Thursday, April 23, 2020

Victorian Novel free essay sample

Many associate the word â€Å"Victorian† with images of over-dressed ladies and snooty gentlemen gathered in reading rooms. The idea of â€Å"manners† does sum up the social climate of middle-class England in the nineteenth century. However, if there is one transcending aspect to Victorian England life and society, that aspect is change. Nearly every institution of society was affected by rapid and unforeseeable changes. As some writers greeted them with fear and others embraced the progress, this essay will guide a reader through an important era in English literary history and introduce with the voices that influenced its shape and development. It was the novel that was the leading form of literature in the 19th century England. The term ‘novel’ itself was a simple narrative form, which in opposition to its forerunner, the ‘romance’ focused on the affairs of everyday life such as scientific discovery, religious debate, politics or colonial settlement. Though there are many arguments among critics which dates frame the period of Victorian literature, it is commonly accepted that it was the reign of Queen Victoria (1837-1901) that saw the novel emerge and flourish, all the more that the 1937 was the year when Dickens’ Oliver Twist, the first major work of fiction. We will write a custom essay sample on Victorian Novel or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page The first readers of both, Dickens and Eliot were not conscious they lived in the ‘Victorian period’. They thought that this was a modern era marked with turbulent transition. However, the most crucial writers of the period grew up in the earlier years, and had been influenced by the age of English Romanticism. Therefore, although Victorian was modern, materialist, factual and concerned with ‘things as they are’, Romantic, associated with Gothic, melodramatic, idealistic influenced the way novelists wrote in the beginning of the 19th century. I THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE NOVEL It was the Industrial Revolution that allowed not only cheap printing and papermaking but also rapid book distribution by rail at the time of flourishing reading population. Reading was some kind of a creative act for lower middle class with political connotation. A good example is the one of the pottery worker Charles Shaw who saved a space only for his books in spite of living in poky room. For such people printing was still not cheap enough, that is why reading aloud remained vital. Since 1870, when novel had been stated as a ‘rational amusement’(Trollope), texts became cheaper. They were eagerly bought as a casual recreation and for railway reading. That kind of Victorian novel, for the middle-class was a mixture of old values and images seen now through the prism of science: psychology, evolution, sociology. Spiritual and temporal worlds are darkened by the shadows of change† and the country was something compared to the heart of revolutions, which referred to the English heydays in terms of urban, social and cultural changes. What were the most significant signs of progress? Firstly, it is worth mentioning the importance of the expansion of railways. In a short time it greatly influenced not only the landscape of the country but also the perception of the space and time. Books, journals, reviews, magazines, papers became the portion of travelling. Even libraries, like those of Edward Mudie and W. H. Smith, thanks to the railways could send different forms of literature to provinces and overseas. Changes in the industry and society were equal to the changes in the novel. Themes like sea adventures after Napoleonic Wars, concerns with Ireland, rural people, nostalgia for country in urban England, fashionable London life, appeared in the novels of Frederick Marryat, William Carleton, Samuel Lower, Robert Surtees, Mrs Gore, Lady Blessington and even Charles Dickens. Despite many changes, the novel remained as the invariable centre of the contemporary debate. The next important factor of the development of ‘Victorian period’ is connected with the time of 1847-1849. The time commonly known as years of revolutions and fighting across the Channel, in Britain was completely different. Here, the most vital issue for all citizens was stability and rising standards of living. Artists of ‘Pre- Raphaelite Brotherhood’ claimed to write only true about nature, concentrate only on the true ideas. These three years saw the rise of such works: of Bronte sisters’ Poems, Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre, Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights, William Thackeray’s Vanity Fair. The Following twenty years could be seen as the high period of ‘Victorian novel’. Despite being a mixture of boom and slump, the years of 1850-1870 were recognized by the economic growth. The nation was the richest in the continent, a leader in trade, with the largest city, London. The authors during these years were mainly focused on morality and decorum, although it was sometimes a great challenge. Mostly, novels were mirror-like for public events and scandals. Nevertheless, religious, domestic and Gothic elements also appeared. In 1860 the novel experienced some changes, mainly due to the fact that its new type emerged- sensational fiction. Written as more entertaining form, it appealed to the middle-class women, especially housewives. They were interested in the tales of bigamy, double identity, violence, set in the realities close to what they were familiar with. What is more, during that time the nation had to face two challenges of social quality. The position of the women in society and their rights to own property within marriage, and the problem of illiteracy- poorer classes were not familiar with the skill of reading. Those were the reasons for the creation of a mass readership less concentrated on tradition, intellect, and morals. During 1881-1901 the Great Britain was shaping into the country known all over the world today, particularly thanks to the development of electricity. Lower prices, better conditions of work, equal rights for women made the status of British citizens improve. In terms of the novel development, it was the â€Å"time of straight speaking, when men wrote from their hearts in a way that would be scorned in these days of subtle intellectualism† as Yens wrote in his The Novels of Wilkie Collins. Authors were like strangers, unknown in the society of the common. Popular texts emphasized anxieties of British conflicts around the world. Novels were full of overseas adventures, religious beliefs, doubts and a danger of psychic possession by the evil stranger Henry James, who spoke for the future changes in the novel, claimed that fiction would be always the same, described either by the means of imagination or real world. He emphasized the role of creativity in the process of producing novels. In contrast, Walter Besant stood for simplicity in the mentioned art that could not pass the clear vision of reality. However, the one who brought the genre into the following period was Stevenson. In his point of view the main aim for an author to achieve was to give pleasure without forgetting about artistic and moral values. In 1848, G. H. Lewes claimed that â€Å" Art always aims at the Representation of Reality, i. e. of Truth†. Realism was a centre of ‘Victorian novel’. The best definition of that