Between World War I and World War II, England was a very different place than it had been in the past. Art and music were changing, and the country was filled with young, modern people, who began to go against the typical rules of society. Thinkers were emerging after the First World War, thinking of ways to keep something that large from ever happening again. Yet, while the country was experiencing so many new things, there were still a number of difficulties that hadn’t gone away. While many people were desperate to get rich, others were barely getting by. Evelyn Waugh, in his novel Vile Bodies, portrays a group of “Bright Young People,” who all place the value of wealth above everything else. On the opposite spectrum, George Orwell, in his book The Road to Wigan Pier, argues the reasons why England must do away with the class system.
The novel Vile Bodies by Evelyn Waugh is meant to depict young people in England in the time period between the two world wars. While the novel is meant to be satirical, it represents the drive that the “bright young things” have to be wealthy. The protagonist, Adam Symes, is a young man that hangs out with a somewhat wealthier crowd, yet never actually has any money himself. He is engaged to a young girl named Nina, who is too shallow to marry him if he isn’t rich. In the beginning of the novel, Adam gives 1000 pounds to a drunk major, who disappears with it. Through out the novel, Adam searches for the major, who always manages to evade him before giving him back the money. Eventually, after the major slips away again, Adam finally admits “I don’t believe that I’m ever going to get that fortune. “ Adam spends the whole time desperate to try and regain the fortune that he so briefly had.
The...
... middle of paper ...
...ing I think and do is a result of class-distinction.” Everything about the way a person speaks, thinks and behaves has to do with the class they were raised in. To abolish class-systems would be like abolishing every one of their beliefs. Still, as Orwell writes, “English class-system has outlived its usefulness.” Although it is time for the class-system to leave England, it shows no sign of dying out.
Both Orwell and Waugh present many of the issues with the class-system. To Waugh, social classes bring out the worst in people. The bright young things are never satisfied with where they are, and are constantly trying to climb up the social ladder. To Orwell, social class is a sign of oppression. It holds people back, while giving others all the power. In either book, social class is portrayed as something negative, driving people to act shallow and selfishly.
The book The Classic Slum: Salford Life in the First Quarter of the Century by Robert Roberts gives an honest account of a village in Manchester in the first 25 years of the 20th century. The title is a reference to a description used by Friedrich Engels to describe the area in his book Conditions of the Working Class. The University of Manchester Press first published Roberts' book in the year 1971. The more recent publication by Penguin Books contains 254 pages, including the appendices. The author gives a firsthand description of the extreme poverty that gripped the area in which he grew up. His unique perspective allows him to accurately describe the self-imposed caste system, the causes and effects of widespread poverty, and the impact of World War I as someone who is truly a member of a proletarian family. His main contention is that prior to the War, the working class inhabiting the industrial slums in England "lay outside the mainstream of that society and possessed within their own ranks a system of social stratification that enclosed them in their own provincial social world and gave them little hope of going beyond it. " After the War, the working class found new economic prosperity and a better way of life, never returning to the lifestyle prevalent prior to the War.
The interwar period witnessed an explosion of a variety of leisure activities within British society, some of which were new and some of which were not. One such leisure activity was that of the cinema, and featured as a popular pastime in Evelyn Waugh's Vile Bodies. Whilst the cinema was not a new leisure activity during the interwar era, there were however, developments within this industry that were unique to this period.
If you have ever read the book 1984 by George Orwell, then an interesting topic may have crossed your mind. The way the classes of people break down can be quite similar, and very different at times. In the United States, we have classes like the lower class, the working class, and the middle class. In 1984, there were such classes as the Proles, the Outer Party, and the Inner Party. The way the classes are broken down in 1984 reminds me a little bit of my old history class. When I studied medieval times and the classes back then were broken down into the nobles, the bourgeois, and the serfs.
