An Overview of the Victorian Era
​overview_of_the_victorian_literature.docx

The Cost of Being a Victorian Woman

  Objectification of the Female Body                  11 Stages of a Woman's Life                              The Fallen Women 
                                                                               Governesses (women in the liminal space)  

Imperialism and the Empire Where the Sun Never Sets (or what they say)

​"The White Man's Burden" (Rudyard Kipling, 1899)

In his 1899 poem, "The White Man's Burden," Kipling exhorts then the US Governor of New York Theodore Roosevelt to take up a more progressive (or aggressive) role in civilizing (or colonizing) the Filipinos. Enlightening the benighted natives with medicine, education, industry, and "freedom" was such a noble endeavor that any son of civilization ought to take "arms" and "sacrifice" themselves. I hope my use of quotation marks conveys piquant irony.

1. How does Kipling characterize the native people of the "uncivilized" countries?  

2. What are the particular British values Kipling celebrates in this poem?

3. How do the rhythm and rhyme scheme reinforce Kipling's moral in this poem?
For example, the cadence of Stanza 1 marches on like this:
       Take up the White Man's burden--
       Send forth the best ye breed--
       Go bind your sons to exile
       To serve your captives' need;
       To wait in heavy harness,
       On fluttered folk and wild--
       Your new-caught, sullen peoples,
       Half-devil and half-child. (1-7)

Every odd line scans with 3 iambs (that is, iambic trimeter) with an extra unstressed syllable while every even line scans with iambic trimeter. A metrical foot (=meter) that consists of unstressed--stressed--unstressed syllables (for example, as in "al-low-ance")
is called amphibrach. So, I might say each stanza employs the alternation of iambic dimeter with an amphibrach and iambic trimeter, which is quite unusual rhythm. 

And yet, Kipling regimentally repeats this cadence throughout the seven stanzas. What poetic effect do you think such oddly regimental rhythm creates?
​​

"God's Grandeur" (Gerard Manley Hopkins, 1877)

The world is charged with the grandeur of God.
   It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;
   It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil
Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod?
Generations have trod, have trod, have trod;
   And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;
   And wears man's smudge and shares man's smell: the soil
Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.

And for all this, nature is never spent;
   There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;
And though the last lights off the black West went
   Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs--
Because the Holy Ghost over the bent
   World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.


Sprung rhythm is a metrical system devised by Gerard Manley Hopkins that is composed of one- to four-syllable feet that start with a stressed syllable. The spondee replaces the iamb as a dominant measure, and the number of unstressed syllables varies considerably from line to line. According to Hopkins, its intended effect was to reflect the dynamic quality and variations of common speech, in contrast to the monotony of iambic pentameter. Although there have been few poets who practiced sprung rhythm, the spirit and principles of sprung rhythm influenced the rise of free verse in the early 20th century.

​

"The Windhover: to Christ Our Lord" (Gerard Manley Hopkins, 1877)

I caught this morning morning’s minion, king-
    dom of daylight’s dauphin,dapple-dawn-drawn Falcon, in his riding
    Of the rolling level underneath him steady air, and striding
High there, how he rung upon the rein of a wimpling wing
In his ecstasy! Then off, off forth on swing,
    As a skate’s heel sweeps smooth on a bow-bend; the hurl and gliding
    Rebuffed the big wind. My heart in hiding
Stirred for a bird--the achieve of, the mastery of the thing!

Brute beauty and valor and act, oh, air, pride, plume, here
    Buckle! And the fire that breaks from thee then, a billion
Times told lovelier, more dangerous, O my chevalier!

    No wonder of it; shéer plód makes plow down sillion
Shine, and blue-bleak embers, ah my dear,
    Fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermillion.
​​
​I have scanned the first three lines of this sonnet. Please try to read this sonnet using sprung rhythm.
​

"My Last Duchess" and a Parody Poem
Parody: a comic imitation of another author's work or characteristic style

    "My Last Duchess" (Robert Browning, 1842)

