Social novel
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The social novel is a genre of novel that originated in the early Victorian era in England. Alternative names for the broad genre include social problem novel and condition of England novel; the industrial novel is a subgenre. Social novels centre around the effects of social and economic conditions on the individual, and often aim to bring societal attention to social problems.
Practitioners include Charlotte Brontë, Charles Dickens, Benjamin Disraeli, George Eliot, Elizabeth Gaskell, Charles Kingsley and Harriet Martineau; later authors such as Thomas Hardy and George Gissing are sometimes also included.
The term has been applied to a wide variety of novels, but some well-known examples include:
- Charlotte Brontë's Shirley (1849)
- Charles Dickens' Oliver Twist (1837)
- George Eliot's Felix Holt (1866)
[edit] References
- Childers JW. 'Industrial culture and the Victorian novel'. In The Cambridge Companion to the Victorian Novel (David D, ed), Cambridge University Press, 2001
- Keen S. The Victorian Social Novel as Genre (The Victorian Web)
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