term can be the one by See Raymond, written in his ‘Keywords’. In his eyes ‘realism’ is â€Å"a description of facing up to things as they really are, not as we imagine or would like them to be†. There were a few approaches to this new thought expanding on the art. Masson tried to draw a distinction between what was ‘realistic’ and ‘idealistic’. Dickens still thought the highest truths could be only expressed thanks to imagination. Bunyan’s â€Å"Pilgrim’s Progress† or Hogarth’s â€Å"Harlot’s Progress† changed objects and situations from everyday life into moral allegory and saw the real ‘truth’ in the moral truths of the Bible. Writers like Trollope saw the ‘realism’ in everyday happenings, and George Eliot was the one who approached ‘realism’ with the deep knowledge of psychology, physiology, sociology, history. Thus, taking English ‘Realism’ of Victorian novel into account, it must be emphasized that it was strongly under the influence of science. Historical novel became one of the highest qualities for the British society that sought for the nation’s identity in the era of changes. The author, seen as the genius in this form of writing was Sir Walter Scott. Influenced by German Romanticism, thus aware of the role of imagination, made the British readers interested in this type of reading by means historical characters with their cultural identities and roots in known places, customs and speech. The first English prose story-teller perceived the history through the experiences of the common people. Sir Walter Scott ascribed the ‘Victorian consciousness’ with the Anglo-Saxon culture and by that he established the ancestry of the English as heroes of prose fiction. He had made the nineteenth century novel possible to appear not only in England but also in Germany, Russia end even the United States. â€Å"History is the essence of innumerable biographies†, claimed Carlyle. Biography itself had a huge influence on the shape of the Victorian fiction. The biography takes its origin back in the Romantic experience of a unique and developing individual reflected in the genre of ‘self-development romance’. However, the romantic biography did not bring the subject to the novel but rather changed its scope of focus to the nature and meaning of human life itself. That concept found a strong affinity with the nonconformist early 19th century Britain. What is interesting, the flourishing of biographies made the women writers set their central role in the process of the development of the ‘Victorian novel’. By means of the biographical fiction, they were able to express their gender identity as the texts usually underlined the close relationship between the author and the reader. Biography was proclaimed to have been â€Å"the most universally profitable, universally pleasant, of all things, especially the Biography of distinguished individuals†. It selected from and interpreted the life of its subject, turning the artist from introspection to engagement with the essence- life itself. By connecting both individual experience and social reality, biographical narrative became fundamental to the agenda of the Victorian novel According to Trollope, Victorian era was the time in the history when the novelist took the position ,occupied before by the preacher, the dramatist, the essayist or the poet, a position of moral arbiter. Not only did religion and morals appear in Victorian novel as motifs, implicated in its interest in moral choice, attitude towards science, life and death , but also had broad impact on the whole fiction of that era. As enormous part of religious institutions and clergy were corrupt , it stood for the subject of severe criticism. Especially in Britain that appalling fact provided a theme, a microcosm of wider society or a background for Victorian novels of such authors like Oliphant, Trollope or Dickens. The latter one was concerned to be the progenitor of hostile stereotypes of ministers and clergy, examples of which could be easily found in the characters of Reverend Mr Stiggins, the fat Shepherd in â€Å"Pickwick Papers† or Reverend Mr Melchisedech Howler in â€Å" Dombey and Son†. Apart from these who were constantly highlighting faults of clergymen , there were also a few more objective writers. One of them was Eliza Lynn Linton, who in â€Å"The Autobiography of Christopher Kirkland† used fiction as a mask that gives more freedom than a real-life writing. Linton showed the denial of finding refuge from personal tragedy in religion, faith and eventually contemplating death in the stoic manner. On the basis of constant controversies and doubts of faith, religious consciousness affected Victorian fiction as a whole. It could be especially well seen in the way that traditions in which the authors were bred, influenced their works. As an example, one can analyse the biography of the Bronte sisters, who were subjected to the Anglican ideals represented by their father, and the Methodist ones of their aunt, both of which shaped imaginative world of sisters fiction. The next example of the religious writers was Dickens, who rejected the orthodox doctrine, considering the New Testament as a part of social action and was drawn to the Unitarianism. Reappearing motif of â€Å"Christmas† is said to be an emblem of Dickens social altruism. For instance, it is observable in the character of Scrooge in â€Å"A Christmas Carol† , which resembles the evangelical conversion narrative – stages from revelation ,through repentance and the experience of a warmed heart ,to the changed life. On the other hand, there is a Trollopes approach, which differs completely from the one mentioned above. Although the novelist shows no sympathy for the corrupted church, he insists on the fact that changing centuries of tradition on the point of principle is not so simple. The point is probably to allow the reader to understand that there are no absolute rights and that ,according to Trollope, the moral issues arose from the gradual working out of the individual conscience within the complexities of social reality at a particular historical moment. The following aspect which is worth concerning in the case of Victorian novel is the motif of evolution. It was frequently connected with the absence of God, like in â€Å"Frankenstein† by Mary Shelley, where there was neither Heaven no Hell, no damnation or redemption presented. This is only one example of how Victorian prose mirrored the ferment of contemporary scientific debates about the nature of life, intensified by the publications of the evolutionists such as Charles Darwin, Sir Charles Lyell, Robert Chambers and their opponents like Thomas Love or Benjamin Disraeli. Besides the struggle about the origin of mankind , on the grounds of social problems, the atheistic study of social evolution appeared and formed the basis of sociology. Many argue that the influence of Darwinism was beyond the consciousness and frequently independent of Darwins actual writing. As a matter of fact, Darwinism shaped the fiction of writers who had never read a page of Darwin. Beginning of the 19th century brought another innovation in prose, which was the birth of a new genre , called detective story. The main precursor of this form were William Godwin and Edgar Allan Poe, who in their works introduced a detective character, the crime and clues, the announcement of a solution and denouement. Later on, the character of detective was also used by such writers