Ferrara:
That's my last Duchess painted on the wall,
Looking as if she were alive. I call
That piece a wonder, now: Frà Pandolf's hands
Worked busily a day, and there she stands.
Will't please you sit and look at her? I said
"Frà Pandolf" by design, for never read
Strangers like you that pictured countenance,
The depth and passion of its earnest glance,
But to myself they turned (since none puts by
The curtain I have drawn for you, but I)
And seemed as they would ask me, if they durst,
How such a glance came there; so, not the first
Are you to turn and ask thus. Sir, 'twas not
Her husband's presence only, called that spot
Of joy into the Duchess' cheek: perhaps
Frà Pandolf chanced to say "Her mantle laps
Over my Lady's wrist too much," or "Paint
Must never hope to reproduce the faint
Half-flush that dies along her throat": such stuff
Was courtesy, she thought, and cause enough
For calling up that spot of joy. She had
A heart — how shall I say? — too soon made glad,
Too easily impressed; she liked whate'er
She looked on, and her looks went everywhere.
Sir, 'twas all one! My favour at her breast,
The dropping of the daylight in the West,
The bough of cherries some officious fool
Broke in the orchard for her, the white mule
She rode with round the terrace — all and each
Would draw from her alike the approving speech,
Or blush, at least. She thanked men, — good! but thanked
Somehow — I know not how — as if she ranked
My gift of a nine-hundred-years-old name
With anybody's gift. Who'd stoop to blame
This sort of trifling? Even had you skill
In speech — (which I have not) — to make your will
Quite clear to such an one, and say, "Just this
Or that in you disgusts me; here you miss,
Or there exceed the mark" — and if she let
Herself be lessoned so, nor plainly set
Her wits to yours, forsooth, and made excuse,
--E'en then would be some stooping, and I choose
Never to stoop. Oh sir, she smiled, no doubt,
Whene'er I passed her; but who passed without
Much the same smile? This grew; I gave commands;
Then all smiles stopped together. There she stands
As if alive. Will't please you rise? We'll meet
The company below, then. I repeat,
The Count your master's known munificence
Is ample warrant that no just pretence
Of mine for dowry will be disallowed;
Though his fair daughter's self, as I avowed
At starting, is my object. Nay, we'll go
Together down, sir. Notice Neptune, though,
Taming a sea-horse, thought a rarity,
Which Claus of Innsbruck cast in bronze for me!
              
                        
Who is the speaker of this dramatic monologue?
Who is the listener? What does this dramatic monologue reveal about the speaker? ​

 "My Ex-Husband" (Gabriel Spera, 1992) 


​That's my ex-husband pictured on the shelf,
Smiling as if in love. I took it myself
With his Leica, and stuck it in that frame
We got for our wedding. Kind of a shame
To waste it on him, but what could I do?
(Since I haven't got a photograph of you.)
I know what's on your mind--you want to know
Whatever could have made me let him go--
He seems like any woman's perfect catch,
What with his ruddy cheeks, the neat mustache,
Those close-set, piercing eyes, that titled grin.
But snapshots don't show what's beneath the skin!
Sure, he'd a certain charm, charisma, style,
That passionate, earnest glance he struck, meanwhile
Whispering the sweetest things, like "Your lips
Are like plump rubies, eyes like diamond chips,"
Could flush the throat of any woman, not
Just mine. He knew the most romantic spots
In town, where waiters, who all knew his face,
Reserved an intimately dim-lit place
Half-hidden in a corner nook. Such stuff
Was all too well rehearsed, I soon enough
Found out. He had an attitude--how should
I put it--smooth, self-satisfied, too good
For the rest of the world, too easily
Impressed with his officious self. And he
flirted-fine!but flirted somehow a bit
Too ardently, too blatantly, as if,
If someone ever noticed, no one cared
How slobbishly he carried on affairs.
Who'd lower herself to put up with shit
Like that? Even if you'd the patience--which
I have not--to go and see some counsellor
And say, "My life's a living hell," or
"Everything he does disgusts, the lout!"--
And even if you'd somehow worked things out,
Took a long trip together, made amends
Let things get back to normal, even then
You'd still be on the short end of the stick;
And I choose never ever to get stuck.
Oh, no doubt, it always made my limbs go
Woozy when he kissed me, but what bimbo
In the steno pool went without the same
Such kisses? So, I made some calls, filed some claims,
All kisses stopped together. There he grins,
Almost lovable. Shall we go? I'm in
The mood for Chez Pierre's, perhaps, tonight,
Though anything you'd like would be all right
As well, of course, though I'd prefer not to go
To any place with checkered tables. No,
We'll take my car. By the way, have I shown
You yet those lovely champagne flutes, hand blown,
Imported from Murano, Italy,
Which Claus got in the settlement for me!