The Victorian era is identified as a time, which broke apart from the romanticism’s deeper way of expression. With such an emphasis on wealth and social rank brought upon by the stern Queen Victoria, the previous era’s morals were replaced with a more superficial simple-minded way of thinking. The Romantic era concentrated essentially on man’s journey on finding a deeper significance in life. Often man would find these deeper meanings by having a close relationship with nature. Moby Dick by Herman Melville represents this time period’s values perfectly, as the story is constructed around the association with a whale and a sea voyage crew.
The new “proper” beliefs began to form the Victorian age and clashed with those of the romantic era. The Romantic era focused mainly on man’s development and rarely expressed worth towards materials and appearance. In contrast the Victorian age rebelled and represented the complete opposite beliefs by having society reflect a more cheerful simplistic attitude towards their way of living and focused on how others perceived them.
In literature authors such as Charles Dickens focused on entertaining the reader rather than have the reader perplexed and thinking about a deeper message as the romantic style did. In architecture, styles shifted from the previous gothic look, which showed little appeal, to a more intricate decorative elegance. Structures were often built in effort to look as high class as possible as did everything else in society during this time. This era idolized the upper class, which is why the Queen had such a great influence on the change.
A very well written synthesis. It was nice to learn about the Victorian era thought your point of view. Your comparison of Moby Dick and the era is well explained how it represents the values of the era.
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