Hatred and Civility: The Antisocial Life in Victorian England

259 Pages·2004·2.63 MB·English

by  Christopher Lane

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HATRED & CIVILITY
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HATRED & CIVILITY
The Antisocial Life in Victorian England
 
   New York
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  
Publishers Since 
New York Chichester, West Sussex
The Northwestern University Research Grants Committee has provided partial support
for the publication of this book. We gratefully acknowledge this assistance.
© 2004 Columbia University Press
All rights reserved
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Lane, Christopher, 1966–
Hatred and civility : the antisocial live in Victorian England / Christopher Lane.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0–231–13064–3 (acid-free paper)
1. English literature—19th century—History and criticism. 2. Misanthropy in
literature. 3. Literature and society—England—History—19th century.
4. England—Social life and customs—19th century. 5. Great Britian—
History—Victoria, 1837–1901. 6. Alienation (Social psychology) in literature.
7. Interpersonal relations in literature. 8. Manners and customs in literature.
9. Courtesy in literature. 10. Hate in literature. I. Title.
PR468.M56L36 2004
823'.809353—dc21
2003055146
Columbia University Press books are printed on permanent and
durable acid-free paper.
Printed in the United States of America
Designed by Linda Secondari
c 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
p 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
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These days we know less about the feeling of hatred than in times when
man was more open to his destiny. . . . These days subjects do not have
to shoulder the burden of the experience of hatred in its most consum-
ing forms. And why? Because our civilisation is itself sufficiently one of
hatred. Isn’t the path for the race to destruction really rather well
marked out for us? Hatred is clothed in our everyday discourse under
many guises, it meets with such extraordinarily easy rationalisations.
—Jacques Lacan,The Seminar of Jacques Lacan,  
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
   
 
 
 Victorian Hatred, a Social Evil
and a Social Good 1
  Bulwer’s Misanthropes and the Limits
of Victorian Sympathy 34
  Dickensian Malefactors 59
  Charlotte Brontë on the Pleasure of Hating 85
  George Eliot and Enmity 107
  Life Envy in Robert Browning’s Poetry 136
 Joseph Conrad and the Illusion of Solidarity 161
 
 
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
0.1. Trunk of an Ash Tree with Ivy(1857) xxiii
0.2. Lastrea Filix Mas(c. 1854) xxiv
01.1. Sheer Tyranny(n.d.) 9
01.2. Sheer Tenderness(n.d.) 9
01.3. The Grand “March of Intellect”(May 20, 1828) 17
01.4. Selection of English Heads(1849) 18
01.5. The British Bee Hive(1840; revised 1867) 24
01.6. The Load Borne by the British Public(December 15, 1819) 25
1.1. The Head Ache(February 12, 1819) 41
1.2. The Blue Devils(January 1823) 45
1.3. Jealousy(November 1825) 50
1.4. Tremendous Sacrifice!(1846) 53
2.1. London Nomades(1877–78) 65
2.2. Bluegate Fields(1872) 66
2.3. Our Next-Door Neighbours(1836–37) 73
2.4. The Sewer-Hunter(1851) 82
2.5. Flying Dustmen(1877–78) 83
3.1. Thomas Carlyle “Like a Block of Michelangelo’s Sculpture”(1867) 94
4.1. Les femmes? . . . un tas de serpents(1851) 110
4.2. J’ai voulu connaître les femmes. Ça ma coûte une jolie fortune . . . je n’en
sais rien!(1851) 110
4.3. Je n’ai plus la terre de Chênerailles, ni mes bois . . .(1851) 111
4.4. Croquis(1873) 111
4.5. Sir John Frederick Herschel(1865) 119
4.6. Sir John Frederick Herschel(April 1867) 120
5.1. Hugh Miller (1843–47) 138
6.1. Der Augenturm(The Eye Tower; 1977) 174