From WolfWikis

ENG 463: The Victorian Period

~Nicole Denman~

Contents 1 Introduction 2 Topics 2.1 Class, Tradition, and Money 2.2 Working Life 2.3 Science and the Urban World 2.4 Government and the Law 2.5 House, Food, and Clothes 2.6 Family and Social Rituals 2.7 Education 2.8 Health and Medicine 2.9 Holidays, Sports, and Recreation 2.10 Religion and Reform 2.11 Morality 2.12 England and Empire 3 References

Introduction

Robert Browning (1812-1889).

List of Works

Pauline: A Fragment of a Confession (1833)

Paracelsus (1835)

Strafford (play) (1837)

Sordello (1840)

Bells and Pomegranates No. I: Pippa Passes (play) (1841)

Bells and Pomegranates No. II: King Victor and King Charles (play) (1842)

Bells and Pomegranates No. III: Dramatic Lyrics (1842)

"Porphyria's Lover"

"Soliloquy of the Spanish Cloister"

"My Last Duchess"

Bells and Pomegranates No. IV: The Return of the Druses (play) (1843)

Bells and Pomegranates No. V: A Blot in the 'Scutcheon (play) (1843)

Bells and Pomegranates No. VI: Colombe's Birthday (play) (1844)

Bells and Pomegranates No. VII: Dramatic Romances and Lyrics (1845)

" The Laboratory"

"How They Brought the Good News from Ghent to Aix"

"The Bishop Orders His Tomb at Saint Praxed's Church"

Bells and Pomegranates No. VIII: Luria and A Soul's Tragedy (plays) (1846)

Christmas-Eve and Easter-Day (1850)

Men and Women (1855)

"A Toccata of Galuppi's"

"Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came"

"Fra Lippo Lippi"

"Andrea Del Sarto"

"A Grammarian's Funeral"

"An Epistle Containing the Strange Medical Experience of Karshish, the Arab Physician"

Dramatis Personae (1864)

"Caliban upon Setebos"

"Rabbi Ben Ezra"

The Ring and the Book (1868-9)

Balaustion's Adventure (1871)

Prince Hohenstiel-Schwangau, Saviour of Society (1871)

Fifine at the Fair (1872)

Red Cotton Night-Cap Country|Red Cotton Night-Cap Country, or, Turf and Towers (1873)

Aristophanes' Apology (1875)

The Inn Album (1875)

Pachiarotto, And How He Worked in Distemper (1876)

The Agamemnon of Aeschylus (1877)

La Saisiaz and The Two Poets of Croisic (1878)

Dramatic Idyls (1879)

Dramatic Idyls: Second Series (1880)

Jocoseria (1883)

Ferishtah's Fancies (1884)

Parleyings with Certain People of Importance In Their Day (1887)

Asolando (1889)

Topics

Class, Tradition, and Money

Robert Browning is a staple Victorian author for his appreciation of, as well as his ability to capture high moral qualities in his works. His upbringing stems from an overzealous, arrogant grandfather who came to London at age 20, and began his career as a clerk in the Bank of England; he quickly rose to the prestigious and lucrative office of principle clerk of the Bank Stock Office which earned him an annual salary of more than 500 pounds and the ability to sign his name as 'Esquire'.

According to Mitchell the Brownings would be considered "middle class" due to pay being issued annually, as well as the occupation of Esquire Browning being a banker, and finally the fact that 500 pounds was being acquired yearly. "The middle class despised aristocratic idleness; the majority valued hard work, sexual morality, and individual responsiblity" which includes Robert Browning.

Robert Browning's father was a true painter at heart, but when a tift between himself and his stepmother arose, Browning's father was sent to the West Indies to work on a sugar plantation, to which, through his deceased mother he could have been an heir. His stay in the West Indies did not last long seeing as though he was outraged by the slavery, and returned to England. A university education was not made available to Robert Browning's father yet he became a man of "cosmopolitan interests and scholarly bent" (Ryals) just as his son would become.

Robert Browning had an upbringing similar to other middle class children in that the connection between his father and himself were so close that his reserved, almost shy demeanor was due to the watching of his father's every move so that he could commit to memory how one is to act. Robert Browning thought his Dad to be an exceptional role model and father to him. Robert Browning also respected his father for his stance against slavery which was a huge problem between the relationship of Robert Browning senior and Robert Browning's father.Soylent

A highly valued tradition in the middle class is family closeness and the ability for Robert Browning to share this tradition allowed for a very introspective, exploratative nature to evolve with love and support. Through literature Robert Browning was able to express himself through a variety of different plots and schemes from The Dramatic Idyls which are a collection of direct narratives, with less analytical disquisition than previous works (which pleased his readers, and kept him a highly-esteemed writer in the public eye); to a vested interest in Greek literature in Balaustion's Adventure.