When Victorian Era, England is brought up in most context’s it is used to exemplify a calm and more refined way of life; however, one may overlook how the children of this era were treated and how social class systems affected them. Samuel Butler’s The Way of All Flesh is a novel written to take a closer look at the life of children growing up in the unfair social hierarchy of Victorian Era England. Butler’s main characters are Theobald and Ernest, who grow up during the time period; Overton, who is Ernest’s godfather, is the narrator of the novel and provides insight into Theobald and Ernest as they mature through the novel. Theobald is the son of a wealthy, strict, and abusive father who treats him with no mercy, but leaves him with a rather significant inheritance from his Christian publishing company, at his death. Ernest is the son of Theobald, who beats him with a stern fits over even the pettiest things in
Published in 1816, Owen’s A New Life for Society was a discussion to try and mend Great Britain’s institutional problems with the working class while avoiding violent revolution. He saw that there needed to be changes to the constitution as well as laws that punished the poor to prevent the vices of society. To do this, Owen asserts to, “withdraw those national laws which chiefly emanate from that erroneous doctrine… training the population to almost every kind of crime. For these laws are, without chance of failure, adapted to produce a long train of crimes.” Owen’s ideology was that starvation, theft, and drunkenness emanated from ignorance being indoctrinated into the poor masses, and universal education was the logical solution. This is apparent as the author argues that, “a national system of education for the poor…to think calmly on these subjects… and they will become conscious of the absurdities and inconsistencies in which their forefathers have trained them… they will exert their utmost faculties to remove the cause of so much misery to man.” All three socialist thinkers believed in free education for the working class. However, it was Owen who believed that enlightenment of the masses would bring about real change and long-term stability in
Through the use of satire, the issues presented by Waugh in Vile Bodies become greatly influenced by the time period in which the novel was written. Great Britain, in the late 1920’s and early 1930’s, was placed on the time line between the Great Wars. Thus, the novel’s placement in the history shifts its focus not only toward the emergence of the World War II but also on the depressed postwar economy of Britain at the time. Some of the most prominent ideas evolving during this period of time were embracive of the idea of change in areas such as religion, science, art, social rules, literature and economic and political conditions—changes that most often led to a feeling of “loss of community” (Wellman, 327). Because of the nature and the ongoing changes during this period the idea of modernism also played a major role in Britis...
H.G. Wells was a prolific writer. In his book The Time Machine, he takes his readers on a journey into a future that is vastly different than they might have expected. During Well's lifetime, England was marked by distinct class differences, the working class and the idle rich. It is not surprising that in his writings Well's Marxist attitude comes through. This is especially seen in his fascination about the class division between the Eloi and the Morlocks, the effect capitalism has on the future, and the advancement of the human
Class is often seen as the income or lifestyle that people fit into; but by creating such a vague definition for class, we lose sight of the reasons that the different classes exist. Even more than that, the general population has been led to believe that classes are a thing of the past-something that used to be important, but is now just a term economists use that has no effect our lives.
Arthur Morrison’s A Child of the Jago (1896) is intrinsically linked to the social class system and poverty. The novel is set and published during the late Victorian age, a period in which the working class experienced a relentless struggle against the harsh realities of social and working conditions. Moreover, in his paper The Working Class in Britain 1850-1939, John Benson highlights the disparities between the poor and the economy during the era, s a result of the Industrial revolution and urbanisation(Benson, 2003,p.30). Although, Benson's argument is valid when focusing on a social novel such as A Child of the Jago; because through his childhood the protagonist Dickie Perrot commits heinous crimes and becomes incredibly defiant in the old Jago; On the other hand, Benson's argument does not explain how and why an individual would succumb to these acts. Morrison makes it clear in his preface to his readers and critics that he wrote the novel to expose the trails and tribulations of the poor and the grim realities of slum living through the characterization of Dicky Perrot ' It was my fate to encounter a place in Shoreditch, where children were born and reared in circumstances which gave them no reasonable chance of living decent lives: where children were born foredamned to a criminal or semi criminal career' (Morrison, 1897). Despite, the novel being set in the fictional genre, elements of Morrison's personal life is prevalent throughout the text. Morrison originates from a working class background and collaborated with Reverend Osborne to campaigned for a variety of social reforms and slum clearance in the Old Nichol (Matlz, 2003). Thus, the novel is based on the conception of reality rather than fiction ...