as Dickens or Collins. Although, Collins â€Å"The Moonstone† is considered to be the greatest Victorian detective story, presenting the enigmatic character of Sergeant Cuff , the private detective came fully into fiction in Conan Doyles â€Å"Sherlock Holmes† which personified a new moral order. Apart from the motifs reappearing in the Victorian novel, there are also some basic elements in the experience of reading that have changed for the modern reader. As far as feelings and emotions are concerned, more attention was paid to human feelings of the common people, childhood, domestic affairs and the ideal of womanhood. To awaken the sense of pity by enabling the reader to empathise with the experience of others, became a task of the novelist. The essence of a work does not lie in the course of action, but in the structure of emotions evoked in its reader. However, these structures of feeling changed over the era of Queen Victoria and were to some extent associated with social class division. One can distinguish a few phases of readers attitude towards sentimentalism and ubiquitously appearing emotions: from the time of fascination to the lack of interest in the undisciplined heart. Due to the rapid enrichment of middle-class families and improvement of life conditions, the home itself became an emblem of refuge from public life. Home was the place in which members of Victorian family gathered in order to read aloud to each other. This particular habit influenced the prose of those times in the way that it not only had to be suitable for adult men, but also for women and children. As a result, the action of many novels took place in a domestic setting and mirrored everyday struggles of ordinary people. It was a commonplace that an addressee of a literary work, inspired by a plot, identified himself with the characters presented in it. The Victorian era, as much as the Victorian novel itself concerned some socially important issues such as prostitution and pornography. Frequently sexual relationships appeared as central to the plots, however their physical aspect was rather implicit and reticence about it only intensified the literary effect. Eroticism was omnipresent in such discreet gestures as brief eye contact or fleeting touch of lovers hand. Despite the prior nterest, by the 1860s family reading was declining and as a consequence appeared sensation novel, the main addressee of which became an ordinary woman. This resulted in the formation of the model of domestic heroine – a governess who has worked her way up from poverty and demonstrated a womans nurturing devotion. Further innovation was the realist novel which used the eye as a device confirming factual reality. W riters started using various complex methods of transferring the visual into words, giving meaning to details such as colour of the hair or cut of the dress. That was the time when things took on a life of their own, dramatically visible, they became signifiers of class and fashion and gained a patina of significance through usage. For instance, buildings described in Dickens works had their own personalities ; places functioned as characters in the narratives. Different perspectives on a single action were provided by introducing multiple narrators in the sensation novel of the mid-century, as a result of which the mystery of individual vision was dramatised. On the other hand, science discovered unreliability of the physical eye, revealed frequent conflicts between the senses and the intellect and was interested in blindness and visual illusion. Victorian era was also an age when the theatre and prose highly influenced each other. On the one hand, some novelists considered dramatic situation to be an important element that gives vitality to their works, On the other, there were many plays meticulously recreating popular prints. There even appeared books on how human passions should be represented by an actor. As a great innovation there appeared a new genre, the theatre of emotions and music, called melodrama. It soon became a tool used by the oppressed society to reflect critical situation in England and to express longing for restoration of harmony. Therefore the form was modified to deal with concerns of the common people. Due to the wide variety of types of melodrama, it enabled all kinds of addressees to identify with characters in a stereotyped plot comprising some moral message. The use of melodrama in the novel was pioneered by Dickens, who implied it in works such as â€Å"Nicholas Nickelby† or short instalments in â€Å"Hard Times†. It was especially used to intensify and heighten a realistic narrative. Despite its popularity, melodrama evoked a struggle between critics. Some of them claimed that this form had been created in opposition to intellectual traditions, others stated that it offered dramatization of essential spiritual conflict. It is also said that melodrama influenced the development of psychology and even passed over into the Freudian conception. According to Bentley, in our dreams each of us is kind of an actor and melodrama is the articulation of the subconscious, realized in sleep. Gradually the genre itself turned inwards to the dramas of psyche and caused the decay of convention of good and evil, making them look empty and stereotypical. Another element in the Victorian reading experience that changed for the modern reader is a concept of time and space. The New age came with a different set of expectations and can be trusted to reflect the spirit of the age by means of being shaped by various technological devices and inventions (gaslight, electric telegraph, railway), which highly influenced and stimulated the novel itself. The true meaning and the significance of time must be understood as something that in relation with ‘space’ revolutionized the perception of the 19th century world thus creating a space for the new comprehensive method, both accurate and precise. The 19th century novel gained – literally and figuratively- a completely new dimension. Moreover, a genuine sense of connection between the past and the present was to be a fundamental principle governing the relation between those two time units while considering the construction of the novel. It was believed that reliance on the past principles is fundamental to the novel writing in present. While taking into consideration the ‘realist’ Victorian novel it must be mentioned that they tended to follow strict formula and their narrative was constructed within a strict chronology. Apart from containing some obvious literally embellishments, they followed a fixed pattern of composition (â€Å"Novels were typically set back in time, not to evade temporal reality, but to fix it in an objective distance. ) As already mentioned, the Victorian concept of time was related to its sense of space. By the use of familiar or challenging locations in which narrative took place, a new sense and time-space relation is created. The exact precision in which setting was constructed influenced the credibility of each artistic work. From the industrial revolution till the 19th century the process of migration was rapidly increasing. English cities were becoming more modernized and more attracting for the foreigners. Thus London became the centre of a world. The resultant process of urbanization channeled its consequences into the creation of the novel: certain literary techniques were employed into the novel. London’s