Victorianism 1840-1880
Victorianism was a period about doubts, great changes and hesitation. It's a
period of great movement, that connects the old world with the new world, the
ancient regime with modernity, it was a transition to modernity of XX century.
Features to develop Victorian criticism.
I- Growth of literacy: Large numbers of the population were included in the
people that could read and write English. In 1807 a bill providing universal
education was defeated by the British parliament because the Napoleonic Wars
introduced revolutionary ideas and British parliament didn't want English
people to read these ideas. In 1877 the bill was passed.
II- Weakening of the religious dogma: The religious blindness was weakened by
the advance of science. Darwin proposed the evolutionary theory, that we are
an evolution from the monkeys and not a creation from God.
III- Gradual disappearance of Classical education (Greek and Latin): People was
not so interested in learning Greek and Latin like they were years before.
Matthew Arnold used the increase of the knowledge of English that increased
the sense of belonging in the English society to create an intellectual class not
based on classical literature, but on English literature. Poetry was called upon
to replace these weakening subjects to reinforce the sense of English unity.
Intelectual and cultural theories of Matthew Arnold.
I-Disinterestedness: More or less the equivalent to critical objectiveness, for
him a good critic should be disinterested.
A good critic:
-Should not engage in directly polemical or controversial criticism.
-Should keep aloof from ''the practical view of things'' (Use a critic to solve an
ideological problem, for example)
-Must not lend himself to mere political or practical considerations.
Religion and science are fighting each other to obtain the mind of it. Science is
winning but for Matthew Arnold they'll both lose, none of them will ever win
and philosophy (For Arnold: No more than shadows and dreams and false
shows of knowledge) is nothing. For him the only solid remaining is poetry, that
will replace religion, science and philosophy. This poetry must have high
seriousness, a solemnity comparable to his Victorian ideologies. There are 3
types of criteria by means of which you can differentiate poetry: Personal,
Historical and Real estimates. For him the two first ones are useless because
''neither the historical or the personal approach will aid us, both approaches
are fallacious (Remember) since both are liable to make us praise and
dispraise for reasons that have nothing to do with poetry.'', because are
external criteria to poetry. The real estimates are the theory of touchstones
(objectival criteria) to compare poetry.
The role of historical criticism in Matthew Arnold
He is a historical critic because he works with a definite historical scheme in his
mind. He belongs to a historical family, so he obtained the historical issue from
his family. He expanded his ideas in the inaugural lecture in Oxford in 1857 'On
the Modern Element on literature' Modern for him is different from the ordinary
meaning, he means adequate and adequacy. A literature work is modern when
it is adequate to the period of time when it was compared. A particular work is
adapted and adequate to its time. A succesful mirror. Modern is completely
