Thematic comparisons of key context for AO3 context for Unit 2 Prose, comparing Tess of the D'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy and Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf. Key relevant thematic facts to facilitate access to higher grade boundaries.
A* achieved sat in examination.
CONTEXT
TESS OF THE D’URBERVILLES MRS DALLOWAY
In 1854, Coventry Patmore wrote a poem called
“The Angel in the House” about his wife Emily which Woolf herself was part of the Bloomsbury group
was the root of this ideal. In this poem, he holds up his who rejected many traditional values, which had many
“perfect wife” as an example to all women. This poem modernist writers, and unusual relationships. Vanessa
SOCIAL ATTITUDES
became immensely popular and became very Bell (a member of the group) had many polyamorous
influential throughout all of England. This ideal relationships, and none of the members of the group
primarily expressed the views of the middle classes enlisted in the war, showing rejection of traditional
and was very popular throughout the 19th century. values.
Throughout the 19th century, roughly 4’500 The war was very influential in attitudes during
women handed their babies to hospitals alone this time, with an expectation of a “British stiff upper
(therefore not accounting for all the other means of lip.” During the First World War, over 750’000 men
giving up their child) as this was the only way to live a were killed, with more suffering from PTSD.
‘respectable life in polite society’
Evangelicalism is an international Christian
movement that arose from impulses of revival and
renewal in 18th-century Protestantism. Fatalism, grew in popularity after the war. The
resignation in the face of future events, and the idea
As science developed, partially replacing that we have no power over what we actually do or
religion, and became the explanation for human what is in the future. Partially popularised by a
RELIGION
behaviour and morality: people began to believe that German writer Friedrich Nietzsche’s book The
sexual immorality lead to disease and depravity. Wanderer and His Shadow. The English translation
People insisted that sexuality could only be was published in 1908, soon before Mrs Dalloway.
understood by doctors. Further loss of religious faith
took place due to Geology in the Victorian era, which Loss of religious faith was worsened by the
made it clear how old the earth was and how industrial revolution, with knowledge of science
insignificant humans were in comparison to this. replacing traditional reliance on religion.
Victorian astronomical discoveries, like that of the
nebular hypothesis, also showed this.
Little was known on how to treat shellshock, and
they used methods such as anaesthetic and electric
shock to treat it.
MENTAL ILLNESS
Woolf herself attempted suicide in 1904, through
(N/A) jumping out a window (same as how Septimus kills
himself). It was said that she felt depressed due to
being education or that she had “Perceived it not to
be madness but due to moral and psychological
views.” She was also subjected to ‘rest-cure’
treatment.
While of a higher class, Hardy was also from the Woolf came from a privileged background. Her
country side, similarly to Tess. Hardy wrote an essay father was a ‘notable man of letters’ who is someone
SOCIAL CLASS
titled ‘The Dorsetshire Labourer’, published by the who engages in critical thinking and gains public
Dorset Agricultural Workers Union in 1884, where he authority as an intellectual. She had servants in her
discussed the decreasing independence of the rural house (but said that she was afraid of them) and was
communities, and disappearing dialects. He also generally termed a ‘daughter of educated men’
discussed the use of the term ‘The Hodge’, which was
a derogatory term for people from the countryside, The draft system of the war greatly favoured the
which is a term that Hardy also wrote a poem about. upper classes. By 1920, 2 million unemployed.
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