TOPIC 50: THE VICTORIAN NOVEL (19th & early 20th c.

To start with, I will provide an outline of my speech. I will place the topic within a legal
framework. Then, I will research the content of the title. After this, I will offer a didactic and ICT
approach, and I will end up with a conclusion followed by a Bibliography and Webgraphy. The
main goal of this topic is to teach students the socio-cultural aspects of the Victorian Novel
Literature from a historical and literary point of view together with the most outstanding figures of
this period. But before doing so, I would like to set this issue within the appropriate legal
framework.
As far as the content of the topic 50 Victorian Novel is concerned, I am going to divide it
into several sections: 1) a historical background about the Victorian Novel; 2) the literary
background; 3) the characteristics of the Victorian Novel; 4) the main authors of the Early, Middle
and Late periods of the novel.
1) According to Sanders in The Concise Cambridge History of English Literature, the
Victorian Era goes from 1830 to 1880, even though Queen Victoria’s reign extends up to 1901.
During this period, the extension of the British Empire took place so that its political and
economical superiority was exerted over the rest of the nations. We should also take into account
the social effects of the Industrial Revolution better explained in topic 47.
Historians agree in dividing the Victorian Era into three different periods:
- Early Victorian (1830-1850). During this period, the rural England was transformed
due to the Industrial Revolution.
- Mid Victorian (1850-1873). This period is characterised by its years of maximum
imperial expansion, its economic prosperity and its political stability.
- Late Victorian (1873-1901). 1873 was the year of the Great Depression. Because of
this, Britain’s economic supremacy started to decline.
According to Roberts in The History of the British Empire, and The Penguin Guide to
English Literature, within the period of the British Empire, the colonization of new territories took
place such as: The Gold Coast (1821), The Falkland Islands, New Zealand and Hong Kong. The
British Empire also colonized some new territories in India, America and other regions. During the
Victorian Age, the empire both reached its height and started to break up.
Another characteristic of the period is the social agitation due to the effects of the Industrial
Revolution. The population increased and, during the Famine Years (1846-48) people started to
immigrate to the new territories of the empire such as the States or Ireland. Life expectancy also
increased because of the improvement of the sanitary conditions and the progress in medicine and
sciences. Industries and cities grew and, with all the material comfort came an emphasis on
education, self-help, greater literary with the circulating libraries and a general increase in cultural
standards.
The reign of Queen Victoria witnessed the consolidation of the constitutional Monarchy, the
extension of the franchise (the Second Reform Bill), the recognition of women’s rights, the
development of party political representation, the Tories and Liberals, the agitation for political and
religious freedom, and the social conflicts of the slow state based on principles of democracy,
freedom of speech and free enterprise, in the context of capitalism and constitutional government.
It would be interesting to create a CLIL programme together with the History Department to
show the Industrial Revolution and main aspects of the British Empire such as the Reform Bills and
the role of women at that time. This project contributes to the coexistence principle stated in the
European Training 2020. Students’ attitude towards differences among people, culture and sexes
will be strengthened.
2) According to Evans in A Short History of English Literature, Utilitarism, founded by
J.Bentham and James Mill, was the most powerful intellectual and ideological position of Victorian
Britain. The objectives were to rationalise human relations, rights and duties in a technocratic way
and to reduce ideology. It was a great age of essay writing. Among the conflicts, the most important
ones were the North versus the South, as it is portrayed in the novels of Elizabeth Gaskell, cities
versus countries, poor versus rich, individual versus society, idealism versus materialism in George
Eliot’s novels, or past versus present in William Thackeray’s novels.
This is the period of the great development of the novel. Novels are very successful because
of the greater literacy of the population and the circulating libraries. Many novels, multiplot novels,
appeared and were published in serializations in magazines and newspapers. They were full of
characters in order to cater the diverse audience. Novels were an entertainment since they were read
aloud and in family.
