The Victorian Age

1837-1901


 An age of industry and
reforms

 In the Victorian age there was a progressive democratization, ruled by
the Reform Bills: the first Reform Bill(1832) about 150 seats were taken
away from the so-called rotten boroughs and given to the new
industrial town, moreover the right to vote was enlarged to great part
of the middle class but little or nothing had been done for working
class.
 The second Reform Bill(1867) gave town workers the right
to vote, but still exluded miners and agricultural workers.
 In 1884 the third Reform Bill was passed: the right to vote
was extended to all male workers and allowed that many
representatives of the working class could enter the
House of Commons.
 An age of industry and
reforms

 In 1851 the Great International Exhibition of London
opened by Queen Victoria displayed the wonders of
science and industry. The triumph of industry
coincided with the invention of steam locomotive,
railways and was introduced gas lighting in city streets;
 At the same time the poor endured terrible conditions and
the new Poor Law wasn’t a great solution for the problem:
they were amassed in workhouses. In large cities,
urban slums became synonymous with the Industrial
Revolution;
 Britain’s modern-day parties were born during Victoria’s reign: the
Conservatives and the Liberals. The growth in political importance of
the working class was marked by the foundation of the Labour Party
(1900).
 Social Reforms

 The Public Health Act obliged local authorities to improve local
conditions by the provision of sewers, water and street cleaning;
 The Mines Act, which forbade the employment of women and children
in mines;
 The Emancipation of religious sects , which allowed Catholics to hold
government jobs and to enter the universities of Oxford and
Cambridge;
 The Trade Union Act, which legalized the activities of the unions
workers. The unions grew steadily and came to play an important role
determining internal policy.
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The British Empire

The Irish question: the relations with Ireland worsened, due to the potato
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• European policy
• Colonial policy
 Empire and
Commonwealth

 The Empire wasn’t just a military and a
commercial corncern. Trough extensive
propaganda, it was generally believed that
having an empire was a necessary duty.
Among the colonies, India was «the jewel
in the crown» the richest and most exotic
part of the empire.
 In the 19° century, some colonies were already being given limited
independence. This meant that they were free from direct British
control in their internal affairs, though not in matters of foreign policy
and defence. They retained Queen Victoria as head of State, and made
up the British Commonwealth of Nations.
 The Victorian compromise
The Victorian period was a time of contradiction, often referred to as the Victorian
Compromise: on the one hand there was the progress brought about by the
Industrial Revolution, the rising wealth of the upper and middle classes and the
expanding power of Britain and its empire; on the other hand there was the
poverty, disease, deprivation and injustice faced by the working classes.


 The writers’ compromise
Victrorian readers epexted to be instructed and at the same time to be
entertained. Novelists were conditioned by their readers’ expectations;
this explains why early Victorian novels present conformity to accepted
moral standars together with a great liveliness. Charles Dickens is the
most representative novelist of the age.


Charles Dickens
(1812-70)
Themes of Dickens’ novels:
• The sufferings of an orphan
brought up in a workhouse;
• Cruelty in boarding school;
• The sufferings of the factory
system ;
• The victorian love for money
and lack of disinterested
affections.

Characters of Dickens’ novel:

• He created lively, unforettable
characters and they are mainly
from the lower and middle
classes and are easily divided
into good and bad.
 Dickens’ novel

Oliver Twist(1837-38)
The Parish Boy’s Progress, novel by
Charles Dickens, published serially under the
pseudonym “Boz” from 1837 to 1839 in Bentley’s
Miscellany and in a three-volume book in 1838.
The novel was the first of the author’s works to
realistically depict the impoverished London
underworld and to illustrate his belief that
poverty leads to crime.
Dickens’ novels

Hard Times (1854)
Hard Times suggests that nineteenth-century
England’s overzealous adoption of
industrialization threatens to turn human
beings into machines by thwarting the
development of their emotions and
imaginations. This suggestion comes forth
largely through the actions of Gradgrind and
his follower, Bounderby: as the former educates
the young children of his family and his school
in the ways of fact, the latter treats the workers
in his factory as emotionless objects that are
easily exploited for his own self-interest.
 Dickens’ novel

A Christmas Carol(1843)
A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens contains several themes:
Change or transformation, forgiveness, compassion, choices,
family, guilt, and memories are some. The most evident of all of
these is probably the change Ebenezer Scrooge experiences
because of the spirits he encounters.
 Alfred Tennyson
(1809-92)

Born in England in 1809, Alfred, Lord Tennyson
began writing poetry as a boy. He was first
published in 1827, but it was not until the 1840s that
his work received regular public acclaim. His "In
Memoriam" (1850), which contains the line "'Tis
better to have loved and lost than never to have
loved at all," cemented his reputation. Tennyson was
Queen Victoria's poet laureate from 1850 until his
death in 1892.
 Ulysses
Poems(1842)

Ulysses is a complex figure: he is the fierce
Homeric warrior and a restless spirit ever
open to knowledge. He fully expresses the
Victorian theme of withdrawal from a dreary
reality into a dreamy world. This is presented
with bitter awareness that dreaming is an
escape into a dead end.