victorian age

Victorian Age (1837-1901) The label Victorian is given to the period of Queen Victoria’s reign, which is from the time of 1837 to 1901. This period consisted of continuity and a change. It was an extension of the Romantic age and also a break from it. There is consciousness of something having disappeared and something having almost appeared. Matthew Arnold spoke of living between two worlds, one dead, and the other two young to be born. There is conflict, doubt, nostalgia and uncertainty in the literature of this age. Doubt is often a product of change. When new times approach, there are fears of what the future holds for people. The Victorian age seems to highlight doubt in a major way. The main reason for this doubt was the scientific advancement and discoveries tried to negate what people’s faith had supported for centuries. Whereas the Bible claimed that God created Adam and Eve in his own image and with his own hands, new scientific discoveries were suggesting that man had evolved from apes. Discoveries of evolution made by Sir Charles Darwin were coupled with the findings of Sir Charles Lyell that revealed that the rocks of the earth’s crust recorded a history of thousands of millions of years. This is not what biblical explanations had claimed. These new assumptions were compelling people to doubt the religious belief in existence. People wanted to believe in what their ancestors had believed, matters that involved them emotionally and which pertained to their faith. However they could not do so because science compelled them intellectually to doubt the validity of their religion and faith. The Victorians were therefore living in skepticism. With the Victorian age came the advent of electricity which gradually revolutionized everything. England became more and more industrialized and productive. These changes were impressive but only to the head. The heart had its own reasons and the average Victorian could still look back to the past. Democracy was