In the Victorian Age, poverty and prosperity coexisted. Education was compulsory so that
the reading public increased. Victorians could have connotations like prudency, bigotry and
hypocrisy because, in despite of the “earnest” respectability of Victorian Age, there are also
allusions to taboo topics such as “sex”.
According to Evans in A Short History of English Literature, The Origin of Species,
published in 1859 by Charles Darwin, was one of the major events of this period. It turned out to be
the most controversial indictment of religion ever written. In it, Darwin stated that the man
descended from apes. Concerning religion, we can find the rise of the Oxford Movement, headed by
Newsman. It influenced some writers who showed the general discontent with the existing beliefs
of the Church of England.
3) Regarding the characteristics of the Victorian Novel, I will consider Carter’s source The
Penguin Guide to Literature in England: Britain and Ireland. As I mentioned above, the Victorian
Period is divided into: Early Victorians, Mid-Victorians and Late Victorians.
- Early Victorians were socially compromised writers. The novel was used as a social
portrait of English life. Writers identified themselves with their age and became the spokesmen for
all. Nevertheless, the respectability of the Victorians was perpetrated by these writers, like “the
taboo sex” and the “hypocrisy”.
- Late Victorians writers questioned the early Victorian’s social assumptions. They wrote
against the times in which they lived. They even accepted new visions on sex.
Jane Austen is absent from this unit because, her last work Persuasion, was published in
1818, two years after her death and twelve after the Early Victorian Period began. Therefore, she
was a Romantic novelist, better explained in topic 48 about Romanticism.
According to Carter, the main authors of the Early Victorian Period were the Northern
Romance, the Brontë sisters considered significant predecessors since they started writing before
the 40s, so they are not “pure” Victorians.
Their parents were of Celtic origin and maybe they inherited the “eloquence” and “ease of
speech” characteristic of these people. However, they presented the Northern England and some
Yorkshire characters in their novels. They possessed a strong religious feeling and a belief in self-
improvement by reading and study.
The Brontë sisters studied in different boarding schools. They also studied French and
German in Brussels in order to set up their own language school back in England, but all sisters
turned to novel writing. Charlotte achieved success with Jane Eyre, written under the pseudonym
Currer Bell; and Emily published Wuthering Heights.
Charlotte’s novels are mainly autobiographical. Four of them are love stories based on her
own experiences. In her first novel, The Professor, she narrates her love for her Belgian teacher,
Heger, but inversing the principal roles. It is a tedious and clumsy effort, a “first attempt” she stated
on the preface. We can emphasize its provinciality of tone, and artificiality of dialogue.
Charlotte’s main achievement was to bring fiction into the domain of the writer’s own
emotional consciousness. Her masterpiece is Jane Eyre, one of the most widely read in the English
language. We can find a mixture of opposite values. On the one hand, the virtues of self-discipline.
On the other hand, the recognition of the importance of sexual and marital independence. Some
people have considered it a “psychological novel”, and the expression “the mad woman in the attic”
has become synonymous with female emancipation.
Emily is considered the most talented of the sisters even though she only wrote Wuthering
Heights. The novel shows the contrast between civilized decadence and primitive vitality. This
contrast parallels a genuine conflict of different levels of passion. The character of Catherine moves
between her love for her husband and her love for Heathcliff. There’s therefore, a distinction
between passion and love. There are also autobiographical notes and Gothic connotations like the
stone built house in the moors and the marsh. The novel is a multi-layered narrative which offers
the reader lots of viewpoints.
For Mid-Victorian Social Novelists, I am going to take into consideration Daichies’ source
A Critical History of English Literature.
Dickens (1812-1870), was born in Portsmouth. His father was a minor government official
arrested for debt, and the whole family but Dickens joined him in Debton’s prison. Dickens
promoted public reading and travelled to Europe and USA. He was buried in Poet’s Corner at
Westminster. His literary output is better explained in topic 47 about the Industrial Revolution.
