Literary Characteristics of the Victorian Period

Cori Shirk and Cat Whelan

Themes

• Social unrest

• Realism

• Sublimity

• Social status

Social Unrest

• Corruption in government

• Economy

• Significant changes in society

Realism

• Details

• Average person

Sublimity

• “Perfection”

• Admiration

• Gender

Social Status

• Overall importance

• Appearance

Additional Themes

• Pathetic Fallacy

• Judgment

Pathetic fallacy

• Often related to personification

• Artistically suggests emotion

Judgment

• Judgment by Others

• Narrator’s Judgment

• Author’s Judgment

Application to A Doll’s House

• Social Unrest“You have never loved me. You have only thought it pleasant to be in love with me.”—Nora, Act III, p. 63

• Sublimity“Have you forgotten that it is I who have the

keeping of your reputation?”—Krogstad, Act II, p. 44

• Realism“Listen to me, Nora. You are still very like a child in many things, and I am older than you in many ways

and have a little more experience…”—Christine, Act II, p. 32

Application to A Doll’s House

• Social Status“From this moment happiness is not the question; all that concerns us is to save the remains, the

fragments, the appearance.”—Helmer, Act III, p. 60

• Pathetic Fallacy“Do you know, you ought to embroider…it’s far more becoming… But in the case of knitting—that can never be anything but ungraceful.”—Helmer, Act III, p.54

• Judgment“How kind you are, Nora, to be so anxious to help me! It is doubly kind of you, for you know so little of the burdens and troubles of life.”—Christine, Act I, p. 11

Sourceswww.victorianweb.com

http://www.waycross.edu/faculty/selby/2120/viclit.html

http://kirjasto.sci.fi/ibsen.htm

http://www.ajdrake.com/e212_fall_04/index.htm

http://vos.ucsb.edu/browse.asp?id=2751

http://andromeda.rutgers.edu/~jlynch/Lit/victoria.html