The

Victorian
Temper
Art, Culture and Society
 It was the time of the world’s first Industrial Revolution,
political reform and social change, Charles Dickens and
Charles Darwin, a railway boom and the first telephone and
telegraph. But the Victorian Era—the 63-year period from
1837-1901 that marked the reign of England’s Queen
Victoria—also saw a demise of rural life as cities rapidly
grew and expanded, long and regimented factory hours,
the start of the Crimean War and Jack the Ripper.

Victoria, who ascended the throne at age 18 following the

death of her uncle, William IV, is Britain’s second-longest
reigning monarch (surpassed by Queen Elizabeth II).

At just 4-feet-11-inches tall, her rule during one of Britain’s

greatest eras saw the country serving as the world’s
biggest empire, with one-fourth of the global population
owing allegiance to the queen.
Queen Victoria-A Blessing
Queen Victoria presided over a time of industrialisation,education, the abolition of slavery and workers
welfare.
Queen Victoria was the matriarch of the British Empire. She epitomised the values of the era and carved
out a new role for the monarchy. During her 63-year reign, a length surpassed only by our current
Queen, Victoria presided over the social and industrial transformation of Britain, as well as expansion of
the empire.
At the height of the empire, a quarter of the world’s land surface was ruled by Victoria. She was
proclaimed Empress of India in 1877.
She survived many assassination attempts and brought of the idea of a unified British empire under her
rule providing for all her subjects as much as she could.
By the end of her reign, Australia and Canada were dominions, South Africa was soon to become a
united nation, and large parts of Africa, the Far East and Oceania were under British rule. Victoria also
exerted a strong, albeit different, influence over Europe.
The queen was related to nearly all the ruling houses on the continent, through her own relatives or her
children’s marriages, giving rise to the epithet ‘Grandmother of Europe’. Victoria died in 1901, aged 81,
having outlived Albert by 40 years.
Understanding the Queen
Princess Alexandra Victoria, was the fifth in line since her birth. Her father passed away
when she was in the early stages of infancy and her mother withdrew herself from public life
into seclusion with a select staff. Her childhood was unhappy with her mother parading her
around and restricting her interaction with her father's relatives and children her age.
On becoming Queen, she took the name of Queen Victoria. She soon married her first
cousin Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha in 1840.
Albert was the love of Victoria’s life and became, in effect, her chief adviser and private
secretary. He encouraged her to be less with parliament and assume the more ceremonial
role that the monarchy performs today. Meanwhile, the Victorian era became associated
with industrial expansion, championed by Prince Albert. One of his greatest achievements
was organising the Great Exhibition of 1851 at London’s Hyde Park, which showcased the
best in technology and design. He became known as a great reformer, backing educational
advances, the abolition of slavery and workers’ welfare.
Albert and Victoria’s marriage was happy. As parents to nine children, the pair placed a
strong emphasis on morality and family values, and thought it was better to set a good
example to their children rather than chastise till Albert died in 1861.
How is Queen Victoria related to Her Majesty. The Queen Elizabeth?
Understanding the Victorians

The British Empire under Queen Vic

In the history of the United Kingdom, the Victorian era
was the period of Queen Victoria's reign, from 20 June
1837 until her death on 22 January 1901.

Morally and politically, this period began with the

passage of the Reform Act 1832. There was a strong
religious drive for higher moral standards led by the
Victorian Age
nonconformist churches, such as the Methodists, and the
Evangelical wing of the Church of England.

Ideologically, the Victorian era witnessed resistance to

the rationalism that defined the Georgian period and an
increasing turn towards romanticism and even mysticism
with regard to religion, social values, and arts.
Victorian Age
Technologically, this era saw a staggering amount of innovations
that proved key to Britain's power and prosperity.

Doctors started moving away from tradition and mysticism towards

a science-based approach; modern medicine saw the light of day
thanks to the adoption of the germ theory of disease and
pioneering research in epidemiology.

There were unprecedented demographic changes: the population

of England and Wales almost doubled from 16.8 million in 1851 to
30.5 million in 1901, and Scotland's population also rose rapidly,
from 2.8 million in 1851 to 4.4 million in 1901. However, Ireland's
population decreased sharply, from 8.2 million in 1841 to less than
4.5 million in 1901, mostly due to emigration and the Great Famine.
 Between 1837 and 1901 about 15 million emigrated
from Great Britain, mostly to the United States,
Canada, South Africa, New Zealand, and Australia.

Thanks to educational reforms, the British

Victorian Age
population not only approached universal literacy
towards the end of the era but also became
increasingly well-educated; the market for reading
materials of all kinds boomed.