According to Daichies, most of Dickens’ novels are autobiographic. His main concerns were
the society in which he lived, his satire about snobbery and the social conditions. He also wrote
about children who survived in an industrialized civilization, and the toleration of their employment
in mines and workshops. He reflects on the differences between the upper and lower classes. This
led him to analyse and describe the social condition of England, and the economic doctrines
concerning poverty, population and the scope of public responsibility. We could say his aims were
to expose the social evil and to improve the social conditions.
Concerning some of his works, Barnaby Rudge and A Tale of Two Cities are said to be
historical works, while David Copperfield is more autobiographical.
Great Expectations is based on the memoirs of an orphan, Philip Pirrip. He gives food to
an escaped convict. Then, he receives an invitation to wait upon Miss Havisham, a rich lady and,
after visiting her very often, he becomes infatuated with her daughter Estella, who has been raised
by Miss Havisham to be cruel and distant to men.
Education is the main theme. Pip is brought by his sister, and Estella by a resentful lady who
destroys her as a woman. There is a very reflective overview of childhood. Pip judges his actions by
means of his attitudes such as the false value of money and appearances, and vain expectations. He
finally understands the importance of true friendship.
William Makepeace Thackeray (1811-1863) was born into a wealthy family of Anglo-
Indians. He started writing for several periodicals. He published a series of papers entitled The
Snobs of England. He also wrote for magazines. In fact, some of his articles from Punch were
collected for his book The book of Snobs, in which there are sketches of London characters. He
was very talented to paint the London scene and write historical novels in which he established a
connection between past and present.
Considering Sanders’ bibliography, The concise Cambride History of English Literature,
Tackeray’s most important novel is Vanity Fair, commonly considered to be a masterpiece. The
story is set during the Napoleonic Wars, and it mixes ambition, greed, duplicity, wealth and poverty
into one of literature’s great satirical pictures.
In Miss Pinkerton’s Academy for young ladies, the advantaged Amelia is in sharp contrast
to the disadvantaged but sharp-witted Rebecca Sharp, but the roles are reversed when Amelia is
disinherited and descends into poverty, while Becky leads an extravagant life. Tackeray called his
novel, “a novel without a hero”, maybe because we can find a heroine, Becky, or maybe because
there is not any character to be considered so, as some critics have stated.
According to Sanders, George Eliot (1819-1880), whose real name was Mary Ann Evans,
was born in Warwickshire and educated in boarding schools. She is considered the first English
modern novelist. She met George Henry Lewes. He was married but he was unable to divorce his
wife. However, they lived together and this provoked a storm of horror and insults. For this reason,
the novelist had to write under the pseudonym of George Eliot.
Regarding her theme and style, her novels show intellectual grasp and historical coherence
and concentration. Her main topics are the development of the “human mind” and “moral sense”.
She also copes with the relationship between the individual and the society and, therefore, its
influence on conduct. The eternal conflicts of “love and duty” and “power and trust” are also
represented in her novels.
In her early novels, she presents her memories of her childhood and some events of her early
life, something shown in Adam Bede and in The Mill on the Floss. She also wrote about politics
and the election riots at the time of the Reform Bill.
Her language is smooth, flowing, well-balanced, rhythmical and musical. Her characters
speak a dialect appropriate to their stage in life and geographical locality. Middlemarch has been
compared to Tolstoy’s War and Peace. This work investigates humans’ aspirations to serve and to
be good under two aspects: the man himself and the society where he lives. Throughout
Middlemarch, Eliot intended to teach the reader some practices that she considered to be a morally
accepted lifestyle. She talks about egoism, ambition and limitations that society imposes on
woman’s possibility of development and integration.
Finally, regarding Late Victorian writers, the most outstanding author is Thomas Hardy. As
Daichies suggested in A Critical History of English Literature, Hardy (1840-1928) was born in
Dorset within a poor family. He moved to London and start writing poetry. His novel Far from the
Madding Crowd was a huge success.
Tess of the D’Ubervilles and Jude the Obscure were criticized, so that he gave up writing
novels and turned to poetry. Nowadays, he is considered a great literary figure of his age. He was
buried in Westminster Abbey, in Poet’s Corner, and his heart is buried with his wife in his local
churchyard in Dorset.
