Good morning.
I welcome you to yet another session of the
NPTEL course, The History of
English Language and Literature.
Continuing our discussion on the Victorian
poetry, we begin
identifying some common traits which marked
the distinctive features of the Victorian
poetry.
Though the Victorian poets were not really
similar to one and other, they do display
a lot of
unique features in their personality as well
as in the kind of writings that they produced.
We notice that there are some striking similarities
which make them all being identified as
Victorian poets informed by the Victorian
temper and also the sensibilities of the time.
So one of
the significant feature is a return to the
past and this also we may notice that is a
countermovement against the dominant scientific
and commercial spirit of the Victorian Age.
As we
have noticed in the introductory session itself,
though the Victorian Age is dominated by a
certain scientific temper and also peppered
by a doubtful feelings which also instigated
a lot of
dilemma between reason, faith, science and
all that were informing the human understanding
of
nature and also of oneself.
We notice that in spite of these very significant
movements, we also find the writers moving
away significantly from these dominant tenets
of the times.
Perhaps they were also quite weary
of the way in which the commercial establishments
were taking over.
And also perhaps they were
not initially aware of the ways in which all
of these could threaten the very foundations
of their
being.
Another significant thing which could also
be seen as an extension from the early romantic
period is a comeback of medievalism.
We also notice that this serves as a potent
force in
literature and art of the Victorian period.
Some of these tendencies may not be visible
in the
Victorian period, this being fairly long period
given that the Queen Victoria reigned for
about 63
years.
But nevertheless it is possible to identify
some of these common themes and common
departures which makes us possible to engage
with Victorian poetry as a whole.
And again reiterating one of the things that
we highlighted at the beginning of our discussions
on
the Victorian period, it is only possible
to give a bare sketch of the period given
the prolific
literary output and also the number of texts
that were being published and disseminated
during
this period.
Today’s session we take a look at a group
of poets known as Pre-Raphaelites.
In fact they were
part of brotherhood known as Pre-Raphaelite
Brotherhood established in 1848.
This consisted of
a group of poets, painters and critics influenced
by the visual arts.
And again this is another
significant move that we notice from the Victorian
period onwards.
The distinctions that
separated different forms of art, it begins
to blur from the Victorian period onwards.
We find this
tendency culminating in the modernist and
the post-modernist period.
The poets who were part
of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, they were
immensely influenced by the paintings of the
contemporary.
So primarily it was an artistic movement and
later it began to influence the literary movements
and literary arts in a narrow sense.
And this was the movement and this was the
brotherhood that
popularized the notion ‘Art for art’s
sake’ which was the English translation
of French slogan
which dominated France in the early 19th century.
In a nutshell, it is possible to say that
the poets
of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood were revolting
against the ugliness of contemporary life.
This ugliness was of different forms, it was
physical, it was economic, it was commercial,
it was
also moral in nature.
The set of poets they call themselves Pre-Raphaelite
Brotherhood for a
particular reason.
This term was first used when their work appeared
for the first time by the
middle of the 19th century.
And this term stresses their admiration for
the Italian art of the period
before the High Renaissance.
So significantly it is not the art of the
period of Raphael which fascinated them but
the art form
and the painting that existed before the High
Renaissance symbolized by the great artist
Raphael.
And accordingly they began to identify themselves
as the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood.
They
celebrated a medieval simplicity and closeness
to nature in representational clarity and
a deep
moral seriousness of intent.
And these were precisely the things that they
found wanting in Victorian art and literature.
Their
artistic temperament was majorly influenced
and inspired by John Ruskin and Ruskin we
notice
that in his work Modern Painters, he also
went on to defend them against the major attacks
that
they faced from the English public.
The founders and the main figures of this
Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood include William
Holman
Hunt, John Everett Millais, Dante Gabriel
Rossetti and William Michael Rossetti who
are
brothers.
And this group, they began to publish a periodical
titled The Germ and this was edited
initially by William Michael but however it
only had four issues in 1850.
They also had a subtitle
in the initial editions which read like this
– Thoughts towards Nature in Poetry, literature
and Art.
And this was quite influential and many also
thought that they were going to make quite
a
revolution in the literary scene in England.
But we also notice that it was rather a short
lived influence and a short lived periodical
that ran
from the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood.
They focused on hard realism and heavy symbolism.
This
also made them closer to the romantics than
to the Victorian artist.
And we also find them at the
same time being forced to respond to certain
dominant things of the time.
They did not remain
aloof from the societal and the political
concerns of the Victorian period.
On the contrary they also give a commentary
on contemporary society and higher state of
being.
They also drew lot of flag from the English
society.
And the some of the major criticisms about
the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood and the kind
of art that they produced was that they were
concerned too much with the body.
