THE PRESS

Eighteenth-century famous publicationThe Spectator, The Tatler (Addison and Steele)The Rambler, The Idler (Samuel Johnson)The Gentleman’s Magazine

Nineteenth century=Explosion of the Press

Since the beginning of the century:The TimesThe (Manchester) GuardianSunday PapersRadical Pamphlets

Mid-century → New Journalism

1880s → London capital of the press

SERIALIZATION

The Pickwick Papers (1836)

Pickwick merchandising included: breeches and waistcoats, chintzes, jugs and mugs, pastries.“Pickwick mania seized first Britain, then abroad. [It] was spontaneous, [...] not invented by successful publishers to cash in on the popularity of a character in a book” (Wilson, p.19).

Punch Magazine

Yesterday we mentioned

ALFRED TENNYSON

ROBERT BROWNING

the two most famous Victorian poets

The Pickwick Papers

Household Words

All the Year Round

The Cornhill Magazine

Punch

Fraser’s Magazine

Serialization

Novels and poems appeared in

INSTALLMENTS(usually twenty, monthly or weekly)

EFFECTS:

- on the writer- on the reader- on the novel

NARRATOLOGY

WHAT IS FICTION?

NARRATIVE FICTIONthe narration of a succession of

fictional events

STORYthe eventsthe characterswhen (time)where (setting)

(NARRATIVE)DISCOURSEvoicefocalizationorder

Real Author

Real Reader

Implied authorNarratorNarrateeImplied Reader

NARRATOR

THIRD PERSON-omniscient / non-omniscient-obtrusive / unobtrusive

FIRST PERSON- protagonist- another character

The most common narrator in Victorian novels is an omniscient and intrusive third-person narrator but there are exceptions.

(see Bertinetti, p. 189)

Some notable exceptions:

→ First-person narrators in Dickens, Charlotte Bronte, etc.

→ Wuthering Heights (1847) by Emily Bronte

→ Dracula (1897) by Abraham Stoker

PROSE FICTION

NovelRomance

Short Storytalefairy tale (vs fable)novella

The novel has been considered the major literary genre of the Victorian age.

However, recognition of the novel as literature starts in the second half of the century (George Eliot, Henry James) and inclusion in the literary canon only in the twentieth.

F.R. LEAVIS (a university professor and scholar)

The Great Tradition (1948)

Jane AustenGeorge EliotHenry JamesJoseph Conrad(later he included Hard Times by Dickens)

DOUBLE and CONTRADICTORY nature of the Victorian Novel

Moralism, endorsment of Victorian values

Subversive power, irony, social satire and denunciation