VICTORIAN LONDON
 

         England in 1841 was at the very dawn of the Victorian Age. It was the decade that would come to be known as "The Hungry Years," as industrialization spread and the lower classes became more firmly established. During the years preceding, the gradual spread of industry had led farmers away from the countryside, and eliminated at single strokes the jobs of countless workers with such inventions as the power loom and the combine. These people found themselves competing for few jobs in what was becoming a highly mechanized economy. A middle class of merchants was formed out of the aristocracy who found their taxes dwindling and the lower class that aspired to more. Business ventures such as the South Seas Bubble company collapsed, but other commercial ventures, such as the China Tea Trade, flourished. However, even for these businesses, times were changing, as the steam ship took over from the mighty and glorious clipper ship, queen of the seas. Ideologically, this was a troubled time, as a crisis of faith in God resulted from the many discoveries of science. Soon educated men divided themselves into two principal schools: Utilitarians, the followers of Jeremy Bentham, who based everything upon the utility of objects, and who managed a quick reform of the Civil Service; and the followers of Coleridge, firm believers in faith. Although we have a lingering impression of the Victorian Age as a repressive and repressed society, it was one of the most vital periods of English history, lively and full of controversy. Belief in technology was at its height, and the superstitions of magic had been swept away, reserved for gothic horror novels. Medical science was improving by leaps and bounds. Living conditions were terrible for many in 1841, and it was not long before Marx produced his _Communist Manifesto_, but England was by that time well ont he way to becoming the dominant nation in the world, and London the jewel in the crown of the British Empire.

        Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809-1892) was one of the Victorian Age's greatest poets. Tennyson showed great promise as a young boy and had composed an epic poem, among others, by the time he was fifteen. In 1827 Tennyson entered the University of Cambridge and left in 1831 without completing a degree. He was known for his idylls and frequently wrote poems concerning Arthurian Legends. Few poets have produced acknowledged masterpieces in so many different poetic genres as Tennyson; he furnished perhaps the most notable example in English letters of the eclectic style. His consummately crafted verse expresses in readily comprehensible terms the Victorian feeling for order and harmony. Tennyson is one of our faves and hopefully you will like him too.

Charge of the Light Brigade

The Lady of Shallot

The Lotos Eaters

Ulysses

      Robert Browning (1812-1889) was especially noted for perfecting the dramatic monologue. Browning was born in Camberwell and was largely self-taught. In 1846, he married fellow poet Elizabeth Barret. He wrote many plays that were unsuccessful. Following his wife's death he wrote Dramatis Personae which was considered to be his masterpiece. Although his wife's reputation as a poet was greater than his own during his lifetime, Robert Browning today is considered one of the major poets of the Victorian era. He is most famous for the development of the dramatic monologue, for his psychological insight, and for his forceful, colloquial poetic style. We're not very familiar with his work, but he comes highly recommended by stuffy English teachers everywhere.

My Last Duchess

Love Among the Ruins

      Matthew Arnold (1822-1888) was representative of Victorian intellectual concerns and was the foremost literary critic of his age. Arnold was born in Laleham, Middlesex and was educated at the University of Oxford. A meditative, elegiac tone is characteristic of Arnold's poetry. Arnold's poems dealt with religious truths and his essays defended culture against critics that thought it overly materialistic. We're not big fans of Arnold, but that doesn't mean that you shouldn't give him a chance.

Dover Beach

        A. E. Housman (1859-1936) was born in Fockbury, Worcestershire, and educated at the University of Oxford. Although a brilliant student, he failed his examinations and became a clerk in the patent office in London. Housman is best known as the author of a few slim volumes of poetry remarkable for their simple diction, lyric beauty, and gentle, ironic pessimism. The poems express the regrets and frustration of young men, especially soldiers. A, as we call him, wrote some great poems, unfortunately, we couldn't find any on the Internet. You'll have to go to an actual library to read his stuff.

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Charles Dickens

        Charles Dickens (1812-1870) is one of the most popular writers in the history of literature. Dickens was born (unfortunately) in Portsmouth in 1812. His education was cut short when his father was sent to debtors prison when he was a boy. He was forced to work in a factory to support himself and he drew upon this experience for his novels. His descriptions of mistreatment of children helped initiate child labor reform. He died (not so) tragically of a stroke in 1870. We've given the benefit of the doubt to marginal authors before, but we really hate Dickens. His writing is long, drawn out and boring. His popularity is totally inexplicable and he has caused all of us much pain. Enjoy!.

A Tale of Two Cities

        Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844-1889) expressed an intense response to the natural world, and his innovations in technique produced an intricately woven tapestry of language that embodied this response. Hopkins was born in Stratford, Essex and was educated at the University of Oxford. His lyrics are attempts to capture the uniqueness by the use of internal rhyme, alliteration, and compound metaphor and by the use of "sprung rhythm." This verse structure, so named by Hopkins because it seems abrupt in contrast to the running rhythm typical of the poetry of his time, approximates the stresses of natural speech. We didn't much care for this guy. He was just another boring product the Victorian (Boring) Age.

God’s Grandure

Spring and Fall

       Lewis Carroll (1832-98) is best known for his creation of the immortal fantasy Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Carroll was born on January 27, 1832, and was educated at the University of Oxford. In 1865 he published under his pseudonym Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Its sequel, Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There, appeared in 1871. He died at Guildford, Surrey, on January 14, 1898. On publication, the works, illustrated by the English cartoonist Sir John Tenniel, became immediately popular as books for children. Their subsequent appeal to adults is based upon the ingenious mixture of fantasy and realism, gentle satire, absurdity, and logic. The names and sayings of the characters, such as the March Hare, the Mad Hatter, the Cheshire Cat, and the White Knight, have become part of everyday speech. The Alice series was good, but his other works were less popular.

Alice in Wonderland

         Oscar Wilde (1854-1900), Irish-born writer and wit, was a novelist, playwright, poet, and critic. He was born on October 16, 1854, in Dublin, and educated at Trinity College. As a student at the University of Oxford, he excelled in classics, wrote poetry, and incorporated the Bohemian life-style of his youth into a unique way of life. Wilde's most distinctive and engaging plays are the four comedies Lady Windermere's Fan, A Woman of No Importance, An Ideal Husband, and The Importance of Being Earnest. One of his most popular novels is The Picture of Dorian Gray. We like Wilde's work, and besides he's very quotable.

Picture of Dorian Grey

          George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950), Irish-born writer, is considered the most significant British dramatist since Shakespeare. Shaw was the antithesis of a romantic; he was ruthless as a social critic and irreverent toward institutions. Shaw was born on July 26, 1856. At the age of 16, took a clerical job; thereafter he was self-educated. Shaw's comic masterpiece, Pygmalion (1914; many years later popular also as a film and as the basis for the musical comedy My Fair Lady), was claimed by its author to be a didactic play about phonetics; it is, rather, about love and class and the exploitation of one human being by another. Although he founded no “school” of playwrights like himself, by forging a drama combining moral passion and intellectual conflict, reviving the older comedy of manners, and experimenting with symbolic farce, Shaw helped to reshape the stage of his time. His bold, critical intelligence and sharp pen, brought to bear on contemporary issues, helped mold the thought of his own and later generations. We have only read Pygmalion, so we can't say much about Shaw's other work, but we recommend Pygmalion to anyone. Unfortunately, none of Shaw's works are available on the Internet so you'll have to visit the library or the book store.

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