The Victorian EraENGLISH IVCLZIANOSKI

LESSON OBJECTIVES• Define Victorianism

• Identify Victorian themes

• Analyze diction’s contribution to a speaker’s tone

• Determine themes of a text

VICTORIANISM• Victorian literature is literature written in England during the reign of

Queen Victoria, or roughly from 1837 -1901. It is largely characterized by the struggle of working people and the triumph of right over wrong.

• Artists and writers were inspired both by the art that came before them and the events occurring during the time that they were working.

• Major events of this time:– A huge growth in population. During Victoria's reign, the population of England

more than doubled, from 14 million to 32 million.–  Significant improvements in technology.–  Changing world views. Darwin’s theory of evolution emerged during this time

period.–  Poor conditions for the working class.

POPULAR VICTORIAN WORKS AND AUTHORS

• Poetry and drama: Robert Browning, Alfred Lord Tennyson

• Science, philosophy, and discovery: Charles Darwin, John Stuart Mill

• Nature writing: Henry Thoreau

• Supernatural or Fantastic Writing: Dracula, Jekyll and Hyde, Sherlock HolmesAlfred Lord Tennyson

VICTORIAN THEMES• Chivalry

• Courtly love

• Good vs. evil

• Nature

• Science vs. religion

• Conflict of the classes

• Social issues

• Industrialism

TERMS TO KNOW• Diction: word choice. The words chosen by the author to

enhance the tone and mood of the text.

• Tone: How the author feels about the text.

• Mood: How you feel about the text.

TERMS TO KNOW• Speaker: The person or character speaking in the poem.

This is NOT the author of the poem!

• Rhythm: The power of stressed and unstressed syllables in each line.

• Rhyme Scheme: A regular pattern of rhyme; rhyme scheme is charted by assigning a letter of the alphabet to matching end rhymes.

ALFRED LORD TENNYSON (1809-1892)• Grew up in a turbulent household with a drunk and abusive father and siblings who

were addicts.

• Poetry became Tennyson’s refuge.

• By the age of 18, he was a published poet, and during his first year at Cambridge University, he won a poetry contest.

• Unfortunately, lack of funds forced Tennyson to leave Cambridge in 1831 without earning a degree.

• In the following years, Tennyson endured many difficulties, including financial problems, scathing reviews, and an engagement complicated by the disapproval of his future wife’s father.

• The death of his friend and publisher, Hallam, inspired an outpouring of remarkable poems, including “Ulysses” and the lyrics contained in In Memoriam.

• In 1850, Queen Victoria recognized Tennyson’s poetic achievements by inviting him to succeed William Wordsworth as poet laureate.

• Decades later, he also accepted the rank of baron and, along with it, the title Lord.

• Tennyson’s poetry reflects many of the Victorians’ concerns, especially their fear that new scientific theories and materialistic values were threatening accepted morality.

“Crossing the Bar”

Sunset and evening star, And one clear call for me! And may there be no moaning of the bar,When I put out to sea,

But such a tide as moving seems asleep,Too full for sound and foam, When that which drew from out the boundless deep

Turns again home.

Twilight and evening bell, And after that the dark! And may there be no sadness of farewell, When I embark;

For though from out our bourne of Time and PlaceThe flood may bear me far, I hope to see my Pilot face to face When I have crossed the bar.

Text Analysis Question: M

Does the parallelism in lines 4, 12, and 16 make the mood

lighter or more solemn?

(pg. 941)

DIRECTIONSALL students will read “Ulysses” (pg. 936) and

“In Memoriam” (pg. 938).

Student’s will count off by two’s:

1’sAnswer Text Analysis Questions

(pg. 936-37):

G, H, and I

2’sAnswer Text Analysis Questions

(pg. 938-40):

J, K, and L

ROBERT BROWNING (1812-1889)• An exceptionally bright child, Browning learned to read and write by the time

he was 5 and composed his first, unpublished volume of poetry at 12.

• At the age of 21 he published his first book, Pauline (1833), to negative reviews. One critic, John Stuart Mill, wrote, “With considerable poetic powers the writer seems to me possessed with a more intense and morbid self-consciousness than I ever knew in any sane human being.”

• Over the next several years, he concentrated on writing verse dramas for the stage. Discovering that he had a talent for developing character through speech, he also began to write a type of poem called the dramatic monologue: a type of poetry written in the form of a speech of an individual character.

• In 1845, Browning met the poet Elizabeth Barrett and began a famous romance that has been memorialized in both film and literature.

• The two poets married in secret in 1846 and eloped to Italy, where they lived happily for the next 15 years.

• After his wife’s death in 1861, Browning returned to England, where he concentrated on writing The Ring and the Book, bringing Browning the recognition for which he had long waited.

DIRECTIONSALL students will read “My Last Duchess” (pg. 946) and

“Porphyria's Lover” (pg. 949).

Students will count off by two’s:

1’sAnswer Text Analysis Questions

(pg. 946):

A and B

2’sAnswer Text Analysis Questions

(pg. 950):

G and H