characteristics, topography, communities were some of the elements that stimulated the development of the novel. II KEY AUTHORS In order to gain some more understanding on how this genre changed and shaped throughout the century, some names have to be mentioned. It is essential to take a closer insight into the work of some novelists and consequently their contribution to the development of the Victorian novel. William Harrison Ainworth is known as one of the most popular historical novelists of the 1840s. Though he was very accurate in historical details, he was not skillful at creating an elaborate plot, characterization and dialogue. However, the phenomenon of the writer was his unique artistic ability to construct a fiction so appealing and so strikingly genuine that it was taken as fact. What is more, he launched a brand new character – he transformed an 18th century criminal into an urban hero (Jack Sheppard). From early days fascinated by popular melodrama, Mary Elizabeth Braddon (later Maxwell), was to eventually become one of the most successful writers of the sensational novel. Being a prolific author, soon became recognized as ‘Queen of the Circulating Libraries’, publishing over 80 novels, among which the most recognizable were John Marchmont’s Legacy and The Doctor’s Wife. In the later stage of her literary career she was involved into more serious social issues, making use of a satire, adopting literary models from working class fiction and elevating the profile of a woman, by which she gained the huge interest from the feminist critics. The Yorkshire Bronte sisters wrote under pseudonyms; Charlotte Bronte, ‘Currer Bell’, Emily [Jane] Bronte, ‘Ellis Bell’ and Anne Bronte, ‘Acton Bell’. From their early age they were interested in natural and contemporary science, philosophy and literature. Having great imagination, they wrote in the way that their works did not lack originality. Jane Eyre, Violette, Wuthering Heights are considered to be the very best novels and masterpieces written by the sisters. Another writer worth mentioning is Wilkie [William] Collins. His knowledge of the law and crime along with the lifelong love for the stage shaped his sensation fiction. His novels were full of violence and amorality (Basil), some featured ‘an ingenious and morally ambivalent heroine’ (No Name) and some explored the psychology of a human being (Armadale). â€Å"A master of ingenious plotting, he successfully adapted his novels for the stage, declaring, in the Preface to Basil, that ‘the Novel and the Play are twin-sisters in the family of Fiction’†. The author’s talent combined with an overdosing of opium resulted in the originality and the thriving convention of his dark novels. The popular notion and genius of Charles [John Huffam] Dickens was that his body of art was something transcendental and having ever-growing influence up to now. He wrote Oliver Twist, Nicholas Nickleby, Christmas stories (A Christmas Carol), â€Å"problem-of- England† novel (Dombey and Son), sensational novels ( Great Expectations) and many other works. It is believed that most of them are so well constructed and developed that their full acknowledgement is beyond the capacity of a human brain. One can credit Arthur Conan Doyle for creating the apotheosis of the detective story on the basis of the creation of a character Sherlock Holmes, which turned out to be extremely popular. What is more, he provided an accurate visual representation of the setting (he made â€Å"the fictional 221B Baker Street, one of the most famous addresses in London in his works†). As a matter of fact Doyle valued more the historic novel (The White Company, The Great Shadow) as â€Å"a more worthy form of fiction† that is why, he later continued to write only historical fiction. Another versatile and prolific female author is Elizabeth Gaskell. With her industrial novel Mary Barton (later edited: North and South) first established her position among great names of writers. Gaskell provides a great insight into common humanity (Novels of the Eighteen-forties) as no one else did before. She â€Å"transformed† the ‘social problem’ novels by enriching its formula with empathy, love sub plot, drama, detailed â€Å"portrait† of life of single poor individuals. Gaskell was also fond of historical fiction, the best example of which is her Sylvia’s Lovers. Many of compelling narratives in English fiction we owe to Thomas Hardy, English novelist and poet. Not only was he a very successful writer, but also he made use of a different variants of the genre. He slightly modified the regional novel, and wrote socialist, comedic, historical novels. What is more, in his style of writing we can also trace the elements of sensational novel. He gained fame after publishing Under the Greenwood Tree, Far from the Madding Crowd, Tess of the D’Urbervilles and Jude the Obscure. An American-born writer, Henry James, although often excluded from the studies on Victorian novel contributed to the evaluation and development of the novel. His novels look from the typical American perspective on the world (Portrait of a Lady) exploring the issue of perception and consciousness (he was regarded as 19th century figure of realism) and examine the theme of supernatural (The Turn of the Screw). Douglas Jerrold’s works played an important role in the social controversies of 1840s. He is most remembered for his satire revealing the contrasts between the rich and poor (A Man Made of Money, The History of St Giles and St James). Among his best known of his numerous works are: melodramas (Black-Ey’d Susan, The Rent Day) Charles Kingsley was the leading writer of religious novels. Some of his works were written in an autobiographical form. In addition, he wrote historical novels often combined of anti-Catholicism moods (Hypatia), imperialism and superiority of a man over a woman. Alienated from Britain, born in India, Rudyard Kipling gained a great sense of sensibility and awareness to eventually become the finest British colonial writer. By focusing on other culture and values he ultimately established a new mode or scope of the perception of colonies. He is best known for his works of fiction, including The Jungle Book. George McDonald’s works have its special logic, most of which is based on the duality of the world, folklore tradition, myths and mystical state of mind. His numerous works of fiction for both children and adults are among his finest works (At the Back of the North Wind). They are visionary, imagination oriented and serve as an inspiration for such literary figures as C. S Lewis or even J. R. R. Tolkien. Another widely read author in the Victorian era was Edward Bulwer- Lytton. His life experience influenced his style of writing, the proof of which is â€Å"the figure of a struggling outsider† recurring in his works. Bulwer made a great use of supernatural elements which in its later form were to become a seminal work in the development of the genre called ‘science fiction’. George [Augustus] Moore was an Irish novelist, art critic, journalist, short story writer and a poet. After the death of his father he went to Paris, where he had his perception of a world modeled on the views of impressionist (â€Å"the use of light to recreate the artist’s experienced perception†) and naturalists (â€Å"to show human character scientifically determined by environment, evolution and biology†) that determined his promising career. He