Combination background slides for London and major figures of British Literature (Shakespeare & Dickens)

1. London and its
Writers
The City Then
and Now

2. London: origins
 London has been a major settlement for over
two millennia.
 Londonium founded by the Romans around
100 A.D. on Thames river.
 Attacked and pillaged by Celts and Vikings;
Romans built walls around the ‘city of
London.’
 Abandoned by Romans in early 5th Century,
(Rome Collapsed). Attacked by Vikings.
 Important Anglo-Saxon trading center;
became political center under Edward the
Confessor when England was unified in the
11th Century.

3. London: origins
 London became center for royalty and
government when Edward the Confessor
built Westminster Abbey.
 Many famous landmarks built in 11th
Century: The Tower of London, The City of
Westminster.
 City of London became financial center
while the City of Westminster seated the
royalty, and later, Parliament.

4. Middle Ages
 London lost nearly a third of its
population to the black death, (Bubonic
Plague) in the 14th century.
 Seat of the Monarchs who ruled
England; The Tudors, Mary Queen of
Scotts, Elizabeth, the Henrys.
 Played a role in the Protestant
Reformation, and in the spread of
Protestant Christianity, (Early 1600’s).
 Anglican Church created by King Henry
VII, (he wanted a divorce and the Pope
wouldn’t give it to him); broke apart
from the Roman Papacy.

5. Shakespeare’s
London
 Playwright, actor and producer William Shakespeare
created theater with the Lord Chamberlain’s Men,
and later, The King’s Men, (1660’s).
 Considered the greatest playwright in the history of
theater. National dramatist and poet of England.
 Wrote 37 plays; Shakespearian cannon has been
performed all of the world for hundreds of years.
 Tragedies, comedies, histories – many of his plays
adapted from stories and history.
 Hamlet, Macbeth, Romeo & Juliet, King Lear, Julius
Caesar, Othello, Henry V, A Midsumer Night’s
Dream, As You Like It, Twelfth Night…
 154 Sonnets.
 Supported the founding of the first prominent London
Theaters: The Globe, The Swan, The Rose.

6. Shakespeare’s
London
 His writing allowed him to invent thousands of words, phrases and idioms
that are still used in the English language, (i.e. melancholy, oblivion)
 His plays featured human characters from all reaches of society: soldiers,
peasants, servants, slaves, royals and fairies, witches, wizards.
 Endowed each of his characters (large or small) with distinct voices,
emotions, yearnings, and thoughts. Found the humanity in every character.

7. The Victorian
Period (1837 – 1901)
 Years when England emerged as the world’s foremost
economic, industrial and political power. The key event that
preceded this time period was the industrialization.
 Coincided with the reign of Queen Victoria.
 Time of unprecedented confidence in England as a nation as a
a cultural and imperial power throughout the world.

8. Contradictions in
The Victorian
Period
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times,
--Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities
 AREAS OF CONTRADICTION:
- Prosperity alongside poverty, child labor and
disease / urbanization, Irish Potato Famine.
- Traditional / literal ideas of faith alongside hopes
that
science, technology and progress will solve problems.
- Sentimentality (treatment of children), and
strict moral ideas, (decency, behavior and relationships
alongside scientific ‘realism’ and radical new ideas.
- Patriotism and conservatism alongside calls for radical
changes to society (Karl Marx, Thomas Malthus).

9. ‘The sun never sets on
the British Empire’
 England’s colonies stretched from Ireland and Canada to parts of
Africa, the Middle East, Australia, India, New Guinea, Burma and
parts of China.
 One quarter of the world’s population lived under British Rule.
 Patriotic sentiment and national confidence reflected in the writings
of Rudyard Kipling, although many expressed unease or anxiety over
Britain’s unquestioned rule.

10. What do these cartoons convey about
British & American Imperialism? What
attitudes?
 LEFT – Uncle Sam ‘carrying a burden’ – portraying imperialism as a
positive endeavor, but an uphill battle.
 RIGHT – Criticizing the economic motives of imperialism – a
capitalist / businessman pawing Africa for its ‘Gold Fields.’

11. What do these cartoons convey
about British & American
Imperialism? What attitudes?

12. The White Man’s
Burden - Kipling
CONTEXT – The poem ‘The White Man’s
Burden’ was written in November 1989 at a
time when the U.S. had just fought a war
against Spain and acquired Cuba,
becoming an imperial power,
Remember our skills:
- Using details from the poem or text to analyze and
explain the author’s attitude.
- Using details and our knowledge of historical context
/ the author’s beliefs to support our own response.

