A History of Victorian Literature [Hardcover]

Incorporating a broad range of contemporary scholarship, A History of Victorian Literature presents an overview of the literature produced in Great Britain between 1830 and 1900, with fresh consideration of both major figures and some of the era's less familiar authors. Part of the Blackwell Histories of Literature series, the book describes the development of the Victorian literary movement and places it within its cultural, social and political context.

• A wide-ranging narrative overview of literature in Great Britain between 1830 and 1900, capturing the extraordinary variety of literary output produced during this era
• Analyzes the development of all literary forms during this period - the novel, poetry, drama, autobiography and critical prose - in conjunction with major developments in social and intellectual history
• Considers the ways in which writers engaged with new forms of social responsibility in their work, as Britain transformed into the world's first industrial economy
• Offers a fresh perspective on the work of both major figures and some of the era’s less familiar authors

• Winner of a Choice Outstanding Academic Title award, 2009

Preface ix

Note on Citations xiii

Introduction: Locating Victorian Literature 1

Byron is Dead 1

Cultural Contexts 2

The Literary Field 11

An Age of Prose 14

The Situation of Poetry 19

Victorian Theater 21

The Novel After Scott 22

1 The Times are Unexampled : Literature in the Age of Machinery, 1830–1850 27

Constructing the Man of Letters 27