So voluptuous bodies were part of most of
their artistic
works and it was considered quite obscene
in the 19th century.
And because of that many of them identified
them with the fleshly school of poetry in
a very
derogatory sense.
And significantly their influence was stronger
on the visual arts than on
writing.
And their impact was less enduring in the
literary arts of the period but however they
were referred to over and again by some of
the modernist writers as we will see when
we discuss
the 20th century.
The most important figure of the Pre-Raphaelite
poets was Dante Gabriel Rossetti who lived
from 1828 till 1882.
He was a singularly unmodern that he sees
to fascinate his contemporaries
because of his peculiar style of living.
He had practically no interest in the life
of his time.
And
we find one of the critics Hall Caine referring
to him as an anachronism in these days.
So that
was the kind of life that he led and also
the kind of belief system that he held onto.
He was rightfully influenced not by the London
of the 19th century but his inspiration and
his
influence lie in the Florence of Dante’s
era.
So he was a man who was living in the Victorian
Age
but was not really present there mentally
or aesthetically.
His work Blessed Damozel is a perfect
example of this.
And this poem, The Blessed Damozel also had
another charge on it because it
was the one of the earliest poems to talk
about eroticism and had an erotic tone built
into it.
But it was quite new in the Victorian verse
and also if you remember discussions about
the
Victorian prudishness, any reference or any
kind of mention of sexuality was considered
quite
taboo in the Victorian period.
When Rossetti wrote about the erotic element
in his poem, quite
publicly it was seen as quite obscene and
it also led to a lot of charges of obscenity
against him.
His intellectual convictions however were
not of the past but he was rather a radical.
He was not a catholic; he did not have any
kind of professed Christian faith.
He was more like an
agnostic.
And that made him closer to the Victorian
Age than with any other age of the previous
times.
He was also a successful ballad writer.
In this element we find him again going back
to the
medieval elements and also getting majorly
influenced by the romantic writers.
His successful
ballads include The White Ship, Sister Helen
and Eden Bower.
He also wrote a sonnet titled The
House of Life.
His general poetic and artistic tendency was
more towards decadence we can say
than towards the aesthetic.
This is one of his famous art works titled
Ophelia.
And we find most of the Pre-Raphaelite
writers producing art of similar kind and
most of these paintings were considered quite
significant and successful in determining
the transition from the Victorian period towards
the
modernist as well.
Algernon Swinburne who lived from 1837 till
1909 is a writer we have already taken a look
at.
But however he forms a significant part of
the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood as well.
And as
Hudson points out he was the last to die of
the great race of Victorian poets.
In a certain way it is
possible to say that his genius belonged to
the romantic stock though he lived in the
Victorian
period.
His significant work, Ave Atque Vale is an
elegy to the 19th century French poet Charles
Baudelaire.
Charles Baudelaire was also a significant
influence in framing the tenets of the Pre-Raphaelite
Brotherhood.
And this work which was an elegy, it continues
in the tradition of Milton’s Lycidas
and Shelley’s Adonais.
Here it is useful to remember that many celebrated
writers of this period,
they used to write mournful or allergic poems
in memory of the death of their favorite friend
or a
fellow colleague.
And in that sense it is also useful to remember
that Arnold, one of the other Victorian poets
also
had written an elegy upon the death of another
poet friend Clough, was titled Thyrsis.
And
Swinburne was a poet who rebelled against
most of the established poets of the Victorian
times.
And if you remember though the Victorian times
were characterized by a dilemma between a
lot
of contesting faiths and contesting principles
and belief system, it was also a time which
try to
impose a certain social code of conduct on
the citizens.
And in that sense it was considered quite
controversial to move against any of the established
conventions of those day.
It said about Swinburne that in religion he
was a pagan and in politics
he wanted to see the overthrow of established
governments.
In poetry, his work confirms a
collapse of conventional Victorian poetic
standards.
It is also said about Swinburne that though
he was considered as quite a successful poet,
his poet had word-music built into it but
it fell to
make much success during his lifetime.
And later also he was never considered as
one of the greatest poets of the Victorian
period.
As
Hudson reiterates as part of the many negative
things that he had to say about Swinburne,
Swinburne was capable of producing miracles
of word-music.
But something more than wordmusic is necessary
to ensure the permanence of a poem.
William Morris was another trouble Victorian
writer who was purely romantic but he could
not
really escape the spirit of the Victorian
times.
In his works, The Defense of Guinevere and
Other
Poems, The Life and Death of Jason and The
Earthly Paradise, we find a significant impact
of
these elements.
And we also notice that while the other Pre-Raphaelite
poets were more focused
on the aesthetic element, we find the aesthetic
movement having a more sustained and significant
impact in the poetry of Morris.
In that sense his poetry is more significant
to the Victorian times than any other Pre-Raphaelite
poets.
