Marco Sievers

Social Change in the 19th Century Novel: Luddism, Chartism and the Women's Question in Charlotte Bronte's Shirley Marco Sievers

Examination Thesis from the year 2008 in the subject English - Literature, Works, grade: 1,0, University of Hannover (Philosophische Fakultät / Englisches Seminar), language: English, comment: Die Arbeit wendet sich dem Roman des 19. Jahrhunderts am Beispiel von Charlotte Brontës "Shirley" zu und untersucht dessen Darstellung von sozialem Wandel. Die in klarem und idiomatischem Englisch verfasste Arbeit beginnt mit einem sehr gutem Überblick über die verschiedenen Lesarten des Romans, um das eigene Anliegen herauszukristallisieren, das sozialen Wandel auf den historischen Zeitebenen der Romanhandlung, wie der Erscheinungszeit analysiert. [...] Insgesamt wird die ausgezeichnete Arbeit, die Herrn Sievers' hohen Standard eigenständigen Denkens und Schreibens belegt, mit 1,0 bewertet. , abstract: The approach of this dissertation is based on New Historicism and Cultural Materialism, and examines the processes of social change in the novel. It contextualises the industrial plot of "Shirley" on two time levels, on the level of the setting (1811-12) and on the level of the novel's production and publication (1848-49). The study first elaborates on "Shirley" as a condition of England novel before shedding light on the historical conditions and their representation in the novel's setting. Subsequently, it describes Luddism and Chartism as historical working-class movements, to show that Charlotte Brontë's choice of Luddism was partly motivated by fears of political reprisals, by institutional constraints of the publishing sector, as well as by the power of public opinion. Furthermore, this paper deals with the author's technique of backdating as a strategy to indirectly comment on Chartism. The examination then turns to the novel's representation of the Luddites, and discusses whether the portrayal of the machine wreckers is just a "lurid travesty", as Terry Eagleton contends (cf. Eagleton, 49). It demonstrates that the novel is based on thoroughly researched historical fact