"Victorian England" - a thought-provoking impulse!

Before this class, I unknowingly expected Victorian literature and life to deal with domesticity, honor, reputation, and families in a pretty prudish and chaste way (btw: my dictionary names “Victorian” as a synonym for ‘prudish’). Fortunately, I seem to be wrong: the texts we read so far all deal with some kind of travel: a travel into a world unknown but still (pretending to be) real (Jungle books), a travel into a more mystical world (water babies), a travel in one's dream (Alice), a travel below the surface of the Earth (Coming Race), and a travel in time (Time Machine, The Ascent of Man). Though the act of travelling does not always play the main part, it is still important. All protagonists happen to get into another world where a lot is unfamiliar. It seems that the authors have to let them go to different worlds where they are confronted with different systems in order to communicate ideas which might otherwise be seen as too modern, too provocative, radical, or would just disappear unheard.

There are the stories of The Jungle Books which present and justify British behavior as Imperial Destiny and well-educated, “civilized” human superiority as a natural power. However, there are some ambiguous moments, e.g. when Rikki-Tikki, the “savage,” saves the colonizer’s life, or the epigraph at the beginning of Toomai and the Elephants. Once started looking for other options, it becomes clear that Kipling’s novel offers very different readings, open to almost every interpretation. One point that was especially important and interesting for me is how (natural) law and freedom coalesce in the Mowgli- stories, and in Mowgli himself. We (and when I say ‘we,’ I mean it in the sense of 21st-century-, Western world-, and educated readers) think of a lot of these topics different than the Victorians did. For example, we do not support or justify the idea of colonizing “savage” people in general, yet there is still a difference between “First World” and “Third World,” the mighty, industrial nations and the poor countries, classified as being in great need of development, thus not as progressive and modern as “we” are. Kipling’s stories might let us think of our ‘modern’ self-understanding and how we see the world. And question it: being confronted with the still apparent disparities today, it seems as if we did not make as much progress in our mindset concerning the power-relations in the world as we might have thought. The second point, the connection between law, nature, and freedom is also still relevant today or maybe even more than ever before. As I argued in my post about the moral of the jungle book, Mowgli and the animals of the jungle eventually manage to live in accordance with the natural, eternal law (at least in the stories we read). This leads me to question the role of our society, what freedom means for us, where nature takes part in our lives, how we define (and justify) our position, and on which rules we base our life. I am far away from knowing the answers, but The Jungle Books was the thought-provoking impulse.
Going from the world of the jungle to the world underwater, we get to know a different part of Victorian society: Kingsley parodies the Victorian educational system by using Tom, former chimney-sweep and now a water-baby, as a model to support his ideal of education through experience, and of an evolution of ideas. The final goal, however, is still to ‘get’ a proper Englishman. I think the method and value of education are always worthwhile to consider. ‘What do I learn, how do I learn, why do I learn?’ are important questions. Kingsley presents us one way (metaphorically seen, I mean, we can’t transform into water-babies). Moreover, he shows us through Tom that education can be a means to develop a sense of one’s identity.
As in Water-Babies, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland also confronts us with the ever challenging question “Who am I?” Alice defines herself in relation to well-known conventions; she does not have the “right” size according to her Victorian knowledge and experience. She feels uncomfortable in the new world and questions her position, has to find out who she is and where she belongs (or wants to belong). And so do we.
Alice challenges me. She is so ambiguous, first apparently stupid, then instinctual. She changes our understanding of her, and thus our understanding of the system, the world she happens to be in. Does she make progress? In some sense yes, as she begins to understand this totally different system down the rabbit hole, and is finally able to find the way out by realizing the world’s real character: everything is nonsense. There might be a critique of the Victorian obsession with order and the expectation of a moral in every story. Maybe we, too, have to accept that not everything has to have a reason, an explanation. Some things just are. I just have to think of the ‘miracle of life’ and how some people desperately try to resolve it (well, this is a bad example, it does not really match…). We also questioned if Alice’s adventures can be seen as a form of escapism, in her case to get away from the ‘boring’ world above (cf. the books without pictures). This question becomes even more important when we think of the new “Alice in Wonderland” film by Tim Burton. There, the way down the rabbit-hole is clearly shown as her solution to get away from this awful betrothal, she literally runs away from this difficult situation, exactly as little Alice changes the setting when she dislikes a scene. Even if this novel is complete nonsense, it still offers a cheerful escape from reality for some hours. And I think this is something that should not be underestimated.

