Victorian Fiction

The Victorian period saw some of the most important developments in Britain's history. Rapid industrialisation, social and welfare reform, ground-breaking scientific discoveries, and an unprecedented rise in literacy, all had their impact on fiction of the time. Mapping the developments in fiction against the key political, cultural, and social events of the nineteenth century, this book looks at issues of humanism, domestic politics, religion, colonialism, class identity, and sexuality, while at the same time providing an introduction to the works of Dickens, the Brontes, Thackeray, Gaskell, Trollope, Eliot, Collins, Gissing, Hardy, and Stevenson.