The focus of everyday life in the Victorian Age gives an idea of what the people, in that particular time, had to deal with. Men and women alike walked the streets of London to complete their daily tasks set before them, “Hundreds of thousands of men and women drawn from all classes and ranks of society pack the streets of London” (Engels 1591). This kind of picture of everyday life shows us a realistic picture of Victorian London; it was crowded with people from all social lives. Although the Victorian Age did mention social class, it did not focus on it like the Romantic Period did. The Romantic Period tended to focus on the struggles of the poor, how they interacted with the rich, and how love, imagination, or determination overcame social class, as in “The Mortal Immortal”. In the realistic view of the Victorian Age, the poor stayed poor most of the time and did not socialize with the rich outsid...
...art of the whole society and have greater power through the amount of support for the party, while those who believe otherwise are less powerful as their support is much less and limited. Orwell shows how those who do not conform will end up being taken down by those with the power and there is not much anyone could do about that. Those who believed in change and tried to change the society only ended up meeting failure as majority rules, those with more power will overpower the weak and succeed.
“Throughout recorded time, and probably since the end of the Neolithic era, there have been three kinds of people in the world, the High, the Middle, and the Low.” (Orwell, 201) From the ancient and primitive tribes of our ancestors to the blue-collar and white-collar jobs within cities, the human race has always divided itself into clear groups of social classes. Sometimes, the distinction is placed to forcibly separate the elite from the workers, while others are formed through a separation of class interests. Over time, writers have distinguished a pattern common within most societies. Most societies, from the utmost primal to the most advanced, have congregated themselves into three classes of people. These societal classes are exemplified
In today’s society people are viewed as being in different classes depending on how much money they bring in. The categorization of people is known as classism. Classism is simply the prejudice or in favor of people belonging to a particular social class. Classism is known as one of the largest social problems plaguing the world today. Classes are formed according to how the rules of the following institutions; government regulations and economic status. It is held in place by a system of beliefs and cultural attitudes that ranks people according to their; economic status, family lineage, job status, and level of education. There are three major classifications to which people are titled. They include upper or high class which includes the people with the most money. The middle class who includes the people that brings home the average income. Finally, the class titled the lower class that includes the people who have only one income coming in or none at all (“What Is Classism.”). In the classrooms these classes still remain and the students within each class have different ways in which they learn, and view schooling. We as educators have to look passed their ways and address each class the same.
The Victorian Age was characterized by a rapidly growing economy, an expansion of the British Empire, relative peace, and the social and economic problems associated with industrialization. Victorian society was conflicted by the changes; they admired the material benefits industrialization brought, as it encouraged great optimism and spurred the growth of the industrial working class and a modern middle class, but it was also a time of social concern. Brutal factory conditions and slums bred poverty and disease. (Literature, the British, 1996)
The Industrial Revolution was a period of time in which Great Britain saw advancements in technology, agriculture, and transportation. These changes heavily influenced the country economically and socially. The creation of the unskilled factory labor worker emerged and a movement began from rural to urban areas. With an increase in wages from factory work, the population of the country increased as well. Overall Britain was becoming smaller during this time period. The Industrial Revolution did not solely bring positive outcomes. The interactions humans once held despite social status were gradually deteriorating as values began to shift. The industrialization taking place in Britain had a great presence in current and up and coming literature. Through the years authors such as Mary Shelley, Oscar Wilde, and D.H. Lawrence created characters whose morals were altered due to the evils of industrialization despite their social classes. During the course of the eras in literature, characters began to have a shift in morals which caused the relationships held with other characters to fall apart. The presence of industrialization and its troubles amongst the range of classes is present in Frankenstein, The Importance of Being Earnest, and Lady Chatterley’s Lover.