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.
[edit] Practitioners
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:
- Charles Dickens' Oliver Twist (1837)
- Charlotte Brontë's Shirley (1849)
- Elizabeth Gaskell's Ruth (1853)
- George Eliot's Felix Holt (1866)
[edit] See also
[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)
 |
This literature-related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |
