Macquarie University

LIT801: Nineteenth Century Literature

Taking a selection of Victorian texts as a starting point, this unit explores Victorian culture as a dynamic and diverse historical period which continues to haunt the present, not only in the more visible form of cinematic adaptations, but in ideological and institutional forms and contexts. The Victorian period was a period of cultural crisis. Industrial turmoil, scientific and theological controversy, war, dramatic urbanisation and the rapid expansion of popular culture changed the way stories were told and read. Bitter ideological struggles raged over the nature of civilization, the ethics of empire, evolution, social inequality, the status of women, the death of God and these struggles inevitably found their way into the literature of the period. This was also a period when the novel, the popular essay, journalism, as well as a variety of new visual media such as photography and proto-cinematic forms, were radically redefining the cultural and public sphere.