Concerning his themes and style, he is the first novelist to write about the countryside and its
inhabitants. He belonged to the peasant class and, in this sense, he became its spokesman. His
favourite topics are love and marriage, although he did not believe in the latter. His novels are
related to one another by the setting and the idea of fatalism. His characters are conditioned by
circumstances which are the products of fate. In his earlier novels, he showed optimism, later
replaced by resignation.
In The Major of Casterbridge, rural and urban lives intermingle. Casterbridge has an
intimate relationship with the surrounding countryside. Authenticity in the rural scenes defines
Hardy’s style. He created a whole series of towns and villages in Wessex county. In The Return of
the Native, settling, structure, symbolism and the conscious exploitations of other conventions are
shown.
Hardy’s greatest element concerning style is his ability as a story-teller. One of his most
representative works is Tess of the D’Ubervilles. This novel is full of poetry and mysterious
settings. The author narrates the story of Tess with peculiar and unforgettable tenderness and
intensity. The imagery and symbolism is amongst the most powerful ever written such as the
powerful and disturbing scene in which Tess, as an act of kindness, breaks the necks of the
suffering birds.
The novel follows the standard pattern of Aristotelian tragedy intermingled with love and
romance.
From a didactic point of view, students could watch films or passages of films, such as
Oliver Twist by Dickens, so that students could observe the Victorian society. For the Pre-listening,
they could see different images of Oliver Twist as a child, or the robbers. For the During-listening
stage, they could do a filling the gaps exercise of a dialogue from the film. Then, for the Post-
listening, they could make up dialogues among the characters, and do a role play. They could also
carry out a debate talking about the values in the Victorian society comparing them with the
education and treatment of children nowadays. Block 2: listen, talk and conversation on the Royal
Decree 1631/2006 includes in the minimum teachings of the Curriculum for ESO.
Besides, students could prepare a Reading Plan with a few passages of the novels written by
the Brontë sisters, such as Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights, translating some passages so that they
could collaborate with the Spanish Language and Literature Department. They could stick some
passages in both languages on the walls of the corridors of the centre. By this, students could
improve their vocabulary and also reflect on the main leitmotifs like the emancipation of woman in
that period or the difference between love and passion as the Royal Decree of ESO 1631/2006 29 th
December suggests. This activity would be for students of 4th ESO.
We could also collaborate with the History Department to make a CLIL programme using
Powerpoint presentations about the historical period of the Victorian novel, as it is also stated in the
European Training 2020 to deal with. This activity is also aimed for students of 4th ESO, and they
could work in groups in order to search for the information in the Computers Lab, contributing to
fulfill the Digital, Learning how to Learn the Autonomous and Personal Initiative.
Moreover, we as foreign language teachers, we should highlight and make students see the
importance of English for our Comunidad de Castilla La-Mancha, since our students will need to
make use of the language at any time in their lives: to read information on the web, to surf the
Internet, to communicate with people whose main language is not out students’, or to travel around
the world. As this essay comes to its end, I would finish by mentioning the Bibliography and
Webgraphy I have found useful. This include:
Loe 2/2006 3rd May
Royal Decree 1631/2006, 29th December.
❖ The Short Oxford history of English Literature, Sanders. A. Ed. University Press, 2006
❖ A short History of English Literature, Barnard, R., 2004
❖ English Literature: a survey for students. Ed. Burgess, A. Longman, 2003
❖ The Penguin Guide to Literature in English: Britain and Ireland. Carter, R., 2010
❖ A Critical History of English Literature. Daichies
❖ The New Pelican Guide of English Literature. Ford
❖ A History of the English Language. Baugh and Cable. Pearson, 2013. Sixth edition.

Regarding the Webgraphy:

➢ www.Sparknotes.com
➢ www.britannia.com/history
➢ www.mainlesson.com
➢ www.agendaweb.es
➢ www.thefreedictionary.es
➢ www.wikipaedia.es