13. Victorian Society
 An immensely upper class emerged, along with an immensely
poor and destitute lower class.
 Attitudes of time were confidence, patriotism, belief in
Christianity and in England’s superiority.
 Confidence in progress, technology and in human capability.
 Society was stratified – or separated into rich and poor.
 Social problems grew along with the number of the wealthy –
child labor, sickness, slums, poverty and prostitution.

14. Dickens’ London
 Charles Dickens lived in London as an
established author, and wrote extensively
about the city and its characters.
 Dickens lived from 1812 – 1870
 Considered the Victorian Period, alluding to
the reign of Queen Victoria.
 Enjoyed wide popularity as a novelist.
 Created some of the most iconic, popular
characters in English literature.
 Characters such as Ebeneezer Scrooge,
Nicholas Nickelby, David Copperfield and
Oliver Twist.

15. Dickens’ London
 Like Shakespeare, his novels featured
characters from every realm of society. He
parodied the manners of upper classes while
portraying who were struggling or in poverty.
 Many of his heroes come from lower reaches of
society and struggle to overcome their origins:
orphans, peasants, the poor, the abused, (like
The Cratchit Family).
 Portrayed characters with a vivid, imaginative
realism. Wrote with warmth, humor, empathy
and often,criticism.
 Wrote his novels and stories in installments or
as serials; ended his stories ‘on a cliff’ in order
to keep readers hooked on the series.

16. Dickens & London
 Wrote extensively about life in London, its
neighborhoods, interactions, characters,
cultures and social conditions.
 Described real and fictional locations as
settings: (for example: the Cratchit family
lives in Camden Town, in North London.)
 His fiction features nearly every
neighborhood of London, from the inns on
the outskirts of the city, to the workhouses
and debtor’s prisons below the Thames River.
 A Tale of Two Cities describes London and
Paris during the French Revolutionary War.

17. Victorian London

18. The Industrial
revolution
 Dickens lived in the wake of great advancements in textiles,
farming, transportation, machinery, and production of goods
known as the industrial revolution.
 Inventions included the spinning jenny, coal smelting, steel
production, steam powered engines, and interchangeable
parts.

19. The Industrial
revolution
 While the industrial revolution brought innovations and provided
work for thousands of people, it helped perpetuate the
stratification of society, (divisions between the immensely
wealthy and the destitute).
 Immense gap between the
wealthy classes and those who
lived in the slums or toiled in
factories or workhouses.
 Dickens explored these issues
in literature, and worked for social
reform through his writing, activism
and public lectures.

20. Child Labor &
Education
 Child labor was common in Industrial England, with children as young
as 6 often working 12 hour days in mines, miles or factories. Wages
were minimal and working such hours resulted in stunted growth,
work-related accidents and early deaths.
 ‘Workhouses’ consisted of orphanages where parentless children were
forced to work for their room and board. Portrayed in the opening
chapters of ‘Oliver Twist.’
 The Second Reform Bill of 1867
began regulation against child labor,
and the Elementary Education Act of
1870 sought to provide education for
all children aged rive to twelve.

21. Social reform
 Social commentary runs through novels such as
Oliver Twist, Nicholas Nickelby, Hard Times, and A
Christmas Carol.
 Oliver Twist shocked people with its realistic
depictions of child labor (workhouses).
 Known for memorable characters (and character
names!) Depicted the humanity in underclass
characters such as the Artful Dodger, a pickpocket,
and Nancy, a generous, heroic prostitute.
 By featuring these characters in his novels, Dickens
encouraged society to face the societal inequalities
that resulted poverty, in child labor, or prostitution.

22. Social reform –
Hard Times
 The tenth novel by Charles Dickens,
published in 1854. Written, like all of his
novels as a serial for the publication
Household Worlds.
 Written to call attention to the social and
economic pressures facing a small,
industrial, working class community: the
fictional Coketown.
 Opening scene introduces key characters:
Thomas Gadgrind, a dictatorial teacher
who believes in facts and nothing else, and
Sissy Jupe, a young student who gets in
trouble for showing her creativity.

23. Social reform –
Hard Times
 Dickens’ exaggeration and imaginative writing
criticizes education and industrialization. His
description of Coketown is famous for pointing out
the monotonous and polluted landscape of an
industrial town:
 “It was a town of machinery and tall chimneys,
out of which interminable serpents of smoke
trailed themselves for ever and ever, and never got
uncoiled. It had a black canal in it, and a river
that ran purple with ill-smelling dye, and vast piles
of building full of windows where there was a
rattling and a trembling all day long, and where
the piston of the steam-engine worked
monotonously up and down, like the head of an
elephant in a state of melancholy madness.”