According to J. Sainsbury, In pre-decimal currency, the abbreviation for an old penny was 'd' (short for the Latin 'denarius', a Roman coin) 12d = 1 shilling (s) 20s = £1

---

The full range of coins were:

farthing - ¼d

halfpenny - ½d (pronounced 'ha' penny.)

penny - 1d

threepence - 3d (pronounced 'thruppence')

groat - 4d

sixpence - 6d

shilling - 1s (often written 1/-)

florin - 2s

half crown - 2s 6d (2/6)

crown - 5s (5/-)

sovereign - £1

guinea - £1 1s 0d

Working Life

Martens analyzes the poem Waring by saying that "In Waring, Browning created a figure of fierce, but suppressed ambition. The narrarator of the poem describes his friend as an unrecognized genius- or at any rate, someone who felt himself to be an unrecognized genius- who is not valued by his friends because he has not actually produced any visual work..."

'He was prouder than the Devil:

How he must have cursed our revel!

Ay and many other meetings, indoor visits, outdoor greetings,

As up and down he paced this London,

With no work done, but great works undone,

where scarce twenty knew his name.'

This exemplifies how "work" in the Victorian Era was only considered work if you have something to show for it. The lower classes or working class lived on the money they earned through various jobs. Those jobs for women included "teaching, surveying, accounting, drafting, and especially clerical work and retailing" according to Mitchell . She also talks about how factory work was preferred to other jobs eventhough the shifts were long with their being usually a schedule on would work of 6 am- 6 pm or 7 am-7 pm. Mitchell then goes on to depict agriculture as the largest single area of employment in the beginning of the Victorian period.

All of the preparation toward accomplishing a task is generally not categorized as work. One who puts effort into a certain task but does not have any physical end product is not working, he would be simply keeping himself busy. For example, someone who works in the factory all day is accomplishing true work and is respected for the hard work they perform daily.

Opium and opium derivitives products include:

Boschee's German Syrup (morphine)

Brou's injection (morphine)

Carney Common Sense Cure(morphine)

Children's Comfort (morphine)

Colwell's Egyptian Oil (opium)

Crossman's specific mixture (opium)

Dr. Drake's German Croup Remedy (opium)

Dr. Fahrney's Teething Syrup (morphine)

Dr. James Soothing Syrup (heroin)

Dr. Moffett's Teethina (opium)

Dr. Seth Arnold's Cough Killer (morphine)

Godfrey's Cordial (opium)

Gowan's Pneumonia Cure (opium)

Harrison's Opium Elixir (opium)

Hooper's Anodyne

The Infant's Friend (morphine)

Jayne's Expectorant (opium)

Maguire's Comp. Extr. Benne (morphine)

Mexican Oil (opium)

Pierce's Extract of Smart Weed (opium)

Rexal Cholera Cure (opium)

Shiloh's Cure (heroin)

One Day Cough cure (morphine and cannabis)

Victor Lung Syrup (opium)

Wright's Instant Relief (opium)

Addressed to Robert Browning from Bexhill on Nov. 9th, 1866 this excerpt from one letter briefly shows the views on work during the Victorian Era, emphasizing the necessity for man to create a finished product of something so that it may be considered work.

. . . True work never misses its mark, but forgive me if I am not always sure that the work is true, and that I would not, for the universe, have Goethe's (to compare great things with small) indomitable satisfaction with my own achievement. I hate Goethe, everything Goethesque; and either you agree with me or I see Goethe and Goetheism wrongly. That man, I believe, to be the incarnate cause of modern times, a horribly perfect Tempter, - the father of unbelief - the Devil's last and subtlest disguise to entrap the beautiful and the pure of soul . . . I find too often that Goethe is influencing me . . . . and directly I feel that I cry out for God's help, feeling utterly maddened and adrift.

