The World of the Novel


 
 
Concept Explanation
 

The World of the Novel

The World of the Novel: In the 19th century, everyday life of common people became the central theme of novel writers. Europe entered the industrial age. Cities expanded in an unregulated way and were filled with overworked and underpaid workers.

  • Charles Dickens wrote about the terrible effects of industrialisation on people's lives and characters. In his novels Hard Times (1854) and Oliver Twist (1838), he focused on the terrible conditions of urban life under industrial capitalism. He not only criticises the profit making of the industrialists but also the thoughtful process and ideas which made this seem a good thing.
  • Emile Zola's Germinal (1885), based on the life of a young miner in France, analysed the harsh detail of grim  conditions of miners' lives.
  • Community and Society: 19th century British novelist, Thomas Hardy wrote about the traditional rural communities vanishing. The great novelist of England wrote novels like "Far From the Madding Crowd", "Tess", "Return of the Native", "The Mayor of Casterbridge (1886)", "The Woodlemders" and many more. He was a great lover of nature and his description of natural surroundings refreshes the mind and one feels something really extraordinary.

  • "The Mayor of Casterbridge (1886) " is about a successful grain merchant (Michael Henchard) who becomes the Mayor of the farming town of Casterbridge. He is both unpredictably generous and cruel with his employees. Consequently, he is no match for his manager and rival Donald Farfrae. He runs his business on efficient managerial lines and is well regarded as he is smooth and even-tempered with everyone.
  • Language Used in the Novels: The novels used the vernacular language that was spoken a by common people. By coming closer to the different spoken languages of the people, the novels produced the sense of a shared world between diverse people in a nation. A novel may take a classical language and combine it with the language of the streets and make them all a part of the vernacular language. Like the nation, the novel brought together many cultures.

     
     


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