it. Part of it is a cheerful as Browning himself:
The year#s at the spring
The day#s at the morn1
/orning#s at seven Q
(ll#s right with the world.
The poems in -ramatic 3yrics (;<GL5 and -ramatic )omances (;<GD5
are a great advance on Browning#s dramas. 2The Pied Piper of
!amelin4 a poem in the second of these boo,s, described the
removal of rats from a city by a musician whose music lead them
away.
Browning#s di8cult style is the result of his unusual ,nowledge of
words and his bold ways of building sentences. 2The )ing and the
Boo,4 (;<F<&?5 is a poem based on a boo, that he found in Florence.
*t is an old story of the murder of a wife Pompilia by her husband, told
in various ways of di9erent people, who do not always have the same
view of the details. (solando was published on the day of his death
This volume contain a lot of important poems.
(nother greatest poetess of this time is +liabeth Barret, who on her
marriage became +liabeth Barret Browning. Bome of her poems are
too long, but in a sonnet she could not write too much. Thus much of
her best wor, is contained in Bonnets from the Portuguese (;<D>5.
They were really an entirely original e'pression of her love for )obert
Browning:
!ow do * love theeH 3et me count the ways.
* love thee to the depth and breadth and height
/y soul can reach.
/ary Bhelley the poet#s wife is remembered now chie@y as the writer
of a famous novel of terror, Fran,enstein ( ;<;<5. Bhe also wrote The
3ast /an (;<LF5 the story of the slow destruction by a disease of
every member( e'cept one 5 of the human race.
$harles -ic,ens is considered to be one of the greatest +nglish
novelists, and he is one of the few whose wor,s did not become
unpopular after his death. !e began with Pic,wic, (;<CF&=5, which
came out in parts and gave +nglish literature some of its most
charming and amusing characters. /r. Pic,wic, himself is almost too
,ind to be true1 it is fortunate to for him that he meets and employs
the cheerful Bam "eller to ,eep him out of most of the trouble caused
by his own ,indness, or to comfort him with his words of wisdom
when the trouble has not been avoided.
Twice -ic,ens wrote historical novels, Barnaby )udge (;<G;5 and (
Tale of Two $ities (;<G?5, a story of the French )evolution and of
events in 3ondon at the same time. Bometimes his novels were partly
with purpose of improving social conditions. Aliver Twist (;<C=&<5, the
story of a poor boy#s cruel treatment and miserable adventures,
includes descriptions of hunger, stealing, murder and hanging. (
$hristmas $arol (;<GC5 is the story of a bad character who improves
his behaviour after a ghost tells him the manner of his death. !ard
Times (;<DG5 is set in industrial surroundings, where 0radgrind#s
children are brought up among hard facts and without any help for
the spirit. The son robs a ban,s, and the girl ma,es an unhappy
marriage1 but luc,ily the father suddenly understands his own
foolishness.
-avid $opper%eld (;<G?&D>5 is based on -ic,en#s own life, which had
a sad beginning. *t is one of the most popular of his novels. 7icholas
7ic,leby (;<C<&?5 is the tale of a boy who is left poor on his father#s
death. !e is sent to wor, in a school, -otheboys !all RS -o&The&BoysT,
where the master, B6ueers, treats forty forty miserable pupils
cruelly , and teaches them nothing. 7icholas gives the reader a good
deal of pleasure when he gives the criminal B6ueers a good beating ,
and then escapes.
-ic,ens#s prose varies in 6uality, but he is nearly always readable. *n
his di9erent novels he describes and attac,s many ,inds of
unpleasant people and places. E bad schoolmasters, government
departments, bad prisons, dirty houses. !is characters include
thieves, murderers, men in debt, stupid and unwashed men and
women, hungry children, and those who do their best to deceive the
honest. (lthough many of his scenes are terribly unpleasant, he
usually ,eeps the worst descriptions out of his boo,s1 therefore the
reader does not throw the boo, into the %re, but continues to read.
Bome of his gentler characters are wea,1 some of the sad situations
that he describes are too miserable to be true. !e uses too much
blac, paint. But he wanted to raise ,indness and goodness in men#s
hearts, and he uses tears and laughters to reach his aim. !e probably
brought some improvement in some conditions, but very often he
failed to do so.