wrote about ‘realism’ (Esther Waters), some of his works were shocking, or even scandalous enough to discourage the audience from reading (e. g. A Modern Lover, A Mummer’s Wife) They depicted the subject of squander and sexual passion of lower-class life. Marie Louise de la Ramee, writing under the pseudonym Ouida, published her first novel being barely 22 (Granville de Vigne later republished as Held in Bondage: about a bigamous relationship, its challenges and complexity). However, Ouida is most famous for Under Two Flags, which turned out to be her most enduring achievement. Characteristically, fairly ebullient style of her writing, plot being â€Å"preposterous† (Strathmore, Chandos ) were the key to the success. Charles Reade, an English novelist and dramatist, is best known for his historical novel The Cloister and the Hearth. He defined himself as a ‘social problem’ novelist, engrossed and interested in a contemporary social issues (Gold, Hard Cash), depicting and dramatizing â€Å"the topics of the day† (‘newspapers novels’ : Put Yourself in His Place, Foul Play). Although he was widely readable a writer, his style of writing, which combined social concerns, fiction and drama was not received well by the readers and critics. According to G. W. M. Reynolds’s obituary, he was ‘the most popular writer of our time†, and even more readable in his heydays than Dickens. He owes his success to Eugene Sue’s Mysteres de Paris, on which he modeled his The Mysteries of London.. He composed more than 20 novels, which by theme range from the Gothic and oriental tales (Wagner the Werewolf), through the ‘social problem’ novels(Mary Price) to historical fiction (Mary Stuart). Additionally, Reynolds contributed to the creation of an elaborate plot and an ambivalent heroine of the sensational novel. Robert Louis Balfour Stevenson was a Scottish novelist, essayist and travel writer (Treasure Island taking a form of ‘adventurous story’). His works were based on his considerations upon his â€Å"double life† (The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde) and, in order to highlight the authenticity, on historical events (Kidnapped). Anthony Trollope was one of the most successful and respected writers, who significantly distinguished himself in the mid-Victorian era by writing as a ‘serious’ novelist. His body of art shows and spreads on a great deal of themes and subjects, social: The Way We Live Now or political: The Prime Minister. He believed in the power of identification with the real life and fiction. His interest into human nature and the moral complexity of social interaction seems to be a dominanta in the Trollope’s works. He is best known for his finest Barsetshire Chronicles (Barchester Towers , Doctor Thorne ,Framley Parsonage and The Small House at Allington , The Last Chronicle of Barset). Mrs Thomas Humphry Ward was an eminent journalist and literary hostess. It was Henry James himself, who encouraged her writing. She translated Amiel’s Journal intime , and this is what led her to write her first novel, Miss Bretherton. Robert Elsmere, the second piece of writing made a huge impression, and met with a great success becoming one of the best-selling novels of the century. Profits from her writing enabled her to establish a London ‘settlement’ for the working classes. She did not survive her period, as her novels focused on the cross-currents of contemporary religious belief, her novels lacked the more extended human perception. Herbert George Wells distinguished himself in several genres of fiction. However, by critics is called a precursor of modern science fiction. His writing, in which by means of literary fantastic he commented on the society, was based on admired Swift, who first combined scientific speculation with everyday experience. Wells wrote five minor masterpieces, one year after another, starting with The Time Machine in1895 and finishing with When the Sleeper Wakes in 1899. The Island of Dr Moreau, The Invisible Man and The War of the Worlds were in between. William Hale White offers in his novels a broad insight into a life, values and sensibility of that part of Victorian society which was usually excluded from the scope of Victorian literature, that is the society of dissent. White frequently read the poetry of Wordsworth which was a great deal of comfort and inspiration to him. He became a civil servant, journalist and a respected man of letters. His writings reveal his nonconformist values and ideals which he remained allegiant to since his youth. White owes his recognition mostly to his best novel, The Revolution in Tanner’s Lane. The empathetic and elaborate record of the inner life of the working class, in two contrasting eras distinguished the work. Ellen Wood writing not only influenced the sensation novel but gave it a new moral purpose. She was a very successful writer. Her first novel, Danesbury House, won a prize in a temperance competition and very controversial East Lynne gained the greatest popularity, though it is claimed to have distorted the literary reputation of the novelist, mainly due to its theme. In all, she published some twenty-seven novels, not including children’s books and short stories, most of which are accounts of domestic middle-class family life (e. g. The Channings, Mrs Haliburton’s Troubles) III KEY TEXTS The aforementioned authors established their strong positions in the 19th century owing to their literary achievements; now available in covers and still appealing to readership in the whole world. The masterpieces along with minor works are the evidence of the century rapid development in novel and are evidence of its rich and well established literature. Below, the closer insight into particular novels, their structures, conventions and themes is presented, as, to this day, the under mentioned works remain as subjects of heated debates among scholars, critics and common readers. John Bunyan â€Å"The Pilgrim’s Progress from this World to the Next† was so popular that it was read by all classes in the Victorian Period. In terms of structure, it consists of two parts and stands out for the dream convention. While the first section is a record of the Christian’s pilgrimage, the second tells of the his wife and children’s struggles to achieve salvation. Bunyan’s narrative drew its vigor from his own courageous life of struggle against religious persecution for his faith. Mary Shelley’s â€Å"Frankenstein† together with â€Å"The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde† were myths created in the nineteenth century that originated in nightmares. Written in a convention of a dream, the work generated literary and philosophic debates in the Shelleys’ circle. What is more, being influenced by Erasmus Darwin and Sir Humphrey Davy’s argument about the origins of life, the novel was praised for its powerful exploration of ‘the workings of the human mind’. Slave emancipation, the Irish Fenians and Russian imperialism were themes to be traced in the narrative, which served as a source of many more themes in works of other authors. For example, in Dickens’ *Great Expectations, in Melville’s Moby Dick and Conrad’s Heart of Darkness. It became a foundation text for an emerging sub-genre of *‘scientific romance’. Pierce Egan â€Å"Sr’s Life in London† was written as a series of urban sketches, recording the travels of a countryman, Jerry Hawthorne, and his friend Corinthian Tom through the