The Coming Race, The Time Machine, and the Blind, Kendall and Naden poems all deal with evolution of men in some sense, but focus on different things. What they all have in common is that they show that mankind, though supposed to be the apex of evolution, will eventually descend. There is this certain fear of degeneration. The Vril-ya, being in possession of the one idea/concept/power that encompasses everything, pretend to be perfect. But in fact, they are not. They lack ambition for progress and lost a sense for the arts. And it is clearly stated out that standstill cannot preserve perfection. This stagnancy finally has to lead to their own destruction. In The Time Machine, art still exists, but it is separated from ‘dirty’ work. Neither the happy Elois, the representatives of an aesthetic value, nor the gloomy Morlocks, the embodiment of industrial work and technologic knowledge, are an attractive alternative to contemporary Man. It is a pretty dark and somber outlook. A lot of the poems somehow mention the wish for a second chance, a new start of evolution. And the idea is presented that man and the ‘lower’ creatures are in fact not as far from each other as many suppose. There is the expectation that the way “creation of the world – lower organisms – fishes, birds – mammals – man” finally goes back to chaos, to the beginning. Thus the devolution of Man is predicted. In yearning for perfection, mankind will (unknowingly?) overshoot the mark, and cause its own end. Furthermore, it is arguable if man is the apex of evolution at all. The poems, at least, indicate this. And according to Darwin, evolutionary development can rather be compared to a spider’s web than to a linear progress, so the superior position of men becomes more and more questionable. I found it interesting how the poems discuss mind vs. physical features, and state that this often creates issues, such as in The Lower Life: “The gaining of a higher goal/ Increaseth sorrow” (ll. 26-27). Though the consideration in which direction mankind will develop and how we create our future is an important and interesting one, I am more intrigued by the art vs. science discussion. As we can see today, the predicted direction towards science has become true. If there is money to spend, it will be spend in order to make further improvements in technology and science. I do not say that this is bad in general. A lot of achievements benefit us, i.e. better medical care, and help us understanding the world a little bit better. But I doubt that every new achievement is advancement at the same time. I support the thesis that we need art, humanities and sciences together in order to get a holistic picture of the world. I wish more people would follow Darwin when he says “The loss of these [aesthetic] tastes is aloss of happiness, and may possibly be injurious to the intellect, and more probably to the moral character, by enfeebling the emotional part of our nature.” The Victorian novels and poems make us aware of the threat that lies in the tendency to only concentrate on sciences – and how long this discussion already exists. It is not a new problem but gains in importance the more “advanced” we become.

All this is very complex. And so it is not surprising that we approach “Victorian England” on different levels: combining science and literature, reading different genres (children’s literature which turns out to be for adults, too, or maybe even more appropriate for adults; fantastic literature; scientific romance/science fiction, poetry). We discuss it, and we write about it. Especially the reviews enable us (or at least let us try to) see the texts we read from a different perspective than our 21st-century one. It is interesting to think of what might have been important for Victorians, and this creates a deeper understanding of the text and its influence at this time. I think in dealing with texts from a different time, we first have to understand their contemporary position and importance before we can transfer the ideas to our time. We have to realize the origin.
So far, I see the Victorian time as a period of large changes in almost every field, science and technology rank first. And a lot of their problems are still not solved, a lot of their topics are still under discussion. The perspective, though, might be a different one as time has passed. I tried to elaborate how very up-to-date Victorian literature can be. I am glad when texts are thought-provoking, more than "read it - know it." And in this, all the authors we read did a very convincing job. No matter if I agree or not, but most of their ideas work in my head for a pretty long time. I think of them, discuss them with friends. What else could be better?