Presentation on Victorian Age of English Literature.pdf

Presentation on Victorian Age of English Literature.pdf

1. The Victorian Era:
Social, Cultural and
Literary Context
Dr. Neelam Mulchandani

2. The Social
context

6. The Industrial Revolution

8. Impact of Industrial Revolution
•The emergence of overcrowded cities
•Due to advance of technologythere was
unprecedented growth in the population of cities
•People in search of work left the country sideto work
in factories in the various urban areas of the country
•They had to live in very dirty and unhealthy conditions
•There were not enough houses, so people lived like
animals
•Diseases rose, hunger, poverty, deprivation prevailed,
crime increased and as a result misery increased

11. Child Labour

13. Cultural context

14. •Charles Darwin
•Darwin's book The Origin of Species in which the
theory of evolution was proposed, transformed the
way people thought about the natural world
•The book was extremely controversial because it
implied that man was simply another form of animal
and that he might have evolved from Apes
•Darwin was strongly attacked particularly by the
Church
•The theory of evolution led to a crisis of faith and
spiritual doubt among many people

15. •John StrautMill
•John mill was the champion of individual rights
and wrote the same in his book On Liberty 1869
•He was a pioneer of women's rights And
published the book The Subjugation of women
1869
•Mill attacked the training of the majority of
people who believed in denying Liberty to
individuals through public opinion

17. Literature of Social Protest
•The social and cultural background of the Victorian
age had a deep impact on the literature of the
period
•The novelist of the 1840s and 1850s responded to
the Industrial and the political scene
•Many works of literature depicted the deplorable
work conditions in factories and mines, the plight of
child Labour, the discrimination against women and
other social issues

18. Major Novelists
•The novel was the dominant genre in the Victorian Age
•Charles Kingsley The Water Babies
•Benjamin Disraeli Sybil
•Elizabeth Gaskell North and South, Mary Barton -was one of the first novel to
warm warn against the problems of Industrialisation
•Charles Dickens 1812 to 1870 created a host of unforgettable characters in such
novels as Oliver Twist Great Expectations David Copperfield hard times and a tale
of 2 cities
•William Thackeray 1811 to 1863 his most famous work is Vanity Fair
•Charlotte Bronte 1816 to 1855 Jane Eyre and Emily Bronte 1818 to 1848
Wuthering Heights are classics of English literature
•George Eliot 1819-1880 most important works are Middlemarch The Mill on the
Floss and Adam Bede
•The major novelist of the later part of the period was
•Thomas Hardy 1842-1928 whose best works include Tess of the Uber Wiles, Far
from the Madding Crowd and Jude the Obscure

20. Victorian Poetry
•Victorian poetry shows a strong influence of the romanticsbut they
could not sustain the confidence of the romantics in the power of
imagination
•Victorian poetry is less subjective than the romantic poetry
•Interest in the past both the classical and the medieval and use of
mythological and historical allusions
•The use of dramatic monologue by the poets
•The themes are more realistic discussing such issues as child Labour
the rights of women science and religion
•Poetry is highly pictorial relying heavily on visual imagery
•Elegy is one of the most popular poetic forms in the period a form of
poetry that laments the dead or the past
•Victorian poetry is often characterised by doubt and psychological
conflicts
•Conflict between the private poetic self and the public social role

21. Greatest
Poets of
the Age
•Alfred Lord Tennyson
•Robert Browning
•Matthew Arnold
•Gerard Manley Hopkins
•Elizabeth Barrett Browning
•Christina Rossetti
•Thomas Hardy -considered as
the best poet of the late
Victorians
•Pre-Raphaelite Poets

23. Victorian Drama
•Throughout the 19th century Drama continued its decline since
the Restoration.
•Most dramatic works of the period let depth and originality the
most popular dramatist of the period work Oscar Wilde (1856
to 1900) he wrote comedy such as
•The Importance of being Earnest
•Lady Windermere's Fan which abound in verbal polish and
Cynicism
George Bernard Shaw (1856 to 1950)
•His plays addressed such social questions as Education,
Marriage and the Class system in a comic vein
•His works include man and Superman Pygmalion and St. Joan

25. Thank You