1. The Victorian World The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

2. Progress!! ► Queen Victoria’s Reign ► Booming Economy ► Expansion ► Two New Classes:  Industrial middle class  Modern middle class ► Browning: “God’s in his heaven -- / All’s right with the world!”

3. All is NOT Right ► Brutal factory conditions ► Stinking slums ► Corn laws – high taxes on corn discouraged food imports and made food too costly for the poor ► Only the wealthy and middle classes could vote

4. Fixes ► Corn laws suspended due to Irish famine ► Reform act brought vote to lower classes ► Women were allowed to attend universities ► Laws regulated workdays, factories, and housing ► A system of free grammar schools established

5. Growth of the Empire ► Hong Kong 1842 ► India 1858 ► Africa 1870-1902

6. Victorian Thought Conflicts ► Admired material benefits of industry ► Deplored brutality of factory life and slums ► Should business have free reign or government control? ► Theory of Evolution vs. Creation

7. Victorian Literature ► Continuing Romantic influence depicted nature as mirror of human feelings ► Naturalism depicted harsh realities of life in the Industrial Revolution and saw nature as harsh and indifferent to human suffering

8. Victorian Poetry ► Alfred, Lord Tennyson – music of language ► Robert Browning – psychological monologues ► Elizabeth Barrett Browning – love poems ► Thomas Hardy and A.E.Housman – life’s disappointments

9. Victorian Drama ► Boomed after government restrictions on playhouses were lifted in 1843

10. Victorian Novel ► The novel is quintessentially Victorian ► New middle class were avid readers ► Novels published in serial form ► Heavy on social issues  Emily and Charlotte Bronte  Charles Dickens  Jane Austen