Because of England’s success, they felt it was their

duty to bring English values, laws, customs, and
religion to the “savage” races around the world
 The Victorian
Temper
In many ways the Victorian age reflected values that
Queen Victoria herself espoused: moral responsibility
and domestic propriety.
Queen Victoria, perhaps more so than any previous
monarch, became visually synonymous with the
country she ruled, in part because she was the first
monarch who lived in the age of photography: her
image could be relatively easily produced,
reproduced, and distributed.
The Victorian Period was an age age characterized by
transition, energy and high moral purpose.
• Writers of the Victorian period tended to note more
explicitly than had writers of previous ages the degree to
which theirs was, for good or ill, an era of rapid transition
and change.

• Because the Victorian period lasted so long and

because it was a time of such great change, it is hard to
characterize in any singular, overarching way. Thus,
scholars often refer to three distinct phases within the
Victorian period:

Early Victorian period (1830-1848);

Mid Victorian period (1848-1870);
and late Victorian period (1870-1901).

We often also recognize the final decade of the

nineteenth century (the 1890s) as an important transitional
period between the Victorian era and Modernism.
THE EARLY PERIOD (1830-1848): A TIME OF TROUBLES

• The early Victorian period is marked by two major non-literary events: first, public
railways expanded on an unprecedented scale; and second, the British parliament
passed a reform bill in 1832 that (at least to some degree) redistributed voting rights
to reflect growing population in newly industrializing centers like Manchester and
Liverpool.

• The 1832 Reform Bill marked, for many Victorians, the beginning of a new age of
political power unlike they had ever experienced.

• The 1830s and 1840s became known as the "Time of Troubles" largely because
industrialization was producing such rapid change on such a profound scale;
industrialization had a cascading effect in as much as it caused many other social
"troubles."
THE EARLY PERIOD (1830-1848): A TIME OF TROUBLES

• Working conditions were deplorable for the majority of people, including women and
children, who worked in mines and factories. • A group called the Chartists organized
themselves to fight for workers' rights. The organization fell apart by 1848 but their efforts set
the stage for real and meaningful reform.

• One of the most important reforms of the early Victorian period came with the repeal of the
Corn Laws in 1846. These laws imposed high tariffs on imported wheat and grains. And while the
tariffs meant good profits for England's own agricultural producers, it also meant prohibitively
high prices, especially on basic food items like bread, for the vast majority of the population.

• The literature of this time period often focused on the plight of the poor and the new urban
reality of industrial England. Many writers commented on what had emerged as the two
Englands: that of the wealthy (by far the minority) and that of the poor (by far the majority).
THE MID-VICTORIAN PERIOD (1848-1870): ECONOMIC PROSPERITY, THE
GROWTH OF EMPIRE, AND RELIGIOUS CONTROVERSY

• The mid-Victorian era was somewhat less tumultuous than was the earlier
Victorian period as the relationship between industry and government began to
work itself out. However, the time was still one of great poverty and difficulty
for many, even as England as a whole began to enjoy greater prosperity.

• A number of acts of Parliament curbed the worst abuses of laissez-faire

industry, like child labor and dangerous working conditions.

• The 1850s were to many a time of optimism, with the promise of prosperity
from industry seemingly so close. So too was England proud of its science and
technology, as is evidenced by the Crystal Palace, centerpiece of the Great
Exhibition of 1851.
THE MID-VICTORIAN PERIOD (1848-1870): ECONOMIC PROSPERITY, THE
GROWTH OF EMPIRE, AND RELIGIOUS CONTROVERSY

• The Crystal Palace was designed using modern architectural principles and materials,
and its role in the Great Exhibition was to showcase English "progress" made possible
by science and industry.

• The mid-Victorian period was also a time when the British empire truly expanded
around the globe (Australia, Canada, and India, for example)―all part and parcel of
the prosperity made possible by the industrial revolution.

• In England itself, debates about religion grew in intensity. By the mid- Victorian
period the Church of England had evolved into three factions: a Low (or Evangelical)
Church, a Broad Church, and a High Church. Each had their share of proponents and
detractors.
 • As a primary driver behind the industrial revolution, rationalist thought destabilized
religious beliefs. Groups like the utilitarian "Benthamites" came to see traditional
religion as little more than outmoded superstition.

• New discoveries in the sciences also led to a new mode of reading the Bible:
Higher Criticism approached the Bible not as a divine and infallible text but rather as
an historically produced set of documents that reflected the prejudices and limitations
of their human writers

• Among other scientific works of the time Charles Darwin'sThe Origin of

Species(1859) andThe Descent of Man(1871) seemed to challenge all previous thinking
about creation and man's special role in the world. As popular readers understood
Darwin, man was just one among many creatures who existed as a product of a long
evolutionary history

• The mid- Victorian period would ultimately see often contrary forces―like the
promise of progress yet the emptiness of long-held beliefs―that would come to a
head during the final decades of the Victorian era and that would eventually be its
undoing.
THE LATE PERIOD (1870-1901): DECAY OF VICTORIAN VALUES

• For many, the late-Victorian period was merely an extension, at least on the surface, of the
affluence of the preceding years.

