THE VICTORIAN NOVEL

DEAN CRISTINA &

ZANABONI FEDERICA

5A

THE VICTORIAN AGE. TRENDS

PURITANISM

UTILITARIANISM

DARWINISM

Progress

Wealth

Scientific approach

Main themes of the Victorian novel

• The birth of a new class: the working class• Poverty • The industrial system of production • The clash between classes• The desire to rise and the fear of falling down the

social ladder• The growth of towns• The struggle for democracy • Education and children• Middle class family life

The reading public was predominantly middle class and in particular lower middle class.

Characteristic elements in Victorian fiction:

REALISM derived from the 18th century narratives

The exaggeration of the tones

PATHOSTHE GROTESQUE

SettingThe Victorian novel is generally set in an anonymous city

Charactersthey give shape to anonymous masses so that they are recognizable

They are considered real

Each chapter was anxiously awaited

Literature becomes an object of mass consumption (of industrial production)

Everything we have said applies perfectly to Charles Dickens.

OLIVER TWIST

TITLE

CHARACTERIZATION

SETTING

NARRATIVE TECHNIQUE

THEME/S

READER’S POSITION

PUBLISHING AND ITS RELATION TO THE NOVEL

MESSAGE

STORY LINE

Analysis of an extract from…

Children, poverty, hypocrisy of Victorian society

Dinning hall of the work house, an institution for poor people

Actions and words

Third person omniscient narrator, telling and showing

Oliver and his companions can only eat small rations of food and they are hungry. Oliver asks for more and all are stupefied

It is the name of the protagonist

The reader is not free because of the narrator’s filter

The creation of a tragic-comic vision of the Victorian world through irony and exaggeration

It is an extract from chapter 2, published in 1837-38

NICHOLAS NICKLEBYTITLE

CHARACTERIZATION

SETTING

NARRATIVE TECHNIQUE

THEME/S

READER’S POSITION

PUBLISHING AND ITS RELATION TO THE NOVEL

MESSAGE

STORY LINE

Analysis of an extract from…

Children, poverty, education, hypocrisy of the Victorian society

Dotheboys Hall, a school for boys in Yorkshire

Actions, words and thoughts

Third person omniscient narrator, telling and showing

After breakfast the boys go to their class. Nicholas Nickleby is ready for his first teaching day. Mr Squeers shows him his modes of education

It is the name of the protagonist

The reader is not free because of the narrator’s filter

The creation of a tragic-comic vision of the educational institutions of the Victorian period through irony and exaggeration

It is from one of the early chapters, published in 1838-39

HARD TIMESTITLE

CHARACTERIZATION

SETTING

NARRATIVE TECHNIQUE

THEME/S

READER’S POSITION

PUBLISHING AND ITS RELATION TO THE NOVEL

MESSAGE

STORY LINE

Analysis of an extract from…

Industrialization, utilitarianism and poverty

Coketown

Narrator’s description and Bounderby’s words

Third person omniscient narrator, telling and showing

Mr Bounderby is described in his physical aspect, personality and his life. He is now a rich man and he is proud to be a self-made man. He is speaking with Mrs Gradgrind

The reader is not totally free because of the narrator’s filter

An example of self-made man who rises the social ladder, according to the Puritan ethic

It is from the first book (chapter 4), published in 1854

It refers to the difficult period in which the story takes place

To conclude …

presence of the typical themes of the Victorian Novel.

themes from the ill-treatment of children to the problems of industrialization

use of pathos and the grotesque.

memorable characters

Dickens wants to condemn

the social injustices of his time