McDougal Littell - British Literature (4) 901 - 1200.pdf - Antologie i opracowania - Patrusiak

Victorian novels were weighty affairs, quite literally—so weighty

that they typically had to be divided into three volumes, collectively

known as a three-decker novel. Fortunately, readers had the time and

the attention spans to appreciate these elaborately constructed fictional

worlds, with their complex storylines and leisurely narrative pace.

Families often spent the evening reading aloud to each other, laughing

at the adventures of Dickens’s Mr. Pickwick and his oddball friends

or sighing over Heathcliff and Catherine’s doomed romance in Emily

Brontë’s Wuthering Heights.

Many novels were first published in serial form in magazines and

newspapers, that is, in monthly installments of several chapters each,

meaning that readers might have to wait as long as two years to find

out how a novel ended. Dickens was a master of this form. Hordes of

fans—not just in England but around the world—rushed to snatch

up each new installment of his 1841 novel The Old Curiosity Shop,

especially as the beloved character Little Nell approached her tragic

end. In fact, the suspense was so great that passengers aboard a British

ship arriving in New York that year were met by crowds of anxious

American readers who had not yet received the latest installment. They

were shouting from the dock, “Is Little Nell dead?”

A Voice from the Times

But this I know; the writer

who possesses the creative gift

owns something of which he is

not always master—something

that at times strangely wills and

works for itself. . . . If the result

be attractive, the World will

praise you, who little deserve

praise; if it be repulsive, the

same World will blame you, who

almost as little deserve blame.

—Charlotte Brontë

A poster from the 1939 film

Wuthering Heights

unit introduction 901

Victorian Viewpoints

Victorians’ love of reading was by no means limited to fiction. The same

periodicals that provided them with the most recent novel installment by

Trollope, Thackeray, or Dickens also offered articles and essays on every

imaginable subject, “from Arctic exploration to pinmaking,” as one scholar

put it. Victorians were generalists, curious about all aspects of their changing

world, and they read for pleasure the sort of nonfiction that today might

appeal only to specialists in a particular academic field.

A great deal of this nonfiction was not merely informational but conveyed

strong opinions. In carefully worded prose that was at once impassioned

and a model of restraint, England’s greatest thinkers clashed over the issues

of the day. While some, like Thomas Babington Macaulay, defended the

status quo, most found much to criticize in Victorian society—though few

went as far as Thomas Carlyle, who in his book Past and Present predicted

bloody revolution as the inevitable result of the social breakdown caused by

unregulated, profit-driven industry.

Whatever their viewpoint, these critics’ authoritative tone must have been

reassuring to a readership no longer sure what to think about anything.

Could science and religious belief coexist, or would one destroy the other?

Did British imperialism benefit both conqueror and conquered, or was

it a disastrous mistake? Would the Industrial Revolution prove to be the

dawning of a great new age or the end of civilization? Increasingly, the

optimism of the early years of the era turned to uneasiness in the face of

what Tennyson called “the thoughts that shake mankind.”

This uneasiness permeated the literature written during the last years

of Victoria’s reign. Poets no longer contemplated life at a romantic distance

victorian viewpoints

• Periodicals offered

nonfiction articles on all

manner of subjects.

• England’s thinkersclashed

over issues of the day.

• Uncertainty permeated

literature of the late

Victorian period.

• Naturalist writers saw

the universe as an

uncaring force, indifferent

to human suffering.

• Readers turned to

escapist fare.

(Left) An 1889 edition

of Puck , a popular

periodical; (right) an

1866 caricature of poet

Matthew Arnold titled

“Sweetness and Light”

902

The Victorian period

saw a boom in children’s

literature, including Robert

Louis Stevenson’s Treasure

Island, illustrated in 1911 by

N. C. Wyeth.

but instead expressed their sense of loss and pain at living in a world in

which order had been replaced by chaos and confusion. In his poem “Dover

Beach,” Matthew Arnold describes a bright “sea of faith” retreating to the

edges of the earth, leaving humanity stranded in darkness. Pessimistic

themes also permeated the poetry and fiction of Thomas Hardy,

who wrote in a new style called naturalism. An offshoot of realism,

naturalism saw the universe as an uncaring force, indifferent to human

suffering. Naturalist writers packed their novels with the harsh details

of industrialized life, unrelieved by humor or a happy ending.

Not surprisingly, late Victorian readers began to avoid serious

literature, finding it depressingly bleak. Instead, they turned to the

adventure tales of Rudyard Kipling, who set his tales in India; the

witty drawing-room comedies of Oscar Wilde; the science fiction of

H. G. Wells; or the detective stories of Arthur Conan Doyle, whose

Sherlock Holmes was England’s first fictional detective. Along with

children’s literature that included Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures

in Wonderland and Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island, such

wonderfully written escapist fare rounded out the great diversity of

Victorian literary voices.

In the end, the pessimism of Hardy and Arnold came the closest to

anticipating what lay just around the bend: the catastrophe of World War I.

In the next century, modernist writers would pick up the torch from their

Victorian predecessors and grapple with issues the Victorians could not

have imagined.