• For many others, though, the late-Victorian period became a time to fundamentally
question―and challenge―the assumptions and practices that had made such affluence possible. It
became a time to hold England to account for the way in which it had generated wealth for so few
on the backs of so many, both at home and throughout the empire.

• Home-rule for Ireland became an increasingly controversial topic of debate. • In 1867 a second
Reform Bill passed, extending voting rights even further to some working-class citizens.

• The political writings of authors like Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels empowered the working class
to imagine itself in control of the industry that it made possible.
THE LATE PERIOD (1870-1901): DECAY OF VICTORIAN VALUES

THE NINETIES • The final decade of the Victorian period marked a high point, both of English
industry and imperial control, and of challenges to that industry and imperialism.

• Even while British empire-building continued with great energy in Africa and India, in England
many were starting to see the beginning of the end of the era.

• Gone was trust in Victorian propriety and morality. Instead, many writers struck a "fin de siècle"
(or end-of-century) pose: a weary sophistication with the optimism of forward progress when the
limits of that progress seemed all too near in sight.

• With the benefit of hindsight we can see the 1890s as a transitional phase between the optimism
and promise of the Victorian period and the Modernist movement, during which artists began to
challenge just how genuine that optimism and promise had been in the first place.
THE ROLE OF WOMEN

• Despite the fact that the Reform Bills of 1832 and 1867 changed voting rights by granting a
political voice to many among the working class who had not enjoyed any such voice before,
women were not included in these reforms.

• In fact, despite its having been an era of great social change, the Victorian period
(particularly its early and middle periods) saw little progress for women's rights. Women had
limited access to education, could not vote or hold public office, and could not (until 1870)
own property.

• Debates about women's rights were referred to generally as "The Woman Question" (one of
many issues in an age of issues).

• In 1848, the first women's college was established; women were otherwise excluded from
England's three universities.
THE ROLE OF WOMEN

• It should be remembered that while the "Woman Question" often sought, at least in principle,
rights for all women, it was primarily addressed to women of the middle class. In other words,
while women argued for access to employment and bemoaned the stereotypical fate of the
middle-class wife, who had to while away her time at home with insignificant trivial pursuits,
hundreds of thousands of lower-class women worked in grueling industrial conditions in mines
and mills.

• Related to the larger "Woman Question," the problem of prostitution gained increasing
visibility. Prostitution itself grew, in part to fill demand, of course, but also because it was
actually a better choice for many women relative to the working conditions they would face in
the factories.

• Importantly, debates about gender did not necessarily fall down gendered lines: many men
argued adamantly for women's rights, and many women (like Queen Victoria herself) were not
convinced that women should enjoy equality with men.
LITERACY, PUBLICATION, AND READING
• As of 1837 roughly half of England's population was literate; that figure continued to grow
throughout the Victorian period (due especially to reforms that mandated at least minimal education
for everybody).

• Because of advances in printing technology, publishers could provide more texts (of various kinds)
to more people.

• The Victorian period saw enormous growth in periodicals of all kinds. Many famous novelists, like
Charles Dickens, for example, published their work not in book form at first but in serial installments
in magazines.

• The practical reality of publishing in serial form had a direct impact on style, including how plots
were paced, organized, and developed. (like modern TV soaps)

• As literacy proliferated, the reading public became more and more fragmented. Writers thus had
to consider how (or if) their writing might appeal to niche audiences rather than to a unified "reading
public."
SHORT FICTION AND THE NOVEL

• Short fiction thrived during the Victorian period, thanks in part to

the robust periodical culture of the time.

• The novel was perhaps the most prevalent genre of the time
period; it was especially well suited to authors who wanted to
capture the wide diversity of industrial life and the class conflict
and divisions that industrialism created.

• A common theme among Victorian novelists involves a

protagonist who is trying to define him- or herself relative to class
and social systems.
POETRY

• While prose fiction was the most widely circulated kind of writing in the Victorian
period, poetry retained its iconic status as "high literature." Most readers continued
to expect poetry to teach a moral lesson, even though many writers were
uncomfortable with that aim.

• As some Victorians would argue, it was through the writing and study of poetry in
particular that individuals could cultivate their greatest human potential.