sights of London. Dramatizations of the novel, which met with a great success and sold very fast, dominated the London stage throughout the 1820s. Thomas Carlyle â€Å"Sartor Resartus† was serialized in Fraser’s Magazine. The narrative was presented as extensive Volume without any boundaries and formed content, which were the embodiments of Carlyle’s sense of a fragmented age. The first part investigates the enigma of â€Å"reality†, the second progresses through â€Å"the Everlasting Nay†, the third foresees the world in idealistic vision. Although, it cannot be classified as a novel, that work of fiction had a great impact on Victorian novel. Charles Dickens â€Å"Oliver Twist† was first major Victorian novel. It began as a serial in Bentley’s Miscellany. The novel, accompanied with brooding pictures, presented a world seen through the eyes of Oliver, a vulnerable child. It baffled its readers mainly due to its leading themes: the exposure of child exploitation and the criminal underworld. Dickens succeeded in depicting the dark side of respectable London very distinctly. Oliver Twist placed social concerns at the heart of the emergent Victorian novel. Its characters, unique atmosphere and melodramatic situations have extended into a long succession of stage, film and television versions. Charlotte Bronte â€Å"Jane Eyre† was one of the novels that all Victorians would have known from childhood. the novel was the first work of fiction that used Gothic conventions, that is imaginative expression of the emotional needs of a ‘real’ woman. The novel is a narrative of Jane Eyre’s progress in life and her spiritual pilgrimage. The work, which for its significance was called the ‘Feminine Gothic’, created a basis for the ‘sensation novel’ of the 1860s. Emily Bronte †Wuthering Heights† is a family saga with a violent, powerful and complex plot which starts when Earnshaw brings Heathcliff, a mysterious waif into his family. The main theme comprise passion, revenge and peacemaking in two generations of a family. It is not only the plot that is mysterious and interesting but also the technique of writing deserves attention. The novel is realistic in setting, and visionary in theme, makes use of different perspectives and centers around such universals as human passions, rock, heath, rain, wind and the cycle of seasons. W. M. Thackeray â€Å"Vanity Fair a Novel without a Hero†- the title proclaimed its departure from the normal novel form. The story is about five main actors but none can be treated as a heroic. There is also a lack of conventional plot, that is wills, mysteries of parentage, development of character or progress from rags to riches. Good is not rewarded, and pleasures are usually combined with disappointment; dark moments are relieved by comedy, and heartlessness by generous impulse. Characters, who appear and disappear inconsequently in the story, are independent of Thackeray’s voice. Their thoughts are inaccessible and dialogues are another vague proof that life is ultimately diverse. W. M. Thackeray â€Å"The History of Pendennis† The success of â€Å"Vanity Fair† had freed Thackeray from financial constraints and established him as a major author. Where the earlier work gives an outsider’s view of society, Pendennis is written from within. Thackeray designed a cover for the part issued showing a young man being tugged by wife and children on one side, and a fish-tailed siren and horned satyr on the other, indicating the book’s moral concerns. Like â€Å"David Copperfield†, Thackeray’s novel traces the moral education of a young man’s heart. Far more than â€Å"Copperfield†, however, Pendennis records England changing as it moves towards the Victorian period. As the book opens in the 1820s Arthur’s conservative uncle, Major Pendennis, serves a guide to him and to his mother. Later appears the moral corruption, Arthur glimpses the major and his ageing cronies through the window of their St James’ club. Charles Dickens â€Å"Bleak House† was the first work which shows the Dicken’s maturity by an experiment of providing a work of fiction with many characters and subplots. Dual perspectives of narrators, the omniscient authorial voice and first-person memory of Esther Summerson are techniques, of which Dickens makes use. The story pulsates between action and prevailing mood and atmosphere. The first-person narrator, is its moral touchstone, like Oliver Twist, is the ‘Principle of Good’ surviving all. â€Å"Bleak House† attracted initial sales of 34,000 monthly parts but reviews were mixed. Despite of bad comments, modern criticism says that Dickens created a great piece of work. Elizabeth Gaskell â€Å"North and South† Elizabeth Gaskell in her creation shows a great understanding of the mill owners’ position. The plot is set in Milton (recognizably Manchester). A religious crisis leads Margaret Hale’s father to leave the idyllic village of Helstone to find a job in Milton, the city situated in the North. There Margaret makes friends with a mill hand Nicholas and his daughter who is dying with a lung disease. She is also drawn to the mill owner, John Thornton, who represents the hard aggressive spirit of the Industral Revolution. Gaskell was interested in culture and different dialects so she used an enormous amount of unique descriptions of landmarks. However, her work met with criticism which concerned her plot containing too many cases of death. What ascribes the work with the feature of endurance is Gaskell’s sympathetic understanding of character and place. George Elliot â€Å"Adam Bede† is set in the ‘Eden-like peace and loveliness’ of Hayslope in Loamshire. The novel is a glowing image of physical labor, closeness to nature and simple faith which contrast with the gloomy mining town. The novel has been the subject of critical debate since its publication. It is probably due to its narrative structure, realism and moral point of view. Wilkie Collins â€Å"The woman in White† is a sensational novel with Ghotic elements placed in atmospheric settings. The story reflects common concerns: the nature of insanity, and the relationship between physical health, nervous disorders and the strains of modern life. Mary Elizabeth Braddon â€Å"Lady Audley’s Secret† is a story of Lady Audley marries the eldery Sir Audley so she takes elaborate steps to hide her earlier experience as the wife of an army dragoon who deserted her for the Australian goldfields. Braddon’s technique of writing is inscrutable and she, in a wonderful way, unpacks the past of the main character. Her style of writing distinguishes itself by the fact that she does not describe everything exactly and clearly and the reader has to reconsider her work. The novel was a foundation text for the sensation novel. Charles Kingsley â€Å"The water-babies† is one of the most extraordinary novels of the 19th century. It is written in a convention of a surrealistic dream and makes use of satire, religious debates, Darwinian theories of evolution and social issues like child employment and the provision of clean water. What is more, the traces of Bunyan’s personifications and Blake’s vision of innocence and experience. The Water-Babies encouraged the movement into worlds of fantasy that characterized the novel in the later decades of the century. George Meredith in â€Å"The Egoist† studied male pride and women’s rights to independence. It is the most tightly organized novel of Meredith’s. It attained a very formal, yet still