A Voice from the Times

Pessimism is, in brief, playing the

sure game. You cannot lose at it;

you may gain. It is the only view

of life in which you can never be

disappointed. Having reckoned

what to do in the worst possible

circumstances, when better arise, as

they may, life becomes child’s play.

—Thomas Hardy

unit introduction 903

Connecting Literature, History, and Culture

Use this timeline and the questions on the next page to gain insight into

developments during this period, both in Britain and in the world as a whole.

british literary milestones

1830

1845

1860

1833

Alfred, Lord Tennyson, begins

writing his long poem In

Memoriam.

1846

Poets Robert Browning and

Elizabeth Barrett elope and

move to Italy.

1860

Dickens publishes first

magazine installment of Great

Expectations.

1843

Charles Dickens publishes his

short novel A Christmas

Carol.

1847

Charlotte Brontë publishes

Jane Eyre; sister Emily

publishes Wuthering Heights.

1861

George Eliot (pen name of

Mary Ann Evans) publishes

Silas Marner.

1850

Elizabeth Barrett Browning

publishes love poems Sonnets

from the Portuguese.

1865

Gerard Manley Hopkins enters

Jesuit religious order and stops

writing poetry.

historical context

1830

1845

1860

1833

Factory Act bans factory work

for children under nine; slavery

is abolished in British Empire.

1845

The Irish potato famine begins,

eventually killing more than a

million people (to 1851).

1861

Prince Albert dies.

1867

Reform Bill doubles

the number of

voters by including

working-class men.

1837

William IV dies and is

succeeded by 18-year-old niece

Victoria, ushering in Britain’s

age of greatest prosperity.

1854

The Crimean War—in which

Britain, Turkey, France, and

Austria fight Russia—begins.

1870

Local governments

establish public

schools; the

Married Women’s

Act gives women

economic rights.

1859

Charles Darwin publishes On

the Origin of Species.

1842

The Opium War with China is

settled, with Britain claiming

Hong Kong.

world culture and events

1830

1845

1860

1839

American Charles Goodyear

invents process for making

rubber strong and elastic.

1848

Ethnic uprisings erupt

throughout Europe; Karl Marx

and Friedrich Engels publish

Communist Manifesto.

1861

Civil War erupts in the United

States (to 1865); Alexander II

frees serfs in Russia.

1844

Samuel F. B. Morse sends the

first long-distance telegraph

message.

1869

The Suez Canal opens.

1851

Widespread hunger and

corruption lead to China’s

Taiping Rebellion (to 1864).

1874

Alexander Graham Bell

develops the telephone.

1853

U.S. Commodore Matthew

Perry sails four ships into

Tokyo harbor, ending Japan’s

self-imposed isolation.

904 unit 5: the victorians

making connections

• Which invention of the time do you think most changed people’s lives?

• What events show Britain’s commitment to imperialism?

• What evidence do you see of social progress and reform in Great Britain

and elsewhere?

• What contributions did women make to British literature of the period?

1875

1890

1900

1875

Hopkins resumes writing.

1891

Thomas Hardy publishes Tess

of the D’Urbervilles; Oscar

Wilde’s novel The Picture of

Dorian Gray shocks Victorian

England with its theme of the

corruption of wealth.

1900

Oxford Book of English Verse

is first published.

1883

Robert Louis Stevenson

publishes adventure novel

Treasure Island.

1901

Rudyard Kipling publishes

his novel Kim, detailing life

in India.

1887

Sir Arthur

Conan Doyle

publishes A

Study in

Scarlet,

introducing

detective

Sherlock Holmes.

1895

H. G. Wells publishes the

landmark science fiction novel

The Time Machine.

1896

Reaction to Thomas Hardy’s

novel Jude the Obscure is so

negative that thereafter he

writes only poetry.

1875

1890

1900

1876

Disraeli secures the title

“Empress of India” for Victoria;

collective bargaining by trade

unions is legalized.

1897

British-Sudanese War begins.

1900

Nigeria becomes a British

protectorate.

1899

The Boer War against Dutch

South African settlers

begins (to 1902).

1901

Britain establishes the

Commonwealth of Australia;

1879

Ireland presses for home rule.

ueen Victoria dies after nearly

64 years of rule.

1884

Reform Bill gives vote to

almost all adult males.

1875

1890

1900

1876

Korea becomes an

independent nation.

1893

Henry Ford develops gasoline-

powered automobile; New

Zealand becomes the first

country to grant women

suffrage.

1900

Austrian psychiatrist

Sigmund Freud publishes The

Interpretation of Dreams; in

China, the Boxer Rebellion

against foreign influence

breaks out.

1879

Thomas Edison

invents the first

light bulb.

1884

The Berlin

Conference of

14 European

nations sets

rules for dividing

Africa into colonies.

1895

Italian Guglielmo Marconi

invents the first radio.

1901

Theodore Roosevelt becomes

president of the United States

after William McKinley is

assassinated.

1896

The first modern Olympic

Games are held in Athens,

Greece.

timeline 905

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