English Literature
historical novels, is a somewhat laborious study of student and vagabond
life in Europe in the days of the German Renaissance. It has small
resemblance to George Eliot's _Romola_, whose scene is laid in Italy during
the same period; but the two works may well be read in succession, as the
efforts of two very different novelists of the same period to restore the
life of an age long past.
ANTHONY TROLLOPE. In his realism, and especially in his conception of the
novel as the entertainment of an idle hour, Trollope (1815-1882) is a
reflection of Thackeray. It would be hard to find a better duplicate of
Becky Sharp, the heroine of _Vanity Fair_, for instance, than is found in
Lizzie Eustace, the heroine of _The Eustace Diamonds_. Trollope was the
most industrious and systematic of modern novelists, writing a definite
amount each day, and the wide range of his characters suggests the _Human
Comedy_ of Balzac. His masterpiece is _Barchester Towers_ (1857). This is a
study of life in a cathedral town, and is remarkable for its minute
pictures of bishops and clergymen, with their families and dependents. It
would be well to read this novel in connection with _The Warden_ (1855),
_The Last Chronicle of Barset_ (1867), and other novels of the same series,
since the scenes and characters are the same in all these books, and they
are undoubtedly the best expression of the author's genius. Hawthorne says
of his novels: "They precisely suit my taste,--solid and substantial, and
... just as real as if some giant had hewn a great lump out of the earth
and put it under a glass case, with all the inhabitants going about their
daily business and not suspecting that they were being made a show of."
CHARLOTTE BRONTë. We have another suggestion of Thackeray in the work of
Charlotte Brontë (1816-1855). She aimed to make her novels a realistic
picture of society, but she added to Thackeray's realism the element of
passionate and somewhat unbalanced romanticism. The latter element was
partly the expression of Miss Brontë's own nature, and partly the result of
her lonely and grief-stricken life, which was darkened by a succession of
family tragedies. It will help us to understand her work if we remember
that both Charlotte Brontë and her sister Emily[242] turned to literature
because they found their work as governess and teacher unendurable, and
sought to relieve the loneliness and sadness of their own lot by creating a
new world of the imagination. In this new world, however, the sadness of
the old remains, and all the Brontë novels have behind them an aching
heart. Charlotte Brontë's best known work is _Jane Eyre_ (1847), which,
with all its faults, is a powerful and fascinating study of elemental love
and hate, reminding us vaguely of one of Marlowe's tragedies. This work won
instant favor with the public, and the author was placed in the front rank
of living novelists. Aside from its value as a novel, it is interesting, in
many of its early passages, as the reflection of the author's own life and
experience. _Shirley_ (1849) and _Villette_ (1853) make up the trio of
novels by which this gifted woman is generally remembered.
BULWER LYTTON. Edward Bulwer Lytton (1803-1873) was an extremely versatile
writer, who tried almost every kind of novel known to the nineteenth
century. In his early life he wrote poems and dramas, under the influence
of Byron; but his first notable work, _Pelham_ (1828), one of the best of
his novels, was a kind of burlesque on the Byronic type of gentleman. As a
study of contemporary manners in high society, _Pelham_ has a suggestion of
Thackeray, and the resemblance is more noticeable in other novels of the
same type, such as _Ernest Maltravers_ (1837), _The Caxtons_ (1848-1849),
_My Novel_ (1853), and _Kenelm Chillingly_ (1873). We have a suggestion of
Dickens in at least two of Lytton's novels, _Paul Clifford_ and _Eugene
Aram_, the heroes of which are criminals, pictured as the victims rather
than as the oppressors of society. Lytton essayed also, with considerable
popular success, the romantic novel in _The Pilgrims of the Rhine_ and
_Zanoni_, and tried the ghost story in _The Haunted and the Haunters_. His
fame at the present day rests largely upon his historical novels, in
imitation of Walter Scott, _The Last Days of Pompeii_ (1834), _Riettza_
(1835), and _Harold_ (1848), the last being his most ambitious attempt to
make the novel the supplement of history. In all his novels Lytton is
inclined to sentimentalism and sensationalism, and his works, though
generally interesting, seem hardly worthy of a high place in the history of
fiction.
KINGSLEY. Entirely different in spirit are the novels of the scholarly
clergyman, Charles Kingsley (1819-1875). His works naturally divide
themselves into three classes. In the first are his social studies and
problem novels, such as _Alton Locke_ (1850), having for its hero a London
tailor and poet, and _Yeast_ (1848), which deals with the problem of the
agricultural laborer. In the second class are his historical novels,
_Hereward the Wake, Hypatia_, and _Westward Ho! Hypatia_ is a dramatic
story of Christianity in contact with paganism, having its scene laid in
Alexandria at the beginning of the fifth century. _Westward Ho_! (1855),
his best known work, is a stirring tale of English conquest by land and sea
in the days of Elizabeth. In the third class are his various miscellaneous
works, not the least of which is _Water-Babies_, a fascinating story of a
chimney sweep, which mothers read to their children at bedtime,--to the
great delight of the round-eyed little listeners under the counterpane.