Science and the Urban World

In Sally Mitchell's Daily Life in Victorian England (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1996). it is stated that "As science demonstrated the predictability and regularity of the physical world, many people were confirmed in their belief that the universe had been constructed by an intelligent designer with a rational purpose." It was not until the Industrial Revolution and the French Revolution that preceeded the Victorian Era where a real shift in the way "science" was looked at became mainstream. Science became less about natural sciences that were relatively based on common sense,and more about theory that turned into empiricism. Large contributors to science in the Victorian Era include:

Nicholas Callan

George Combe

Robert Chambers

G.Cuvier

Erasmus Darwin

Charles Darwin

Thomas Edison

Michael Faraday

George Francis Fitzgerald

Joseph Fourier

Sigmund Freud

Sir William Rowan Hamilton

J.B. Lamarck

Pierre Simon Laplace

Charles Lyell

James Clerk Maxwell

Richard Owen

William Paley

Herbert Spencer

John Tyndall

Alfred Russel Wallace

and William Whewell as stated in The Victorian Web

Government and the Law

Wilde published a few maxims for the instruction of the over-educated in which state several satirical views of government and leadership of government officials in The Complete works of Oscar Wilde...

"Public opinion exists only where there are no ideas."

"One should never listen. To listen is a sign of indifference to one's hearers."

"The only thing that can console one for being poor is extravagance. The only thing that can console one for being rich is economy."

Many Victorian authors often find themselves writing numerous satirical works dealing with the government and laws that are created merely to make light of the incredulties against them that they feel in society. Robert Browning is no exception. The Ring and the Book deals with a plot that involves a nobleman (Count Guido) who is charged with the murder of his wife and her parents. She was suspected of having an affair with another man (Giuseppe). There are a total of twelve books where the narrative voice changes in each one so that various versions of the story are portrayed. This story mirrors a Japanese murder story named "Rashomon" which was put to film in 1950, where there is a murder in which several narrative voices are portrayed throughout the story to have the reader see the story from each characters point of view. England was and still is a large influence to countries that were and are trying to Westernize themselves. "Rashomon" was filmed in 1950 some 112 years following Browning's "The Ring and the Book" showing that Robert Browning's thoughts on government influenced director Akira Kurosawa of Rashomon.

This is an image advertising the 1950 film "Rashomon".

Robert Browning believes law and government in England during the Victorian Era to be unproductive, as well as not influential in changing events as shown through the sarcastic tone throughout Browning's work "The Ring and the Book".

House, Food, and Clothes

ARISTOCRACY DRESS

MIDDLE CLASS DRESS

WORKING CLASS DRESS

Victorian homes were kept running by the woman of the household. Women were expected to be the ones to cook, clean, and remain close to the home and not to work. Victorian homes vary from house to house but generally a Victorian home would have a bottom floor for the servants of the house, and 2 other floors where on the top floor the woman of the house could meet her guests at the top of the stairs.

According to Mitchell, depending on your social class families ate varying foods. The lower class tended to stick to bread and rice. Higher classes tended to have a choice of what to eat. During the Victorian Era, cookbooks on what to eat was beginning to become popular and there was a market for cookbooks.

Family and Social Rituals

Robert Browning was the only child born to the Browning family and grew up to be a struggling poet for most of his career. He was financially dependent on his family for most of his adulthood. Browning enjoyed reading and writing at a very young age and began writing poems because of his father's insisting on his reading often. His earliest work, "Pauline: A Fragment of a Confession" paved the long road for this struggling writer who today is very well recieved.

A ring without a posy, and that ring mine?

O lyric Love, half-angel and half-bird

And all a wonder and a wild desire,-

Boldest of hearts that ever braved the sun,

Took sanctuary within the holier blue,

And sang a kindred soul out to his face,-

Yet human at the red-ripe of the heart....

THE RING AND THE BOOK 1390-1396

Browning's epitaph to his wife, Elizabeth Barrett Browning. She died on June 29, 1961, after sixteen years of marrige.

Education

"Education is an admirable thing but it is well to remember from time to time that nothing worth knowing can be taught". Daily Life in Victorian England (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1996).

This quote by Oscar Wilde shows his distaste for formal education with no self reflection and self thought. Often Wilde is able to express his views through his characters such as in "The Importance of Being Earnest" with a particular exchange between Lady Bracknell and Jack Worthing.

Lady Bracknell: A man who desires to marry should know everything or nothing. Which do you know?

Jack Worthing: I know nothing.

Lady Bracknell: I am pleased. I do not approve of anything that tampers with natural ignorance.

This exchange can be compared to education in that a man who knows nothing would be a man who knows only what he is told through formal education (memorizing languages, learning facts, and rewritting various information). A man who knows everything would be someone who knows both how to take the important information from formal education that he recieves and apply that information to the way he thinks. The fact that Lady Bracknell is pleased that Jack does not know anything is showing that Jack Worthing is someone who relies solely on formal education and Lady Bracknell believes that is all that is important. Oscar Wilde seemes to have made Lady Bracknell exemplify an educated, close-minded individual of the upper class of whom he does not agree with.