"illiam /a,epeace Thac,eray studied and described the nobility
instead of the poor. !e followed in the steps of Fielding and
0oldsmith. !is best ,nown boo,, Vanity Fair (;<G=&<5 , describes the
adventures of two girls of di9erent sorts: )ebecca (Bec,y5 Bharp, a
clever, brave and poor girl without conscience1 and (melia Bedley,
the gentle daughter of a rich 3ondoner. The title of the novel comes
from Bunyan#s Pilgrim#s Progress. The 7ewcomes (;<DC&D5 is based on
the life, love and marriage of $live 7ewcome, the son of an
honourable o8cer who loses all his money. Thac,eray gives a good
picture of +nglish society in the ;<
th
century. Thac,eray was not a
romantic, and he did not produce his characters for the purpose of
e'pressing violent feelings. !e could describe strange 6ualities in
human beings, and he could also show life#s cruelties and people#s
wea,ness. !e wrote as an educated man.
$harlote Bronte#s %nest novel, Jane +yre (;<G=5, also describes the
life of a poor and unbeautiful girl who is brought up by a cruel aunt
and sent to a miserable school. (fter that she goes to teach the
daughter of /r. )ochester at Thorn%eld !all. (lthough she is not
beautiful, )ochester falls in love with her1 but when she discovers that
his wife is still alive, she runs away. 3ater the !all is burnt down and
the mad wife is ,illed. *n trying to save her, )ochester is blinded and
loses all hope of happiness. An hearing of all this, Jane marries him
and so is able to bring comfort into the remaining part of his life.
The boo, was very successful , although the heroine was neither
beautiful nor rich. *t is an hones description of strong feelings at a
time, when some feelings e'pressed in boo,s were shallow. The
power of the writing made it sell fast, and in a few months two more
editions were printed. The dialogue is more realistic, li,e real life, and
less formal than in many novels of the period. !ere are a few lines of
dialogue between Jane and )ochester which came near the end of the
boo,. ( Jane#s use of 2Bir4 might be e'plained by that fact that she
had been )ochester#s employee5:
2Jane will you marry meH4
2Nes, Bir.4
2( poor blind man, whom you will have to lead about by the handH4
2Nes, Bir.4
2 ( crippled man, twenty years older than you, whom you will have to
wait onH4
2Nes, Bir.4
2Truly JaneH4
2/ost truly, Bir.4
2AhU /y darlingU 0od bless you and reward youU4
(nother, and less important, novel by the same writer is Bhirley
(;<G?5, which is concerned with the wool industry, with riots, and the
7apoleonic wars.
$harlotte#s sister, +mily Bronte, wrote one of the greatest of +nglish
novels, "uthering !eights (;<G=5. The passionate !eathcli9 falls in
love with $atherine +arnshaw, but he hears her say that she could
never marry such a low sort of creature, and so he leaves the house.
Three years later, when he returns, he %nds that $atherine has
married +dgar 3inton, a man of wea, character. !eathcli9 then begins
a life of cruelty and revenge. $atherine dies, and !eathcli9 marries
+dgar#s sister and treats her very badly. The novel has been
compared to Bha,espeare#s Ming 3ear , chie@y because of its immense
and uncontrollable passions. *n the opinion of some critics, no woman
could have written it U
(nother woman novelist, ,nown as 0eorge +lliot, writes calmer boo,s
than this. !er real name was /ary (nn +vans. !er %rst novel was
(dam Bede (;<D?5, which in@uenced by memories of her childhood.
Bhe showed at once that she could draw character and describe
scenes with great s,ill, and that she had pity and humour. The /ill on
the Floss (;<F>5 and Bilas /arner ( ;<F;5 followed, and then she
wrote a historical novel about Florence, )omola (;<FC5. !er %nest
novel is probably /iddlemarch (;<=;&L5 which is set in a provincial
town where -orothea Broo,e, a girl of noble 6ualities marries old /r.
$asaubon1 but the marriage is a failure.
+liabeth $leghorn Btevenson became /rs. 0as,ell on her marriage.
Bhe is often considered a one&novel writer because of the immense
success of $ranford , a delicate picture of life in a village. Bocial
problems a part. !er other novel is /ary Barton ( ;<G<5, which shows
deep feeling for the poor employed at that time in factories. )uth
(;<DC5 is the sad story of a girl whose parents are dead. 7orth and
Bouth (;<DG&D5 is a study of the di9erent lives led by +nglish people,
especially the poor in the north and the happier ones in the south.