The Great Victorian Age : Unknown Facts
The Victorian Age is named after the reign of Queen Victoria. Several movements and reforms took place during this period, which influenced the literature. There was tremendous growth in publication of periodicals and also the emergence of children’s literature as a genre. Dramatic monologue emerged as a poetic form in the poems of Robert Browning. Charles Dickens, George Eliot, the Bronte sisters were storytellers and their novels reflected the Victorian period.
Historical Introduction to the Victorian Age
The Victorian Age is named after the reign of Queen Victoria, who ruled from 1837 to 1901. She was the first English monarch to see her name given to the period of her reign while still living. Vast social, political and technological changes occurred during this age. It was one of the most prosperous periods in the history of England, a period of industrial development and colonial expansion. It is also sometimes known as the Age of Reform because of the plethora of reforms, which took place during this period.
It was an age of democracy. The major democratic movement in Britain during Queen Victoria’s reign was directed toward expanding the voting population for parliamentary elections. Victoria came to the throne 5 years after the passage of the 1832 Reform Bill, which reduced property requirements for voting and holding office in Britain and increased the number of individuals entitled to vote. However, the 1832 Reform Act still failed to extend the vote beyond those owning property. As a result of this, a People’s Charter was drawn up for the London Working Men’s Association (LWMA) by Thomas Lovett and Francis Place in 1838, which demanded votes for all men, equal electoral districts; abolition of the requirement that Members of Parliament be property owners; payment for MPs; annual general elections and the secret ballot. This movement known as the Chartist Movement of 1838, became important for working class agitators for social reform.
The 1867 Reform Bill (extended right to vote to all settled male tenants) and 1884 Reform Bill (which gave working men in rural England the same rights as those in the boroughs) achieved further democratisation of British politics and by the end of the 19th century universal male suffrage became almost a reality. However, women were still deprived of the right to vote.
Literary Characterisitics of the Victorian Age
The Victorian period was a high point in the history of English literature, which produced a number of prominent writers such as Charles Dickens, the Brontes, the Brownings and Oscar Wilde. Writers of this age were perceptive to numerous changes occurring during this period and reflected upon these in their writings. Dickens, for instance, commented on the effects of the Poor Laws in his novels.
Tennyson and Browning represented the two pillars of Victorian poetry and the dramatic monologue was the preferred mode of expression. However, even though these poets flourished in the early part of the Victorian period, the novel became the form most chosen by writers later during the period. The poet Arthur Hugh Clough attests to this fact, when he remarks that “The modern novel is preferred to the modern poem.”
The Victorian period also witnessed tremendous growth in periodicals of all kinds. Many famous novelists such as Charles Dickens published their work in serial installments in magazines. Also, the works of early and mid Victorian novelists, especially George Eliot were marked by a moral purpose.
Literature for children also developed in the Victorian Age as a separate genre. Works of Lewis Carroll (1832-1898), author of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (1865) and Through the Looking Glass (1865) and adventure novels, such as those by Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894): Treasure Island (1883), Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1886) became well known.
Frederic Harrison describes Victorian literature as ‘brilliant, diverse and complex’. Defining the spirit of the Victorian age, he states, “The Victorian Age, it is true, has no Shakespeare or Milton, no Bacon or Hume, no Fielding or Scott-no supreme master in poetry, philosophy or romance, whose work is incorporated with the thought of the world, who is destined to form epochs and to endure for centuries. Its genius is more scientific than literary, more historical than dramatic, greater in discovery than in abstract thought.”
Literary Movements of the Victorian Age Oxford Movement
Oxford movement was a 19th century movement centred at the University of Oxford that sought renewal of Roman Catholic thought and practice within the Church of England. Immediate cause of the movement was the change that took place in the relationship between the State and the Church of England.
The igniting factor was the proposal of the Whig government to suppress half the Anglican bishoprics and to re-dispose their incomes, without first consulting the church. This created a wave of opposition, spearheaded by John Keble, John Henry Newman and others.
John Henry Newman dated the beginning of the Oxford movement to Keble’s Assize Sermon of July 1833, on National Apostasy. Other figures associated with this movement were Richard Hurrell Froude, Frederick Faber, Isaac Williams, Charles Marriott, Bernard Dalgairns, William Ward and Edward Bouverie Pusey.
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