Robert Browning agrees with Oscar Wilde in that education is necessary, but individual thinking and coming to realizations through your own experiences and thoughts is not only more rewarding but necessary. In "The Ring and the Book" Robert Browning renders the Pope as handling the morality through the book. Guido is condemned to death by the pope who was considering pardoning him but instead cannot be pardoned. In response to the Pope's decision he says, "There's a new tribunal now higher than God's- the educated man's".

The fact that Robert Browning was indecisive about his belief in Christianity makes this

statement in the "The Ring and the Book" fairly ambiguous. It is hard to determine whether this quote is satirizing the fact that no tribunal can be higher than God's, or if Browning is trying to show that through the Victorian Era the ideological shift to man being equal to god becomes prevalent. This quote is also very ambiguous because an educated man could mean that he is self-taught, or formally taught which begs that question, "What is education?" It is tough to be able to see where Robert Browning stands.

Girls and Boys were encouraged to be active and exercise during school hours.[Thomas Arnold], head of Rugby school in particular was a huge supporter of 'muscular teaching' which practiced including organized sports in his curriculum, he also made children leadership possible, all the while having an emphasis on moral education.

Health and Medicine

According to Mitchell, tuberculosis was the leading killer in the nineteenth century, and was responsible for one-sixth of all deaths in 1838. Robert Browning lived in an era of drastic measures of improving public health. Mitchell mentions Edwin Chadwick's Report on the Sanitary Condition of the Labouring Population and how it was the first comprehensive investigation of the people's health. Due to Chadwick, The Public Health Act of 1848 was instituted and discoveries were made having to do with negative influences from drainage, proper cleansing, and ventilation.

Another large part of Victorian daily life especially in the lower classes such as the working class was the use of opium. Opium is a drug that created a euphoric feeling when consumed and was legal during the Victorian Period.

Robert Browning fell in love with Elizabeth Barrett Browning who's health was not all together great and was constantly looking after her.

Holidays, Sports, and Recreation

Robert Browning grew up in a household of support where Browning's father approved and even insisted on high education. Therefore, the theatre was naturally an interest of Browning's from an early age. Browning appreciated art, music, and of course poetry.

Mitchell does an excellent job describing recreation in her book however a large interest of individuals during teh Victorian era is gardening. It is believed that "gardens would decrease drunkenness and improve manners of the lower classes" according to David Ross.

Religion and Reform

Religion in the Victorian Era consisted of 49 percent nonconformists, 47 percent Anglican, and 4 percent Roman Catholic according to Mitchell. Religion to Robert Browning was a constant changing form. Browning a knowledgeable individual "knew the Bible so well that he called his first few collections of poems Bells and Pomegranates--a reference (to the decorations on the robes of the Hebrew priests) so obscure that even Elizabeth Barrett, a knowledgeable Bible- reader, had to ask what it meant" according to The Victorian Web Browning was forever testing his ability to play both sides of religion. He enjoyed finding the truth in both sides.

Morality

"The Woman Question" is another name for the separation of spheres. In Victorian England, women generally attended to the home, were known for showing emotion, and being very moral. On the other hand men were known to work, known for their rationality, and sexuality. During the feminism movement evolved two very different branches of feminism; difference feminism and equality feminism. Difference feminism believes that women are different from men and they feel that this is a good thing that society will benefit from. Equality feminism maintains the mentality that "women are just as capable as men". This has to do with morality because if a woman feels that she is being the sexual being instead of her husband for instance she could feel as though she is being immoral because she is crossing over into the males sphere.

Robert Browning tends to refer to morality with a religious undertone in many of his works rather than leaning toward any other moral tendency.

England and Empire

Refer to Government and the Law[[3]]

References

Bexhill, Nov. 9, 1866.

Martens, Britta. "Robert Browning". Victorian Poetry. Vol. 44 (2006): p.332-338. Martens

NNDB. Soylent. Feb. 2007. Soylent Communications. Feb. 2, 2007. Robert Browning

Ross, David. "Victorian Gardens and Gardening." Britain Express. 1996. [4]

Ryals, Clyde. The Life of Robert Browning. Oxford. Blackwell, 1993.

Wilde, Oscar. The Complete Works of Oscar Wilde. 1966. Gen ed. J. B. Foreman. NY: Perennial Library, 1989. 355.