The Victorian Age was named after Queen Victoria and lasted from 1837 through 1901. Literature from the Victorian Age exposed the world for what it really was. Literature talked about societies problems socially and economically. During the time of this period Great Britain was industrializing rapidly. They believed that nature was just nature and didn’t really care for us. Writers such as Tennyson and Carlyle strayed from the concept of art for art’s sake. I believe Thomas Carlyle who wrote The Condition of England would have agreed that the poem, Dover Beach, by Matthew Arnold expresses the essence of the Victorian Age. Carlyle and Arnold both write depressing poems about their time that express the real world and its evils. Also, both writers are pessimistic towards the world and how it is changing. Both poets questioned society as well.
Carlyle talks about the poor conditions of England in The Condition of England. He states that England is growing faster and getting wealthier but less people are working. He says, “England is full of wealth, of multifarious produce, supply for hu...
“Victorian poets illustrated the changeable nature of attitudes and values within their world and explored the experiences of humanity through these shifts.”
lust. To his Coy Mistress is a pure lust one even though in parts may
Throughout the lives of most people on the planet, there comes a time when there may be a loss of love, hope or remembrance in our lives. These troublesome times in our lives can be the hardest things we go through. Without love or hope, what is there to live for? Some see that the loss of hope and love means the end, these people being pessimistic, while others can see that even though they feel at a loss of love and hope that one day again they will feel love and have that sense of hope, these people are optimistic. These feelings that all of us had, have been around since the dawn of many. Throughout the centuries, the expression of these feelings has made their ways into literature, novels, plays, poems, and recently movies. The qualities of love, hope, and remembrance can be seen in Emily Bronte’s and Thomas Hardy’s poems of “Remembrance” “Darkling Thrush” and “Ah, Are you Digging on my Grave?”
The Victorian Era started when Queen Victorian inherited the throne in 1837 and lasted till 1901. Over those years, England underwent “technological, commercial, and social developments that fundamentally changed English life, replacing the world into which Victoria was born with one that looks much more familiar to the twenty-first-century eye.” (Nelson 1). According to Houghton “never before had men thought of their own time as an era of change from the past to the future.”(1). England was in the period of transition, the change from the Middle Ages to the modern period. The old doctrines and institutions were attacked and modified and a new order was proposed. The Victorians had to live between two words,
One poet who was found immense success in the last twenty years in Elizabeth Alexander.An African American woman, Alexander published her first collection of poetry in 1995 and has continued to produce outstanding works since then. Elizabeth Alexander is well known for her poems because of the skillful use of techniques such as diction, enjambment, and asyndeton. In addition, Alexander has garnered attention by adhering to traditional topics such as family, motherhood, and love. Yet, her work does not fit all of the conventional expectations of poetry. Alexander defies expectations by the lack of rhyme or consistent structure in her poems. Nevertheless, I personally find Elizabeth Alexander’s poems of witnessing and stream of consciousness
During the time period of the emancipation proclamation multiple black authors were becoming educated enough to write works of poetry. Such works have influenced and persuaded the minds of white people all over America to this very day. It also gave their own people a work of art to turn to for their own history. The poets have ventured into modern day eras also, and still have the same topics at hand. The main idea of these poetry pieces was on their ancestors in Africa but also of course of the modern problem of slavery. Langston Hughes was the first influential black poet. Lucille Clifton and Colleen McElroy are modern poets but is a black woman who has other views on slavery but also very similar looks on their historical past. All of the poets all mentioned their historical background in Africa. Langston Hughes, Lucille Clifton, and Colleen McElroy all wrote about their ancestors and of slavery, and some of the same references were of the rivers, and the connection between the people even though they are literally worlds apart; a difference between the poems was the desire for freedom and the freedom that was already existing in the modern day poetry of Lucille Clifton and Colleen McElroy.
The living conditions of Great Britain developed into a very poor country due to overpopulation because of the Industrial Revolution. The houses they lived in were very dilapidated and not in great condition for people to be living in. “The wife’s face was dirty and tangled hair hung over her eyes. Her cap was ill washed and slovenly put on.” “The wet came in at the door of the only room, and when it rained, through every part of the roof also: large drops fell on her as she lay in her bed: in
"The Condition of England" in Victorian Literature: 1830-1900. Ed. Dorothy Mermin, and Herbert Tucker. Accessed on 3 Nov. 2003.