24. Utilitarianism –
Hard Times
 In particular, Dickens took aim at
Utilitarianism, a philosophy which took an
extremely rational, reductionist view of
society and social problems.
 Philosophers James Mill and Jeremy
Bantham believed that a rational, analytical
approach to education, social planning and
every aspect of life would promote the
general
welfare: “The greatest good for the greatest
number of people.”

25. Utilitarianism –
Hard Times
 Many, like Dickens, felt that a society
based solely on reason and facts would
produce misery and chaos. He believed it
was a selfish philosophy which squelched
emotion, imagination and the human
spirit, (factors, which he believed would
help people face social issues).
 Hard Times is a scathing critique of the
consequences of Utilitarian philosophy.
 The opening scene of Thomas Gadgrind’s
horrific teaching sets this tone of social
criticism through exaggeration and
intriguing characters.

26. Social reform
 A Christmas Carol emphasizes personal
responsibility and charity as a response to the
problem of poverty.
 Part of a series of ‘Christmas Books,’ that
encouraged a change of heart, or a change of
attitude as a way to help the poor or destitute.
 At the beginning of A Christmas Carol,
Ebeneezer Scrooge is consumed with greed, and
business affairs; he is detached from the
suffering of others.
 Scrooge represents a popular attitude of the
Victorian era: the poor are responsible for their
own suffering. They are burdens of society,
standing in the way of progress.

27. Poverty & Malthus
SCROOGE: “If they [the poor] would rather die, then
they’d better do it, and decrease the surplus
population!”
- Scrooge’s rant echoes the theories of Thomas
Malthus, a popular social scientist at the time.
- Malthus predicted that the population of a society
would always grow faster than its resources,
resulting in starvation, poverty and misery.
- The argument followed that the poor who toiled in
the workhouses, or who died, actually helped
society by making the popular smaller.
- The first of many abstract ideas that reduced
humanity and suffering to math equations,
(Marxism, Eugenics and Social Darwinism).

28. Dickens &
Spirituality
 A Christmas Carol is unique in its emphasis
on spiritual inward renewal as a mean of
social reform.
 This spiritual renewal is centered on the
character of Ebeneezer Scrooge.
 Spiritual renewal connected to the source of
Christmas: Christ and Christianity.
 As Ebeneezer Scrooge is haunted by three
spirits of Christmas (Past, Present, Yet to
Come), he faces his own mortality, and the
consequences of failing to help others.
 Inward renewal combined with acts of
charity was Dickens’ answer to the grim
inhumanity of Malthusian thought.

29. Spirituality
 Inward renewal leading to works of charity
was a common theme of Dickens’ novels.
 At the end of the novel Nicholas Nickelby,
the hero, Nicholas, lifts a starving child in
his arms off of the street and carries him to
safety.
 In A Christmas Carol, Tiny Tim and the
Cratchits represent the poor.
 Yet they share a warmth and camaraderie
that is foreign to Scrooge at the beginning of
the novel.
 Themes of family, camaraderie and warmth
accompany redemption.

30. Literary London
 Like Dickens, scores of novelists,
playwrights, journalists and writers
have called London home.
 Evelyn Waugh, Brideshead Revisited
 William Makepeace Thackery,
(Dickens’ contemporary), Vanity Fair
 Oscar Wilde, The Importance of
Being Earnest, An Ideal Husband,
The Picture of Dorian Gray
 Gilbert Keith Chesterton* Orthodoxy,
the Father Brown Series
 George Orwell, 1984, Animal Farm,
Down and Out in Paris and London

31. London Today
Punk rockers at Piccadilly Circus
Statue outside Buckingham Palace

32. London Today
St. Paul’s Cathedral, seen across the
Thames River.
Lord Nelson’s statue at Trafalgar Square.

33. London Today
National Portrait Gallery.
The National Theatre.

34. London Today
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A leading global city, and one of the top four
command centers of the world economy:
(London)
Population: 7.8 million people. Population of
Greater London: 12 million people.
Leading city for government, world commerce,
business finance, entertainment, education,
research and technology, the arts, media,
transportation, fashion, culture and tourism.
Leading city in the world for live theater and the
performing arts.
The most ethnically and linguistically diverse
city in Europe.

35. Multicultural
London
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Over 300 languages are spoken in the city.
Significant populations from Europe and
former colonies: Ireland, France, Italy
Germany, Poland, Russia, India, Pakistan,
Bangladesh, Jamaica, Nigeria, South Africa,
Ghana, Sri Lanka, Turkey, New Zealand,
Somalia, Kenya.
Amazing city for multicultural dining: Indian
food (see Brick Lane), Turkish food, curry,
kebabs, European cuisine.
Main religions represented: Judaism and
traditional (Anglican) Christianity
More increasingly, Islam and Buddhism.

36. London Today
Camden Town – Home of the
Cratchit Family