artistic pattern, which shapes the action and brings it up to actual human experience. Henry James â€Å"Portrait of a Lady† is a masterpiece. Isabel Archer leaves New York for England to stay with her aunt married to a banker. She inherits a fortune on her uncle’s death but while visiting Florence she meets a widower Gilbert Osmond. She discovers he is cold and self-centred so she returns to England. James entitled his work as a ‘Portrait’ because he portrayed Isobel as a constant centre of the book showing pictures of her passing and changing with her open consciousness. George Moore â€Å"Esther Waters† was his finest novel which began with the idea of a scullery maid, seduced and struggling to bring up an illegitimate child. It developed into the story of the 17-year-old Esther who enters service in the Barham household to escape the violence of her drunken stepfather, is seduced by William Latch a footman, is dismissed and flees to London to beat her child. She survives the dangers facing an unprotected single mother in the city with great courage, and turns down a respectable suitor in order to marry Latch and so make her son legitimate. The work is one of the very few English novels to benefit from the example of French realism. Moore’s total identification with the main character enabled him to create a very realistic record of working-class life. The novel does not moralize and is very humane. Marie Corelli â€Å"The sorrows of Satan† was her hugely popular novel which marked a reaction against the changes of the fin de siecle. The story tells about an opportunist and agnostic author, Geoffrey Tempest, whose lack of religious convictions makes him an ideal subject of attention for the mysterious aristocrat Lucio Rimanez. He is the incarnation of Satan who is roaming an England sunk in egotism and moral corruption hoping to find a soul. This tale is energized by Corelli’s extraordinary imagination and her uncritical belief in her ideas and talent. H. G Wells is a precursor of what we now consider a science fiction genre and The Time Machine (1895) is his very firt and much appreciated novel. The protagonist, called „Time Travellerâ€Å", invents the machine, which takes him through the ‘fourth dimension‘ of time to year 802,701, where he meets Eloi. The novel commented social situation in England, as well as questioned the optimistic view of the social progress of the earlier 19th century. It still has a relevance to contemporary times and has been adapted into films, TV productions and comic books. After publishing the novel, A Child of The Jago (1896), Arthur Morrison became respected and hailed as a leading British realist writer. He described very vividly the slum life, inspired by an area of ‚Old Nichol‘ in East End. In the world of violence and gagns, where you have to steal in order to survive, is where we met Dicky Perrot, the main character of the book and learn about his brief and harsh life in the slums. Abraham Stoker’s Dracula (1897) is a Gothic horror novel about Count Dracula, a wampire who attempted to move from Carpathian Mountains to England in order to establish a colony of vampires. The plot involves also characters as doctor Abraham Van Helsing and two contrasting women: Lucy and Mina. Novel created a modern myth which embodied the fears of its era. It also reflects fin-de-siecle fears of female sexuality in the character of Mina, the „new womanâ€Å". It is sometimes seen as a parable of capitalism and reflects a sense of England‘s vulnerability in a world she no longer dominated. Samuel Butler wrote his novel, The Way of All Flesh, about Victorian life between 1873 and 1884 but published it in 1902 because he did not want to offend any of the living originals. He described three generations of the Pontifex family, with their marriage affairs, frustrations and hypocricy characteristic for the middle-classes. The Way of All Flesh is a powerful culmination of the Darwinian novel. IV TOPICS The historical development influenced the novel in such a way, that critics often place them in separate categories. The historical, cultural, social and scientific progress brought many subjects to the novel, the subgenres of which serve not only as means of important source of scientific information but above all as entertainment reading and the channel of values for ordinary people, raging from children to the adults of all social classes. The undermentioned 14 major types of the Victorian narrative reveal a great variety of approaches towards this literary genre in the 19th century. Children’s Novels Victorian times were a golden age for children’s book. Many prolific â€Å"adultâ€Å" writers wrote for children at some point of their careers. Not only Dickens, Kingsley, Thackeray and George Macdonald but also Charlotte Yonge, Robert Louis Stevenson and Oscar Wilde. It gave them the opportunity to dream of the unreal and explore worlds of imagination. Before stories for children were extremly moralizing, but the realistic spirit of the era softened them. Translated Grimm’s Fairy Tales and those of Hans Christian Andersen also had a great impact on the youngest readership. Quickly appeared the distinction between books prefered by boys and girls. Boys read The Children of the New Forest, The Coral Island, The Young Fur Trappers, Oliver Twist, David Copperfield, and girls read Little Women, Jane Eyre and Alice in Wonderland. Slowly the distinction between adult and children’s novels began to shift, and books like The Treasure Island or King Solomon’s Mines became adult’s bestsellers. Colonial Novels Together with British colonies‘ expantion came the growing interest of colonial life and exotic, unexplored lands. Thackeray portrayed Indian colonists as „living on the degenerate outer edge of British cultureâ€Å". Some authors concentrated on the white people’s hardships in colonies, other on the complexity of Indian life in the new culture that began to develope (Kipling’s Plain Tales from the Hills). At the same time, Africa was still a mysterious continent, „the heart of darknessâ€Å", with its slavery, cannibals and dangerous nature. Sir Rider Haggard wrote She in 1887 describing an adventure in the wild Africa to find a white queen – it is now seen as the greatest influence on anti-colonial The Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad. British writers had ambivalent attitude to Australian colonies – Dickens and Kingsley wrote about it as a land of opportunities, but Marcus Clarke in his For the Term of His Natural Life concentrated on a cruelty and problems of deportation. British colonial fiction is very diverse; it extended the curiosity for discovering the world, gave birth to some utopian hopes and made provoked readers to think wider and be more critical even about their own society. Historical Novels Historical Novels were thought to be rather prestigious in the Victorian period. Scott was the most influential from the writes of this genre, but G. P. R. James is thought to bet the most prolific one. Often, historical novel overlapped with religious novel. Before science fiction genre became popular, people looked very carefully into the past and examined it on many different ways. Historical novels were popular till the end of the century, and the most valued were The Trumpet Major (about the time of the Napoleonic wars) by Thomas Hardy and the historical sagas by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Illustrated