The Victorian The Victorian

AgeAgeAn Introduction

Yes, it’s

time to

take

some

notes!

0 1840: England issues the Penny Black stamp, the first stamp in the world

0 1848: Women begin attending University of London0 1850: Life Insurance introduced0 1851: Gold discovered0 1860: Florence Nightingale founds school for nurses0 1876:

0 Alexander Graham Bell patents the telephone0 School attendance becomes compulsory

0 1877: Thomas Edison patents the phonograph0 1878: Electric street lighting appears in London0 1886: Wimbledon opens0 1888: Jack the Ripper stalks London’s East End0 1901: Queen Victoria dies

Interesting Dates from the Victorian Age

Queen Victoria0 Ruled from 1837-1901, the longest reign

in British history (63 years and 7 months)0 Took the throne at age 180 Was graceful & self-assured0 Exemplified qualities of earnestness,

moral responsibility, domestic propriety and helped restore high opinion of the monarchy

0 Married German prince Albert in 1840, who became Prince-consort

0 They had a happy marriage that produced 9 children and 42 grandchildren!

0 After Albert died in 1861, she sank into a deep depression and wore black every day for the rest of her life5 minutes

Social Context of the Victorian Age:

0Victorians emphasized decorum: life would be improved if it became more refined, more rationally organized, better policed, and therefore safer.0Because 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

0By the end of the century, however, the disruption and materialism of the era made people question changes brought on by rapid industrialization and reevaluate the definitions of progress.

5 minutes

Victorian England and Social Class

The social class system consisted of three distinctive groups:0The working class consisted of agricultural workers, factory workers, mine workers, maids, servants, housekeepers, soldiers, etc. 0The middle class became the most influential segment of British society. The middle class consisted of administrators, merchants, professionals, and business owners.0The upper class consisted of the hereditary aristocracy and the landed gentry who had come into money through commercial enterprise and ascended from the middle class. Members of the upper class did not work.

Victorian Society and Gender Roles0Middle- and upper-class society was

characterized by a strict and conservative moral code that dictated rigid formal manners and an unwavering adherence to duty, family, and propriety.

0Gender roles were firmly defined. 0Men dominated the public sphere in politics and

industry0Women were relegated to the private sphere where

they were to oversee the household and supervise the educations of their children.

0The ideal Victorian woman was a domestic “angel”—always quiet and demure. She had no business participating in public life or politics.

Historical Context of the Victorian Age:

0Advancements in technology, science, and industrialization change the entire world quickly01830: England opens first public railway line in the world

01851: Crystal Palace opens at Great Exhibition0During this time…

0British Empire largest in the world0Britain largest importer and exporter in the world

0Great Britain is richest country in the world0Intellectuals convinced that all social problems could be overcome by progress.

0Time of great social and political change0Many challenges to religious belief

01859: Darwin publishes The Origin of Species5 minutes

All was not rosy, however…0Unemployment0Poverty0Rioting0Crime0Disease0Slums in large cities0Working conditions for

women and children were terrible

0The “Naughty 90s”

3 minutes

Social Context of the Victorian Age:0Victorians emphasized decorum: life would be

improved if it became more refined, more rationally organized, better policed, and therefore safer.

0Queen Victoria exemplified qualities of earnestness, moral responsibility, domestic propriety and helped restore high opinion of the monarchy.

0Because 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

0Far-reaching new ideas created the greatest outpouring of literary production the world has ever seen

0By the end of the century, however, the disruption and materialism of the era made people question changes brought on by rapid industrialization and reevaluate the definitions of progress.

Literacy, Publication, and Reading

0By the end of the century, literacy was almost universal.

0Compulsory national education required to the age of ten.

0Due to technological advances, an explosion of things to read, including newspapers, periodicals, and books.

0Growth of the periodical0Novels and short fiction were

published in serial form.0The reading public expected literature

to illuminate social problems.

3 minutes

Victorian literature focuses on:

0 conflict between those in power and the common masses of laborers and the poor  

0 shocking life of sweatshops and urban poor is highlighted to encourage reform 

0 country versus city life

0 romantic triangles0 heroines in

physical danger0 aristocratic villains0 misdirected letters0 bigamous

marriages 0 sexual discretion

(or lack of it)  0 strained

coincidences5 minutes

The Fabulous Oscar WildeThe Fabulous Oscar Wilde

An Introduction to The Importance of Being Earnest

Biographical InformationOscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde was born

in Dublin, Ireland on 16 October 1854.Wilde excelled in his studies and attended

Trinity College in Dublin, where he was top in his class and won numerous writing and academic awards.

He then went to Oxford to further his studies.After graduation, he moved to London and

continued to write with moderate success.He went to America in 1881 and spent a year

touring and lecturing and meeting with such greats as Longfellow and Whitman.

He married Constance Lloyd in 1884, and the couple had two sons, Cyril and Vyvyan.

Biographical InformationOver the next several years, Wilde experienced great

writing success, publishing two collections of children’s stories, The Picture of Dorian Gray, and several plays such as Lady Windermere’s Fan, An Ideal Husband, and The Importance of Being Earnest.

The Picture of Dorian Gray was greatly criticized for its “homoerotic” undertones, and it played a role in the legal troubles with which Wilde would later find himself embroiled.

Because of his relationship with another man, Wilde was eventually arrested for and convicted of gross indecency (“buggery”) and sentenced to two years hard labor.

Upon his release, Wilde mostly spent the last three years of his life wandering Europe, staying with friends and living in cheap hotels.

Biographical InformationHe was unable to rekindle his creative fires. When a recurrent ear infection became serious

several years later, meningitis set in, and Oscar Wilde died on November 30, 1900.

He is buried in the Pére Lachaise Cemetary in Paris, France.

Wilde is renowned as one of the greatest playwrights of the Victorian period.

Aestheticism and Decadence

As a reaction to the conservatism and restrictive moral and social code of the Victorian Age, the Aesthetic (or Decadent) Movement championed artistic excess and rejected morality as a measure for the value of artistic expression.

Aesthetes promoted the creation of “art for art’s sake.” Writers and artists of the Aesthetic Movement believed that art should not be judged on moral grounds but, instead, should be valued for pure beauty, sophistication and refinement, and the pleasure derived from its design and composition.

Oscar Wilde is a representative figure of the Aesthetic Movement. He dressed flamboyantly and made the enjoyment of “art for

art’s sake” the focus of his writing. Wilde, although married, was engaged in homosexual

relationships with younger men. Many literary and artistic ideas as well as the notion of fluid

gender identities carried on into the twentieth century and became cornerstones of the age of modernism.

Things to pay attention for in Earnest…

Seriousness (“earnestness”) vs. trivialityThe complex and contradictory notion of being “earnest”The hypocrisy and superficiality of the upper classesThe complex nature of identity – one cannot accurately

judge others by their apparent adherence to social norms or the ways they behave in public.

The institution of marriageIRONY! Situational, verbal, and dramatic are all present.SATIRE!Comedy of manners: uses elements of satire in order to

ridicule or expose the behaviors, manners, flaws, and morals of members of the middle or upper classes.