The Victorians

British history is two thousand years old, and yet in a good many ways the world has moved farther ahead since the Queen was born than it moved in all the rest of the two thousand years put together. Mark Twain, 1897 at Queen Victorias Jubilee

Queen Victoria reigned 1837-1901

May 24, 1819: born at Kensington Palace only child of Edward, Duke of Kent, the fourth son of George III 1837: on the death of her uncle, William IV, she became queen at the age of 18 1840: married her cousin, Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha 1861: Prince Albert died Nine children Presided over an Empire upon which the sun never set It was during Victoria's reign that the modern idea of the constitutional monarch, whose role was to remain above political parties, began to evolve. January 22, 1901: died after a reign of 64 years longest in British history

Prince Albert
Son of Duke Ernest of Coburg, Victorias maternal uncle he and Victoria were first cousins, born the same year Became Victorias closest advisor A serious patron of the arts, a composer and a painter, an architect and an educator As chancellor of Cambridge, he modernized the traditional classics-and-theology curriculum with science and technology Arranged for the design and building of experimental houses to better serve working class families Organized and oversaw the Great Exhibition of 1851 -- the first World's Fair. "Machinery, Science, and Tasteare of no country, but belong, as a whole, to the civilized world."

The Crystal Palace in Hyde Park site of the 1851 Great Exhibition

The Royal Family

Political Reform
1832: The Reform Bill extended voting rights to all males owning property worth 10 in annual rent lower middle classes 1832: redistribution of parliamentary representation elimination of rotten boroughs 1838-48: Chartist Movement Peoples Charter advocated universal suffrage, secret ballots and legislative reforms 1867: Second Reform Bill: extended right to vote to some of working class 1870-1908: Married Womens Property Acts granted women the right to own property women were legally recognized as individuals in their own right for the first time in history.

Social Reform and Education

1846: Repeal of Corn Laws elimination of tax on grains free trade 1833-78: Factory Acts restricted child labor, limited work hours, required public education 1839: Custody Act 1857: Divorce and Matrimonial Causes Act Higher Education for Women 1848 establishment of first Womens College in London By the end of Victorias reign, women could get degrees at 12 universities and study at Oxford and Cambridge

Technology
1830: Liverpool and Manchester RR first public steam railway in the world steam ships telegraph -- intercontinental cables photography high speed printing cast iron for building anesthetics -- ether Technology on the Victorian Web

Gustav Dor, London Underground

Science: Geology and Astronomy

Geology the hottest science going all accredited geologists agreed that the earth was millions of years old, that strata were layers from different times and that Genesis was incompatible with the findings of modern geology or irrelevant many discoveries about dinosaurs throughout the 19th c. http://rainbow.ldeo.columbia.edu/courses/v1001/dinodis3.html Astronomy: new planetary and cosmic discoveries Geology gives one the same sort of bewildering view of the abysmal extent of Time that Astronomy does of Space. John Sterling, 1837

The Great Exhibition 1851

included first exhibition of dinosaurs

Science: Biology
Charles Darwin (1809-82)
1859: On the Origin of the Species 1871: The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex 1872: The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals

Thomas Henry Huxley (1825-95)

Populizer and advocate of Darwins theories On a Piece of Chalk influenced thinking about education Huxley advocated broad primary school instruction: reading, writing, arithmetic, art, science, and music. The basic form of nearly every American college curriculum is what Huxley advocated more than 100 years ago: two years of more liberal basic studies followed by two years of specialization Huxley emphasized doing and observing in science classes

Religion
1829: Catholic Relief Act granted Catholics the same political rights as Protestants 1835: Jews are granted the right to vote
1857: Sir David Salomons elected Lord Mayor of London 1868: Benjamin Disraeli, a convert to Anglicanism, becomes Prime Minister

The Church of England

Low Church evangelical, highly individual, abolitionists, Puritanical ( Christian right ) Broad Church open to modern advances in science, emphasized inclusion ( liberals ) High Church emphasized tradition, ritual and authority the Oxford Movement resistant to liberal ideas (conservatives)

Biblical Studies
Linguistic and Historic: Higher Criticism Study of original Hebrew, Greek, and Aramaic texts history of composition Historical contexts David Friedrich Struasss Das Leben Jesu translated by George Eliot as The Life of Jesus Biblical Archaeology vs. Mesopotamian Archaeology Sumerian texts

Philosophy: Utilitarianism
Philosophical Radicalism All humans seek to maximize pleasure and minimize pain. Morality that which provides the greatest pleasure to the greatest number Religion outmoded superstition Fails to provide for spiritual needs Attacked by:
Carlyle, Sartor, Resartus (1833-34) Dickens, Hard Times (1854) Ruskin, Unto This Last (1860) John Stuart Mill, Autobiography ( 1873)
Jeremy Bentham

James Mill

John Stuart Mill

Philosophy: Marxism
Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels in London, 1867

Friedrich Engels 1844: The Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844 1884: The Origin of the Family Private Property and the State Karl Marx 1867-94: Das Kapital 1848: Co-authored The Communist Manifesto

The British Empire

Imperialism: The British Empire

1853-1880: Over 2 million Britons emigrated to settle in British colonies especially Canada and Australia 1839-42; 1856-60: Opium Wars with China 1857: Parliament took over rule of India from East India Co. and set up a civil service government 1867: Canadian provinces united into Dominion of Canada 1876: Victoria declared Empress of India 1880s the Irish question Home Rule 1899-1902: Boer War in South Africa By 1890, the British Empire contained of the earths territory, and of the earths population.

Victorian Literature

The Novel
Dominant Victorian literary form Initially published in serial form in periodicals Usually appeared in 3 volumes three deckers in book form Focus on social relationships in middle class world Ample opportunities for women novelists although many choose male pseudonyms to be taken more seriously

Thackeray

Eliot

Trollope

Gaskell

Novelists

E. Bronte C. Bronte

Dickens

Disraeli

Social Realism
Social novels deal with the nature, function and effect of the society which the characters inhabit often for the purpose of effecting reform Condition of England novels in 1840s and 1850s: response to . the condition of laborers in the Industrial Revolution: Dickens Hard Times, Gaskells Mary Barton; Disraelis The Two Nations Social and political realism: Trollopes The Palliser Novels, The Barsetshire Chronicles, etc. Satirical social commentary: Thackerays Vanity Fair Probing psychological realism: Eliots Middlemarch

Non-fiction Prose
Instructional purpose: history, biography, theology, literary and artistic criticism Centrality of argument and persuasion Professional writers
Walter Pater

Matthew Arnold

Victorian Poetry
Highly pictorial picturesque combines visual impressions to create a picture that carries the dominant emotion of the poem Narrative
Long narrative stories poetic novels: Tennysons Idylls of the King, Elizabeth Barrett Brownings Aurora Leigh, Robert Brownings The Ring and the Book Dramatic monologues esp. Robert Browning

Distinctive sound experimentation Poetry of mood and character

Poets

Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Robert Browning

Aestheticism
Art for arts sake A cult of beauty: Life should imitate Art Strong connection between visual and literary arts Anti-Victorian reaction, post-Romantic roots The Arts should provide refined sensuous pleasure, rather than convey moral or sentimental messages Pre-Raphaelites and Arts and Crafts Movement

William Morris

Christina Rossetti

Algernon Swinburne

Dante Gabriel Rossetti

William Holman Hunt

Aubrey Beardsley

Gilbert and Sullivan

Dramatists

George Bernard Shaw

Oscar Wilde