The Victorian novel emerged as a new literary genre in the 1800s. Novels were first published in installments in periodicals, which made them affordable and accessible to masses. Victorian novels portrayed realistic depictions of contemporary society and examined characters' inner lives. Popular genres included novels of manners, social problem novels, and sensation novels. Throughout the Victorian period, novels evolved from didactic works that aimed to instruct readers, to more realistic and critical works that questioned societal norms and portrayed characters as alienated and powerless. Realism and naturalism became influential styles as novels adopted a more objective, scientific approach to literature.

1. Victorian Age
Novels
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2. The novel
• There was a communion of interests and
opinions between the writers and their
readers.
• The Victorians were avid consumers of
literature. They borrowed books from
circulating libraries and read various
periodicals.
The Victorian Age

3. • Novels made their first appearance in
instalments on the pages of periodicals.
• The voice of the omniscient narrator
provided a comment on the plot and
erected a rigid barrier between
«right» and «wrong», light and darkness.
The Victorian Age
The novel was the best way to convey
a picture of life lived in a given society
and to question it.

4. • The setting chosen by most Victorian
novelists was the town.
• It was realistic
• Victorian writers concentrated on the
creation of characters and achieved a
deeper analysis of their inner life.
The Victorian Age

5. Victorian Novel
• Novels of manners
• Humanitarian novels
• Social problem novel
• Nonsense
• Adventure novels
• Bildungsroman
• Exotic Novels
• Crime Novel

6. Victorian Literature is often
divided into 3 stages:
• Early -Victorians
• Mid-Victorians 1860- 1880Mid-Victorians 1860- 1880
• Late-Victorians : last 20 years of Victorian Age
and Edwardian Age

7. Early Victorian writers
• The Novelists identify themselves with their age
• They felt to have a moral and social responsibility
• They analysed their society paying attention not to offend
the moral code of the period
• Their purpose was didacticdidactic : they saw in the novel a way to
correct the vices and weakness of the age.

8. Novels’ main characteristics:
• Published in instalmentsin instalments they were cheaper and also read
by the lower classes
• episodic structureepisodic structure
• excessive length
• obliged to maintain the interestinterest so the reader went on
buying the periodicals
• too manytoo many details, coincidence and incidents as the writer
could modify the story according to the necessity and
success
• the development of SENSATIONALSENSATIONAL to catch the
attention, to create suspense and expectation

9. Mid-Victorian
• The Bronte sisters
• George Eliot (Mary Ann Evans )
• Elisabeth Gaskel

10. Late-Victorian or
Anti-Victorian Reaction
• the sense of dissatisfaction and rebelliondissatisfaction and rebellion prevailed
• a new sort of realismrealism which rejected any sentimental
and romantic attitude; it focused on the clash between
man and environment, his dreams and their fulfilment,
illusion and reality
• the writers were critical and attacked the superficialattacked the superficial
optimism and self confidenceoptimism and self confidence of the age , a more
pessimistic view

11. THE CHARACTERS
• The Individuals are increasingly portrayed
as alienatedalienated from the world in which they
live and powerlesspowerless to alter their destiny
• The characters’ interior world, their
dreams, illusions and despair, becomes
more important than the alienating and
mechanical external reality

12. Anti-Victorian Reaction
literary movements
• Realism:Realism: reproduction of the reality without idealizing it (
as the Romantics did)
• Naturalism:Naturalism: total objectivity and scientific approach to
Literature
• Aestheticism:Aestheticism: Art for Art’s sake
• Decadentism:Decadentism: Art is superior to nature, the finest beauty
is that of dying and decaying things

13. Realistic Novel
• Different from the mild realismmild realism of the first phase.
• In France Honore de Balzac, StendhalHonore de Balzac, Stendhal who analysed the
human beings in their psychological and moral complexity

14. Naturalistic novels
• It started from POSITIVISM , in France, with its faith
in reason and science
• Zolà describes the Urban setting in a scientific way

15. Naturalism:Thomas Hardy
George Eliot Mary Anne Evans
• Theories of DarwinDarwin
• Man conditioned by heredity,environment, circumstances
• Deprived of his free will
• At the mercy of an indifferent fate
• No longer responsible for his actions because these were
conditioned by forces beyond his control
• To be realistic they focused on the worst aspects of life
• The writer had to be objective as a scientist

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