• Poets of the period ranged widely in their subject matter: some sought to revive
mythic themes (Arthurian legend, for example) while others turned a critical eye on
the industrial abuses of the present (such as the problem of child labor).
PROSE

• Nonfiction prose writing gained wide readership during the Victorian period
(due again to the vibrant periodical culture). No less, authors were attracted to
nonfiction prose as the best vehicle for addressing―in a direct and specific
way―the problems of industrial England and, in some cases, for proposing
solutions to these problems

. • Nonfiction prose authors (who were often writers of fiction and poetry as well)
tackled subjects that were as diverse as the age itself, including politics, religion,
art, economics, and education.

• Much Victorian nonfiction prose is marked by a sense of urgency, which reflects

the pace of change of the age: many authors felt that society would, at some
point, be overwhelmed by change and descend into some form of what Matthew
Arnold called simply "anarchy."
DRAMA AND THEATER
• The Victorian theater was a popular institution, especially for
those with the means to enjoy it as one of life's many pleasures.

• In addition to traditional plays, the theater also included all

manner of spectacle, from burlesque to musicals to pantomime.

• Especially towards the end of the Victorian period, playwrights

like George Bernard Shaw and Oscar Wilde began to reflect, in an
increasingly satirical way, the pretentious values and behavior that
they believed characterized Victorian life.
Types of Literature:
Four types of writing were popular
during the Victorian Era:
Realist
Naturalist
The Novel
Poetry
Realism
Realistic, detailed descriptions of everyday life, and of its
darker aspects
Themes in Realist writing included families, religion, and social
reform

Naturalism
Based on the theory that actions and events are the results of
largely uncontrollable external forces
Authors chose subjects and themes common to the lower and
middle classes. They were attentive to details, striving for
accuracy and authenticity in their descriptions
The Victorian Novel

The novel was the dominant form in Victorian literature.

Victorian novels seek to represent a variety of classes.
Victorian novels are realistic.

Major theme is the place of the individual in society

The protagonist’s search for fulfilment is symbolic of the human condition.
For the first time, women were major writers: the Bronte’s

For the first time, women were major writers: the Bronte’s. Elizabeth Gaskell,
George Eliot (Mary Ann Evans). The Victorian novel was a main form of
entertainment that was relatable and accessible.

Some Famous Novelists of the Age:

Emily Bronte: Wuthering Heights
Charlotte Bronte: Jane Eyre
Charles Dickens: A Christmas Carol, Great Expectations, David Copperfield
Victorian Poetry

Poets sought new ways of telling stories in verse.

Victorian poets show the strong influence of the Romantics, but they can’t sustain the confidence the
Romantics felt in the power of the imagination.
Victorian poets often rewrite Romantic poems with a sense of belatedness.

Dramatic monologue – the idea of creating a lyric poem in the voice of a speaker distinct from the
poet is the great achievement of Victorian poetry.

Victorian poetry is pictorial;

Poets use detail to construct visual images that represent the emotion or situation the poem
concerns. Conflict between private poetic self and public social role.

Famous Poet Alfred Lord Tennyson was the Poet laureate of most of the Victorian age. He wrote
narrative poems
Robert Browning: raised the dramatic monologue to new heights—making it a vehicle for deep
psychological probing and character study
Elizabeth Barrett Browning: Wrote love sonnets valued for their lyric beauty popular in the UK and
USA.
Victorian Drama
The theater was flourishing and popular.
The popularity of theater influenced
other genres.
George Bernard Shaw and Oscar Wilde
transformed British theatre with their
comic masterpieces.
Children's literature

The Victorians are credited with 'inventing childhood', partly via their
efforts to stop child labour and the introduction of compulsory education.
As children began to be able to read, literature for young people became
a growth industry, with not only established writers producing works for
children (such as Dickens' A Child's History of England) but also a new
group of dedicated children's authors.

Writers like Lewis Carroll, R. M. Ballantyne and Anna Sewell wrote mainly
for children, although they had an adult following. Other authors such as
Anthony Hope and Robert Louis Stevenson wrote mainly for adults, but
their adventure novels are now generally classified as for children.
Children's literature

Other genres include nonsense verse, poetry which required a childlike interest
(e.g. Lewis Carroll). School stories flourished: Thomas Hughes' Tom Brown's
Schooldays and Kipling's Stalky & Co. are classics.

Rarely were these publications designed to capture a child’s pleasure; however,

with the increase in use of illustrations, children began to enjoy literature, and were
able to learn morals in a more entertaining way.

With the newfound acceptance of reading for pleasure, fairy tales and folk tales
became popular. Compiling folk tales by many authors with different topics made it
possible for children to read literature about many topics which interested them.

There were different types of books and magazines written for boys and girls. Girls'
stories tended to be domestic and to focus on family life, whereas boys' stories
were more about adventures.