Scarica Sanders letteratura vittoriana e dopo e più Dispense in PDF di Letteratura Inglese solo su Docsity! SANDERS Prima corrente letteraria: letteratura vittoriana, che copre tutto l’ottocento. Victorian literature (chapter 7+8) Modernism (chapter 9) Post modernism (chapter 10) Fiction poetry Theatre Charles Dickens w.h. thackeray thomas hardy robert louis stevenson joseph conrad the bronte sisters elizabeth gaskell george elliot Pre raphaelite brotherhood Robert tennyson Robert browning Oscar wilde George Bernard Shaw Victorian age starts in 1837 and ends in 1901, it was characterized by material progress, imperial expansions and political development. The Industrial revolution brought to improvement in technology such as the invention of the railway, and photography drasticly changed the way to perceive reality. There was a massive growth in population, it more than doubled at the beginning of the century to the end of it. In 1851 there was the Chrystal palace, it symbolized the power of England, economic and industrial. In 1859 on the origin of the species was published by Charles Darwin. Scientific discoveries disturbed the traditional view of the world, it discarded the theory of creation. All living creatures have taken their forms through a slow process of change and adaptation in a struggle for survival only the strongest can survive pros Cons Progress brought by the industrial revolution Poverty, disease and deprivation in the working class, prostitution Rising wealth of the upper and middle classes Young children forced to work in textiles mills and mines Expanding power of Britain and its empire (india, large parts of Africa, etc.) Poverty and debt crimes to be punished with imprisonment The Victorian age is also called Victorian compromise, referring to its great contradictions. • Morality, churchm family, home • Idea of respectability of the middle-upper class • Puritan society and repressed sexuality • Family as patriarchal unit; role of the submissive woman • Patriotism and ideas of racial superiority Literature: • Writers and readers shared, for the first time, the same interests and opinions • Literature became the most powerful form of entertainment of the Victorian period • Publications through a series of chapters on periodicals • Circulating libraries Novel: • Moral and social responsibility of the writers • Reflected the social changes (industrial revolution, growth of the city, working class conditions) • Third person narrator = omniscient narrator • “good characters are rewarded, bad characters are punished” industrial revolution provoked the destruction of rural communities, the city was seen as a newly experienced world. London was the symbol of the new social system, with signs of progression and despair. Charles Dickens and Elizabeth Gaskell wrote realistic representations of the industrial setting. CHARLES DICKENS Had an unhappy childhood, and it inspired most of his novels, such as oliver twist, david copperfield and little dorrit. They are the symbols of a exploited childhood. Bleak house, hard times and great expectations deals with social issues and the life of the poor. • Written in episodes to conform to the public taste • Set in contemporary London • The battle between right and wrong • Radical view of the social scene: negative effects of industrialism • Characters from the middle class and lower classes (house keepers and little orphans) • Didactic aim He is always on the side of the poor, the outcast, the working class, they usually have a didactic aim, and the children became moral teachers. The wealthier classes acquired a knowledge about their poorer neighbours. Elizabeth Gaskell • Social novel • Denounces inequality and injustice on the workers • Comparison between the old rural and new industrial societies • Contrasting values and ways of life between rural life and industrial city She lived in Manchester, where she witnessed the injustice toward the working class, it influenced her writing. It appeared serialized, she recalls the small town where she spent her childhood in contrast with the industrialized Manchester. Mary burton is the first realistic portrait of the industrial city, describing the pressure of the working class Cranford North and south George eliot George eliot was in reality a woman, her name was mary ann evans, she decided to use a male name in order to write. The bronthe sister did the same. middlemarch • Eight books with eight different stories • Set in a provincial town and the country estates around them • Characters of different social strata • Portraits the position of women in Victorian society, regarded as inferior and forced to marriage. The bronthe sisters Emily: wunthering heights • Evocative use of language The picture of dorian gray • The only novel of wilde • Preface as the manifesto of aestheticism (25 aphorisms) • “the purpose of life is to have no purpose” • 19th century version of the myth of Faust (Goethe, sells his should to the devil to have immortality) • concept of dandy • the picture as the dark side of Dorian, the double, that he tries to forget by locking it up in a room. It can be seen as symbol of the bourgeoisie hypocrisy. Stevenson The strange case of dr. Jekyll and mr. hyde • example of duality in late Victorian literature • good vs. evil • Jekyll “man is not truly one, but truly two: an angel and a fiend” • Hyde is an urban creature: darkness of London (civilization has its dark side) theme of the double: - Stevenson • Wilde • Conrad The two characters are described as two different people, but the same, since they are different parts of the same person. Conrad • Born in Poland, sailor, experience in Congo • Heart of darkness provides a bridge between: Victorian values and the ideals of modernism • Two main characters: marlow and kurts • Kurtz symbolises commercial mentality, love for power • Marlow symbolizes the spirit of adventure and love of knowledge • Set in Africa, congo and congo river • Critique against the brutality of imperialism • Madness is closely linked to imperialism • Critique from chinua achebe: the full novel is a racist text • A bridge between Victorian novelist and modernist writer It explores the issues surrounding imperialism, such as the exploitation of the native people of Congo. Both marlow and kurz travel to the interior of Africa for the collection of ivory. Kurtz sees the horror and desctruction, while marlow saw the darkest side of the human mind. It relies on humorism, women are traditional, they wait at home for their husbands, but the modern traits are: it is about alienation, profound doubt, he uses different narrators with different points of view. It is different to judge human actions. He uses modernist strategist, he uses the fragmental perspective such as flashbacks. Madness is very closed link to imperialism, kurt is considered mad, because he has been sent to Africa from England, and this provoked madness. His madness is only relative, his madness is the madness of the empire of England. Chinua achebe Nigerian writer and critic, considered heart of darkness as racist. From his prospective Africans are not seen as human beings, but are compared to hyenas.