Novels Pictures started to be a great value in Victorian period – people realized that they made books more interesting and aesthetically attractive, therefore increasing their popularity. First illustrations were obtained by wood-engraving (cutting the design across the grain of boxwood) and met with a great success. Dickens works were acommpanied with the Browne’s illustrations, while George Cruikshank prepared them for fairy stories by Brothers Grimm and Pierce Egan’s Life in Progress. Later illustrations became perceived as real pieces of art, independent from the text, especially in the Children’s Literature where they had a great opportunity to animate child’s imagination. Irish Novels With The Young Iraland Movement of the 1840s began the recovery of the Gaelic tradition. The most authentic representation of a traditional Irish life can be seen in the works of the brothers John and Michael Banim, who wrote Tales of the O’Hara Family. Irish Literature was strongly afflicted by social problems and historical events – it faded because of famine and political instability of the country. There were not many nationalist in Ireland in those times, therefore literature concentrated mostly on melodramas of Dion Boucicault, but more serious novels had to wait to be fully understood and appriciated like W. B. Yeats‘ The Wanderings of Oisin from 1889. Still, figures like Bernard Shaw, Oscar Wilde and Bram Stoker (Dracula, 1897) are thought to have had a distinctive impact on the London-based British culture. „New Womanâ€Å" Novels This term was coined by Sarah Grand in 1894 to represent a new phase in female emancipation, which was meant to provoke a new view on women’s issues. She wrote Heavenly Twins in 1893, which concerned women’s sexual frustration, cross-dressing and veneral disease – then, extremely unpopular topics to write about. New Womanâ€Å" novels suggested many difficulties of women’s position in mid-Victorian times, but they were still far from being a program of emancipation – they were too desperate and full of frustration, and lasted for a rather short time. Publishing Formats It is impossible to separate the growth of the ninetteenth-century nivel from technical innovation and commercial enterprise. First, books were too expensive for most people, then due to the collapse of the publishing houses it was very difficult to buy any book. The first public library in London opened in 1742 and in the beginning was indentified mostly with a romantic fiction. Gradually books began to appear in more and more volumes and editions, they were rented from the libraries and bought by upper classes. The division between „seriousâ€Å" novels and more entertaining fiction increased, prices of books began to drop, and they were published in cheap re-prints leading to the compeletely different quality of reading – out of home. Novels began to be the part of everyday life. Regional Novels All British authors, even those living in the outskirts, were still dependent on the London publishers in the Victorian period, as the city dominated the book trade. While England was becoming overwelminghly urban, the differences between rural world like from Wuthering Heights and the metropolis slowly began to disappear and be less significant. Religious Novels The Victorian age was a period of intense religious activity – also in literature. Elizabeth Jay noted in The Religion of the Heart that in the mid century religious works made 33,5 per cent of all books published. Novels of this genre were written by believers of different religions, agnostics and also non-believers. Science, Utopias and Dystopias The term „science fictionâ€Å" came into use in 1926, but the genre has its roots in the 19th century. The most important novels in discussion were Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (1818), Jules Verne’s A Journey to the Centre of the Earth and Johnson’s Rasselas, in which we can find advances like human flight, aircraft, extra-sensory perception and many more. When England global power came to threat, the anxiety of the society was becoming more visible in the written works. The feeling of unsecurity, danger, fear of future and invasions probably inspired H. G. Wells to write The War of the Worlds (which is also a parallel to the situation of Tasmanian aborigines and white settlers). At the same time, those feelings moved writers to dream of Utopias – like William Morris in News from Nowhere and H. G. Wells again in The Time Machine (1895), The Island of Dr Moreau (1896) and in The Invisible Man (1897). The last three examples brought together elements of the 19th century ‚scientific romance‘, that is science, social issues and human interest, all in one genre. Sensation Novels This genre of novels was supposed to shock and surprise a reader and the term was coined in 1860s. It made a use of the conventions of the domestic novel, middle-class homes and relationships in families which were a perfect setting for secrets, murder, bigamy and other mysterious events. Pieces of writings were published in series in magazines and were widely read by general public. Sensational novels derived from melodrama and mystery, but appealed to the lowest instincts of the readers, by the arrangement of the plot, chracters of moral decay, with no boundaries and higher values. Critisized by many intelligent connoisseurs, novels of this infamous genre gave voice to the concern of the women rights, later leading to the the rise of the „new womanâ€Å" novel. Social Problems Novels This genre have three sub-genres: „conditions-of-England novelsâ€Å", „the novels of outcast‘ Londonâ€Å" and „novels of social propagandaâ€Å". Their main themes were speculations on the class divisions, political situation in England and social crisises and problems of London society. Some of them had an impact on the serious matters: like Anna Sewell’s Black Beauty (1877) which influenced the treatment of horses and animals in general, and Walter Besant’s All Sorts and Conditions of Men and The Children of Gibeon (1886) which plead for education in the East End slums. The Supernatural The Gothic tradition merged with different ways into the Victorian novel. Gothic elements were modified by social, moral and psychological concerns – like in Dickens Christmas stories, where a ghost became a seasonal escape from materialistic values. However, it is sometimes difficult to distinguish between ‘natural‘ and ‘supernatural‘. Many succesfull writers like Dickens, Lytton, Thackeray, Kipling and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle shared an interest in telepathy, mesmerism, spiritualism and clairvoyance. The tensions of an era of moral uncertainty are reflected in the supernatural themes of Stevenson’s The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1886), Henry James‘ The Turn of the Screw (1898) and in Oscar Wilde’s The Portrait of Dorian Gray (1891). Working-Class Novels Rather few novels were written by working-class writers that concentrated on their own conditions. Most of the novels came out of political struggle. Allan Clarke was a recognizable working-class writer, a son of a mill-worker, who wrote a powerful fiction for periodicals around the end of the century. W. E. Tirebuck’s Miss Grace of All Souls (1895) illustrates the spirit of emergent socialism, and Robert Tressell’s The Ragged Trousered Philantropist is the classic representation of working-class life.