He also was immensely influenced by Ruskin.
And we find him increasingly moving away
from the modern commercial tenets of those
times.
And he also shows tendencies towards
socialist government.
We find that unlike many other Pre-Raphaelite
poets he is not able to
remain unconcerned about the turn of events
which were dominating the century.
And we also find him moving from a vague sentimental
regret over the past into a positive
program for the future.
He is in that sense one of the few Victorian
poets who begin to realize
that it is very important to have a hope for
the future and also a practical solution to
come out of
this despair than to just loom regretfully
over the past which has already left England.
In his
work we also find an indication of the powerful
sway of social interest during the Victorian
period.
This is not peculiar to Morris poetry.
We also find that in though in varying degrees
in most of
the writers who were writing in the Victorian
period.
It is only his work critics say that we can
find protest of romanticism and materialism
in a practical form.
And in that sense we also find
him moving away from the aesthetic and the
literary sort of productions and towards more
useful
pragmatic and practical responsibilities in
life.
And he also contributes actively to the social
and
political life in London.
Ernest Dowson, another important poet of the
Victorian period had, Ernest Dowson, another
significant Victorian poet had the aesthetic
sensibility of the 1790s rather than the stoical
selfdoubt of the mid-Victorians.
In our discussion we have so far noted that
there are many Victorian
poets who actually lived in the Victorian
times and because of the kind of crisis which
the age
was ridden with, we find that aesthetic sensibilities
being shaped more by a preceding age than
by the contemporary age.
His important work was Yellow Book in which
we find most of his
works being compiled and collected.
He also died in 1900, the same year as Oscar
Wilde.
Christina Georgina Rossetti who lived from
1830 till 1894 was a sister of Gabriel Rossetti.
In
terms of her canonical importance she is also
placed beside Elizabeth Barrett Browning who
is
considered as the most important woman poet
of the times.
Christina Rossetti’s poems were
more significant in the sense that it had
a deep religious feeling, mysticism and metrical
charm.
Here it is also useful to remember that the
women poets and the women writers of the period
were not really torn apart like the male writers.
On the other hand we find them more, being
more grounded and also talking about things
with more firm temperament.
As we come to the fag-end of our discussion
on Victorian poetry, we take a look at the
poetry of
Gerald Manley Hopkins.
It said about Hopkins that the Victorian despair
verse reaches its climax
in the poetry of Hopkins.
His poetry was written in the 1870s and 1890s
but they were only
published in 1918.
His work was published by a close friend of
Hopkins named Robert Bridges.
And he is considered in that sense as a poet
who bridges the centuries and carries Victorian
doubt
to the other side of the First World War and
into modernism.
And because of these varying decades in terms
of the actual writing of his poetry and the
publication of the poetry, many historians
find it quite difficult to classify his work.
There is a lot
of debate about whether he needs to be considered
as modern 20th century poet or as a late
Victorian poet.
We find anthologies including him in both
these sets of works.
Hopkins is more
significant for the highly personal theories
of poetry that he had put forward namely inescape
and sprung rhythms.
And we also find him in his poetry breaking
linguistic rules and also being quite inventive
about
words and phrases.
He came up with new coinages and also collocations
of words.
He, his poetry
is ridden with grammatical inventiveness.
And there is also an individual use of rhythm
which
was not found quite common in English poetry.
His 1876 poem, The Wreck of Deutschland is
the
most famous of his works.
In that we find him being inspired to a sense
of grief by the death of
five nuns in a certain boat accident.
His poetry could be regarded along the lines
of the metaphysical poetry of John Donne and
George Herbert.
And though his influence in the Victorian
period was quite limited because the
work was not published, we find him being
more influential on the future generations
especially
on the modernist poetry.
In this particular poem titled The Windhover,
we can find the use of sprung rhythms.
If you read
just even the first couple of lines, “I
caught this morning morning’s minion, kingdom
of
daylight’s dauphin, dapple-dawn-drawn Falcon,
in his riding.”
So we find this particular kind of
rhythm and energy in most of Hopkins poems.
The other major Victorian poets who wrote
and lived during this period include Sir Henry
Taylor,
Robert Stephen Hawker, Martin Farquhar Tupper,
Philip James Biley, Sydney Dobell, Alexander
Smith, James Thomson, Lord Macaulay who is
also a prose writer, Lord Lytton, George Eliot,
Thackeray, and Kingsley.
Again some of them were also significant novel
and prose writers.
All of these other Victorian poets about whom
we shall not be discussing in detail, they
had also
produced a significant number of works but
however since they were not considered
representative of the age and their work was
not considered with notable worth we shall
not be
going into the details of their works.
So with this we come to the end of today's
session.
Thank
you for listening and I look forward to seeing
you in the next session.
