The Victorian Period

1. The Victorian Period “Paradox of Progress”

2. The Victorian Period • Victorians thought of themselves living in a time of great change. • Growth • Prosperity • Progress

3. Peace and Economic Growth: Britannia Rules • Empire grew steadily until 1900 • India • North America • Queen Victoria was the ruler of more than 200 million people living OUTSIDE of Great Britain

4. Economic Growth • Industrial Revolution expanded • New towns, new goods, new wealth, and new jobs for people maneuvering through levels of the middle class. • Middle class and working class politicians and voters achieved political power while leaving the monarchy and aristocracy in place.

5. The Idea Progress • Thomas Babington Macauley voiced middle class Victorian attitude • History = progress • Progress= material improvement that could be seen and touched, counted and measured • Cleanliness and order • Victorians have confidence that all social and material problems can be solved by “progress.” • By the end of the era, disruption and materialism led to a reevaluation of these values.

6. The Hungry Forties • 1st decade of Queen Victoria’s reign was troubled • She came to the throne in the first year of a depression • 1.5 million unemployed workers (out of 16 million people)were on some form of relief

7. The Hungry Forties • Poor working conditions • Government commissions investigated poor working conditions • Children were mangled at machines when they fell asleep at the end of 12-hour work days. • Children hauled coal in the mines

8. The Hungry Forties • Potato Famine • Ireland (1845-1849) – potato blight caused famine that killed a million and forced 2 million to emigrate. • Some went to England – caused severe overcrowding in cities

9. The Hungry Forties • Pollution and Filth • Rapid growth of the cities • Filthy and disorderly • Major cities were expanding because of industry • Streets were unpaved; Thames River was polluted with sewage, industrial waste, and drainage from graveyards • Bodies were buried six or eight deep

10. The Movement for Reform: Food, Factories, and Optimism • Violence and massive political rallies (1840) - To protest government policies that kept the price of food high and deprived most working men of the vote and representation in Parliament • Political reformers organized a “monster rally” to protest

11. Movements of Reform • Improvements in Diet • Mid-century – Price of food dropped because of increased trade with other countries and the growing empire • Diet improved – meat, fruit, and margarine (Victorian invention) was available to working-class households • Factories and railroads made items and services cheap

12. Movements of Reform • Florence Nightingale • Transformed public’s perception of modern nursing • Reformed hospital management • Octavia Hill – became authority on housing reform • Believed that adequate housing could “make individual life noble, homes happy, and family life good.”

13. Movements in Reform • Reform Bills • Almost all adult males got to vote by the last decades of the century • First Reform Act – All men who owned property worth 10 pounds or more in yearly rent could vote • Second Reform Act – Right to vote to most working-class men except for farm workers • Women age 30 and over won the right to vote – 1918 • Woman age 21 and over – 1921

14. Reform Bills • Factory Acts – Limited child labor and reduced usual working to 10 hours with ½ holiday on Saturday • State supported schools established – 1870 • Compulsory education – 1880 • Free education – 1891 • By 1900 – 90% of population was literate

15. “Blushing Cheeks”: Decorum & Prudery • Middle class obsession with gentility or decorum • Censored books/magazines of things that could bring “a blush to the cheek” • In fiction – sex, birth, and death were softened into tender courtships, joyous motherhoods, and deathbed scenes in which old people were saints and babies were angels • Seduced/adulterous women = “fallen” into the margins of society

16. Authoritarian Values • Family • Autocratic father of middle class households (in both fact and fiction) • Women were subject to male authority • Women marry to make comfortable homes as a refuge for their husbands to escape the male domain of business

17. Authoritarian Values • Few occupations for unmarried women • Working class – servants in wealthy homes • Middle class – governesses/teachers • Unmarried women had painful, difficult lives

18. Prudery and Social Control • Used to control immorality and sexual excess associated with violent political revolutions of the 18th century and social corruption of regency of George IV

19. Intellectual Progress: The March of the Mind • Humans began to understand more about the earth, its creatures, and natural laws • Charles Darwin – Evolution of the Species • Technology, chemistry, and engineering aided with the industrial movement

20. Questions and Doubts • Victorians questioned the cost of exploiting the earth and human beings to achieve material comfort • Protested or mocked codes of decorum and authority

21. The Popular Mr. Dickens • Most popular and important figure in Victorian literature • Thanks to the high literacy rate • Son of a debt-ridden clerk, but due to his talents and energy rose from poverty to become a wealthy and famous man

22. Mr. Dickens • His books had happy endings, but many characters were neglected, abused, and exploited (esp. children). • Oliver Twist (hungry) “Please sir, may I have some more?” • Tiny Tim (handicapped) “God bless us, everyone!” • David Copperfield (abused by stepfather) “Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show.” • Attacked hollow, superficial excess of the Victorian Age

23. Trust in the Transcendental & Skepticism • Transcendentalists (Romantics) – Purpose of the poet (or any writer) was to make readers aware of the connection between earth and heaven, body and soul, material and ideal • Mid-century- a withdrawal of God from the world • Matthew Arnold’s “Dover Beach” • No certainty about God

24. Trust in the Transcendental & Skepticism • By the end of the century • Skepticism and denial of God dominated • Thomas Hardy and A. E. Houseman