MRS. GASKELL. Mrs. Elizabeth Gaskell (1810-1865) began, like Kingsley, with
the idea of making the novel the instrument of social reform. As the wife
of a clergyman in Manchester, she had come in close contact with the
struggles and ideals of the industrial poor of a great city, and she
reflected her sympathy as well as her observation in _Mary Barton_ (1848)
and in _North and South_ (1855). Between these two problem novels she
published her masterpiece, _Cranford_, in 1853. The original of this
country village, which is given over to spinsters, is undoubtedly
Knutsford, in Cheshire, where Mrs. Gaskell had spent her childhood. The
sympathy, the keen observation, and the gentle humor with which the small
affairs of a country village are described make _Cranford_ one of the most
delightful stories in the English language. We are indebted to Mrs. Gaskell
also for the _Life of Charlotte Brontë_, which is one of our best
biographies.
BLACKMORE. Richard Doddridge Blackrhore (1825--1900) was a prolific writer,
but he owes his fame almost entirely to one splendid novel, _Lorna Doone_,
which was published in 1869. The scene of this fascinating romance is laid
in Exmoor in the seventeenth century. The story abounds in romantic scenes
and incidents; its descriptions of natural scenery are unsurpassed; the
rhythmic language is at times almost equal to poetry; and the whole tone of
the book is wholesome and refreshing. Altogether it would be hard to find a
more delightful romance in any language, and it well deserves the place it
has won as one of the classics of our literature. Other works of Blackmore
which will repay the reader are _Clara Vaughan_ (1864), his first novel,
_The Maid of Sker_ (1872), _Springhaven_ (1887), _Perlycross_ (1894), and
_Tales from the Telling House_ (1896); but none of these, though he counted
them his best work, has met with the same favor as _Lorna Doone_.
MEREDITH. So much does George Meredith (1828-1909) belong to our own day
that it is difficult to think of him as one of the Victorian novelists. His
first notable work, _The Ordeal of Richard Feverel_, was published in 1859,
the same year as George Eliot's _Adam Bede;_ but it was not till the
publication of _Diana of the Crossways_ in 1885, that his power as a
novelist was widely recognized. He resembles Browning not only in his
condensed style, packed with thought, but also in this respect,--that he
labored for years in obscurity, and after much of his best work was
published and apparently forgotten he slowly won the leading place in
English fiction. We are still too near him to speak of the permanence of
his work, but a casual reading of any of his novels suggests a comparison
and a contrast with George Eliot. Like her, he is a realist and a
psychologist; but while George Eliot uses tragedy to teach a moral lesson,
Meredith depends more upon comedy, making vice not terrible but ridiculous.
For the hero or heroine of her novel George Eliot invariably takes an
individual, and shows in each one the play of universal moral forces.
Meredith constructs a type-man as a hero, and makes this type express his
purpose and meaning. So his characters seldom speak naturally, as George
Eliot's do; they are more like Browning's characters in packing a whole
paragraph into a single sentence or an exclamation. On account of his
enigmatic style and his psychology, Meredith will never be popular; but by
thoughtful men and women he will probably be ranked among our greatest
writers of fiction. The simplest and easiest of his novels for a beginner
is _The Adventures of Henry Richmond_ (1871). Among the best of his works,
besides the two mentioned above, are _Beauchamp's Career_ (1876) and _The
Egoist_ (1879). The latter is, in our personal judgment, one of the
strongest and most convincing novels of the Victorian Age.
HARDY. Thomas Hardy (1840-) seems, like Meredith, to belong to the present
rather than to a past age, and an interesting comparison may be drawn
between these two novelists. In style, Meredith is obscure and difficult,
while Hardy is direct and simple, aiming at realism in all things. Meredith
makes man the most important phenomenon in the universe; and the struggles
of men are brightened by the hope of victory. Hardy makes man an
insignificant part of the world, struggling against powers greater than
himself,--sometimes against systems which he cannot reach or influence,
sometimes against a kind of grim world-spirit who delights in making human
affairs go wrong. He is, therefore, hardly a realist, but rather a man
blinded by pessimism; and his novels, though generally powerful and
sometimes fascinating, are not pleasant or wholesome reading. From the
reader's view point some of his earlier works, like the idyllic love story
_Under the Greenwood Tree_ (1872) and _A Pair of Blue Eyes_ (1873), are the
most interesting. Hardy became noted, however, when he published _Far from
the Madding Crowd_, a book which, when it appeared anonymously in the
_Cornhill Magazine_ (1874), was generally attributed to George Eliot, for
the simple reason that no other novelist was supposed to be capable of
writing it. _The Return of the Native_ (1878) and _The Woodlanders_ are
generally regarded as Hardy's masterpieces; but two novels of our own day,
_Tess of the D'Ubervilles_ (1891) and _Jude the Obscure_ (1895), are better
expressions of Hardy's literary art and of his gloomy philosophy.
STEVENSON. In pleasing contrast with Hardy is Robert Louis Stevenson
(1850-1894), a brave, cheery, wholesome spirit, who has made us all braver
and cheerier by what he has written. Aside from their intrinsic value,
Stevenson's novels are interesting in this respect,--that they mark a
return to the pure romanticism of Walter Scott. The novel of the nineteenth
century had, as we have shown, a very definite purpose. It aimed not only
to represent life but to correct it, and to offer a solution to pressing
moral and social problems. At the end of the century Hardy's gloom in the
face of modern social conditions became oppressive, and Stevenson broke
away from it into that land of delightful romance in which youth finds an