Victorian Britain
Last updated: May 09, 2024
The Victorian age in Britain corresponds with the reign of Queen Victoria (1837-1901). At the time, the British Empire—the horrors of which we are only now properly coming to terms with—stretched around the globe and Britain was also responsible for the Opium Wars in China. At home, the Industrial Revolution caused horrific factory conditions, fuelling the radicalism of Friedrich Engels and Karl Marx, who would spend the last three decades of his life in London.
However, science made giant strides, with Charles Darwin finally figuring out how animals (including humans) came to exist, paving the way for the decline of religious belief in the 20th century. It was also a golden age for novels, many of which you can find in our separate Victorian literature section.
The best books on Life in the Victorian Age, recommended by Judith Flanders
History books often focus on big political or economic events, wars and leaders. But there’s much to learn from studying the way people lived, and what made the Victorian age both like and unlike our own, as Judith Flanders explains.
The best books on British Empire, recommended by David Cannadine
Historian David Cannadine tells us why it’s less interesting to argue about whether the British Empire was a force for good or ill, than to understand how it worked and why it fell apart. He suggests a reading list to get us started.
-
1
Wonderful Adventures of Mrs. Seacole in Many Lands
by Mary Seacole -
2
Victorian Lady Travellers
by Dorothy Middleton -
3
Florence Nightingale: The Woman and Her Legend
by Mark Bostridge -
4
Mrs Duberly's War: Journal and Letters from the Crimea, 1854-6
by Fanny Duberly, edited by Christine Kelly -
5
An American Diary
by Barbara Bodichon
The best books on Mary Seacole, recommended by Jane Robinson
The best books on Mary Seacole, recommended by Jane Robinson
Mary Seacole looked after and provided support to British troops during the Crimean War (1853-1856), setting up a hotel for sick and recovering soldiers close to the fighting near Balaclava. In her day, she was as celebrated as Florence Nightingale, but it was not until the rediscovery and publication of her diary in the 1980s that she came to be widely known as a Victorian heroine in modern times. In 2016, a memorial statue of her was unveiled in London, the first in the UK in honour of a named Black woman. Here her biographer, Jane Robinson, tells us more about the remarkable life of Mary Seacole and the world she lived in.
The best books on The Opium War, recommended by Julia Lovell
The 19th century opium war marked the clash of the world’s great empires of the age – Britain and China. Historian Julia Lovell says its legacy of Chinese humiliation is still felt keenly in Beijing.
-
1
In Byron's Wake: The Turbulent Lives of Lord Byron's Wife and Daughter: Annabella Milbanke and Ada Lovelace
by Miranda Seymour -
2
Victorian Sensation: The Extraordinary Publication, Reception and Secret Authorship of 'The Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation'
by James Secord -
3
Mathematics in Victorian Britain
by Adrian Rice, Raymond Flood & Robin Wilson -
4
The Thrilling Adventures of Lovelace and Babbage
by Sydney Padua -
5
Middlemarch
by George Eliot
The best books on Ada Lovelace, recommended by Ursula Martin
The best books on Ada Lovelace, recommended by Ursula Martin
Ada Lovelace (1815-1852) has become an iconic figure for women in science and is often credited with the invention of modern computing. But, as Ursula Martin—mathematician, computer scientist and Lovelace biographer—explains, all of that is a bit overblown. The Lovelace myth obscures the truth about a woman who was certainly a very brilliant mathematician, but who was also often frustrated in her scientific ambitions, in poor health and unhappy.
The best books on Victorian Adventures, recommended by Stephen Evans
High Commissioner to Bangladesh chooses books on the defining moments of 19th-century Britain and describes the game of exploration & espionage played out by Britain and Russia in the 19th century
-
1
Selected Prose
by Charles Lamb -
2
Culture and Anarchy and Other Writings
by Matthew Arnold -
3
Selected Essays, Poems, and Other Writings
by George Eliot -
4
Studies in the History of the Renaissance
by Walter Pater -
5
The Hands of the Living God: An Account of a Psychoanalytic Treatment
by Marion Milner
David Russell on The Victorian Essay
David Russell on The Victorian Essay
With the advent of the Victorian age, polite maxims of eighteenth-century essays in the Spectator were replaced by a new generation of writers who thought deeply—and playfully—about social relationships, moral responsibility, education and culture. Here, Oxford literary critic David Russell explores the distinct qualities that define the Victorian essay and recommends five of its greatest practitioners.
The Best Charles Dickens Books, recommended by Jenny Hartley
He was the most popular novelist of the Victorian era, a convivial family man who always championed the underdog. But he also harboured dark secrets that only came out after his death. Jenny Hartley recommends the best books by and about Charles Dickens and discusses Dickens the phenomenon, past and present.
The best books on Dickens and Christmas, recommended by Robert Douglas-Fairhurst
When it was published on December 19th, 1843, Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol was an instant classic. Oxford Professor of English Literature Robert Douglas-Fairhurst runs through the best of Dickens’s prolific writings about Christmas.