Robert Louis Stevenson found himself attracted to the subject matter of his novel The Master of Ballantrae: A Winter’s Tale due to his interest in the years following Jacobite Scotland’s 1745 rebellion. He also drew inspiration from Captain Marryat, commenting,… Read More ›
Charles Dickens first published his sixth novel, Martin Chuzzlewit, as a 10-part serial between January 1843 and July 1844. He later stated that he thought the lengthy tale of a young man’s emotional and ethical maturation the “best” of his… Read More ›
Benjamin Disraeli wrote Lothair 23 years after his last novel, Tancred (1847). His political career had prevented his pursuit of fiction, but when the general election of 1868 propelled Gladstone to power in Disraeli’s place, he decided to return to… Read More ›
When George Meredith wrote Lord Ormont and His Aminta, he focused on a theme he would use again: incompatibility in marriage. Many critics considered it a slight work; some felt Meredith wrote it during a break after the far more… Read More ›
First published as a 20-part serial between December 1855 and June 1857, Charles Dickens’s Little Dorrit served to expose several social abuses of interest to its author, including rampant financial corruption and an incompetent civil service, where members were appointed… Read More ›
Victorian readers enjoyed reunions with familiar characters in Anthony Trollope’s final entry into his Barsetshire series, The Last Chronicle of Barset, claimed by Trollope to be his favorite of all his novels. He approaches his topic of everyday people living… Read More ›
First serialized in Robin Goodfellow and then in The Sixpenny Magazine, Mary Braddon’s most famous novel, Lady Audley’s Secret, became an instant hit with the reading public, if not with critics. In its year of publication in volume form, 1862,… Read More ›
In his novel Kenilworth, Sir Walter Scott tells his romanticized version of the death of Amy Robsart, wife to Robert Dudley, the Earl of Leicester, favored by Queen Elizabeth I. Set in 1560, the novel seeks to, as Scott writes… Read More ›
Dinah Mulock (Craik) emphasized nonconformist ideals in her popular fifth novel, John Halifax, Gentleman. Nonconformist churches believed that each member should freely respond to the Gospel and take responsibility for their own membership, while the church should maintain its congregation’s… Read More ›
Already known as a writer with a social conscience, Charles Reade published It Is Never Too Late to Mend specifically to stimulate public interest in social revolution. He proved successful, spurring his reading public to lead a movement to reform… Read More ›
Anthony Trollope first began work on He Knew He Was Right at the end of 1867, following in that same year the publication of The Last Chronicle of Barset, the final entry in the series that had won him fame… Read More ›
Supposedly, Charlotte M. Yonge was challenged by a friend to write a story about a hero with a flaw requiring reform who does not triumph through strength or talent, but rather proves his heroism through forbearance and forgiveness. She accepted… Read More ›
Upon beginning Charles Reade’s sequel to his novel Love Me Little, Love Me Long (1850), a reader might believe the book is purely romance. Mrs. Dodd and her children, Edward and Julia, keep one another company in the absence of… Read More ›
First published as a serial in The Cornhill Magazine between July 1875 and May 1876, The Hand of Ethelberta represents Thomas Hardy’s sole published attempt at humor. Whether because his reading public did not expect him to write humor, or… Read More ›
R. S. Surtees creates a satire of the hunting set in his novel Handley Cross. Surtees, an avid hunter, sportsman, and sportswriter, knew his topic well and adds to reader enjoyment by openly making fun of his own passion. He… Read More ›
Charles Reade, a playwright as well as a novelist, became well known for his attacks against human injustice and his pleas for compassion through his fiction, of which Griffith Gaunt became a strong example. Reade’s fiction proved melodramatic and dealt… Read More ›
When Robert S. Hichens published his roman à clef, or novel with a key, The Green Carnation, he joined others in mimicking the famous style of Oscar Wilde, arguably England’s best-known writer at the end of the 19th century. Wilde,… Read More ›
The story of the events that led Mary Shelley to write her Frankenstein story is now almost as well known as the plot itself. The tale began to take shape in 1816 as a result of ghost-story-telling sessions held among… Read More ›
First published in The Cornhill Magazine from January 1860 through April 1861, Anthony Trollope’s Framley Parsonage was the fourth in his Barsetshire novels sequence. That sequence had opened in 1855 with The Warden and would conclude with The Last Chronicle… Read More ›
When Robert Buchanan wrote Foxglove Manor, he had experienced years of poverty, worsened by the illness of his wife. Her death in 1881 followed the failure of his journal, Light, leaving him penniless and desperate for funds. In order to… Read More ›
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