Poetry by William King, Martyn Lowery, Andrew Marvell, Liz Lochhead, John Cooper Clarke and Elizabeth Jennings
The span of time from the Victorian age of Literature to the Modernism of the 20th century wrought many changes in poetry style and literary thinking. While both eras contained elements of self-scrutiny, the various forms and reasoning behind such thinking were vastly different. The Victorian age, with it's new industrialization of society, brought to poetry and literature the fictional character, seeing the world from another's eyes. It was also a time in which "Victorian authors and intellectuals found a way to reassert religious ideas" (Longman, p. 1790). Society was questioning the ideals of religion, yet people wanted to believe.
During the time that Charles Dickens lived, which was during the Victorian Age (1837-1901), “...1837 ( the year Victoria became Queen) and ends in 1901 in ( the year of her death),” (UNLV 1). It is important to realize that the Victoria’s reign over Britain is the second longest reign in British history, lasting for 63 years, only behind that of the current Queen Elizabeth. Many historians consider 1900 the end of the Victorian Age, “...since Queen Victoria’s death occurred so soon in the beginning of a new century,..” (UNLV 1). Even though Charles Dickens was born in 1812 and died in 1870, the Victorian Age is time period which most, maybe all, of his literature were published/read in. This era is often considered as “prudish, hypocritical, stuffy, and narrow-minded” (UNLV 2), because during this time, there were classes animosities between the “common man” and that of what was considered the “gentleman”, which was like as if they were two different species (Orwell 3.5). The advancement in literature during this period also was important, “...primarily financial, as in Charles Dickens’s Great Expectations…marrying above one’s station, as in Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre...[it] may also be intellectual or education-based,” (UNLV 4). Without the literature advancements, the Victorian Age wouldn’t have made such an impact on the world as it did literary-wise.
There is no denying that Thomas Carlyle’s social and political criticism of England’s condition during the 1840s was among the most influential writing of that time. In his essay “Past and Present,” Carlyle acknowledges the fact that poor working conditions is a big problem in society. He states in the text, “And yet I will venture to believe that in no time, since the beginning of Society, was the lot of those same dumb millions of toilers so entirely unbearable as it is even in the days now passing over us.” (Carlyle, 29). This quote demonstrates so much about Carlyle’s attitude toward the working class. For instance, he reveals that he is very concerned about their predicament. Moreover, he understands that they have been overloaded with more work that they should, they have not been earning enough money for the work that they do, and they have been discriminated against because of their social class. Carlyle also realizes that it is very unfair that the working class has to experience these types of situations, especially when there are wealthy people witnessing the discrimination who can clearly do something about it. Furthermore, in the text, clearly wanting the inequality to end, Carlyle provides the reader with a solution to these injustices. He claims that labor needs to be organized and a better style of leadership will the best thing for society. Additionally, he states, “The main substance of this immense Problem of Organising Labour, and first of all of Managing the Working Classes, will, it is very clear, have to be solved by those who stand practically in the middle of it, by those who
The Victorian Literary Movement that took place in England during the reign of Queen Victoria is what lead to the prominent factors that can be seen across the era of writing. From 1837 to 1901 Victorian Literature evolved from a heavy focus on proper behaviors, to a high level of rebellious acts against the proper Englishman. The code of conducts and push towards social advancements that once moved literature forward soon fell victim to change. This era started out in poetry and moved towards novels as being the dominate form of writing. The Victorian era, being so large in and of itself, has always been thought of as the time when Queen Victoria ruled. Through the years however, there are three major ideas that have been seen in writing that can really help to break this era down. As the audience for writers changed, the stigma of reading only for pleasure began to dissipate. People began to see how social advancement could be a positive thing, and from there aspired to be proper Englishmen. Authors such as Charles Dickens, William Thackeray, Charlotte and Emily B...
The Victorian era was the time period after the Romantic era, it went from poems, plays
The Victorian time period started in 1837 when Queen Victoria took the throne. The people living in England that were ruled by Queen Victoria at the time, were called “Victorians”, this congregation of people were also said to be very “stuffy, prudish, hypocritical and narrow minded” (Everett). During this time period, if you were at the nobles rank you were the very best you could be and everyone wanted to be at that rank.