Throughout the novella, descriptions of architecture parallel the inhabitants’ dispositions. Stevenson quickly creates a contrast between the well-kept houses of the middle class and the decrepit houses of the lower class. He depicts a particular street in the city, “...The street shone out in contrast to its dingy neighbourhood, like a fire in a forest; and with its freshly painted shutters, well-polished brasses, and general cleanliness and gaiety of note, instantly caught and pleased the eye of the passenger” (6). The geniality of this particular street suggests that the inhabitants are not only financially stable, but also virtuous, according to the Victorian standard that possessions reflect wealth. On the other hand, the dilapidated surrounding
...he rain’s sharp”. This is related to the night in the factory, which is meant to make the feeling of the events even worse. However, when Davis in the end describes areas out of the factory-driven town, where the richer class live, it is described as happy, beautiful place that is described as a ‘perfect town”. “If one oft’ with dwarfs wud come from t’ lane moors to-night, and gif hur money, to go out, -OUT, I say,-’out, lad, where t’ sun shines, and t’ heath grows, and t’ ladies walk in silken gownds, and God stays all t’ time-where t’man lives that talked to us to-night, Hugh knows,-Hugh could walk there like a king!” This quote shows that, what might seem like every day life to the richer class, is described as close to heaven for the people who live in the factory-driven town. Davis uses visual imagery to illustrate to the show the negativity of industrialism.
In his book Modern Civic Art, Robinson discussed various ways to beautify the city from avenues to small streets, the tenements, the administrative center, and the furnishings of the streets, comprehensive planning, parkways and so forth. Some of his ideas were only good on paper at that time but as the city evolved most of them have now come into fruition. He explained that the backyard should be as beautiful as the front of the house as well as the inside. (Robinson, 1903 p. 241)
Mr. Grein had remarked on the London Sunday Times that:” the English are not artists in the dram, nor in the other arts, but they are eminent artists in living and in the ordering of a home”. In the story of Pride and Prejudice, characters’ daily chat are always surrounding house decoration or beautiful houses too, several plots are drew from the conversation about house, for example, when Mrs. Darcy came to Elizabeth’s place to tell her to keep away from her son, she ask Elizabeth to lead her a tour to the house. It can be seen that house’s position in English mind. Like the fiction Pride and Prejudice, story began with a “house” on the site of Alice Keck Park.
The street I will be focusing my essay on is West Main Street in Armadale, West Lothian. This street is a lot like City Road in Cardiff in terms of the businesses of which it is made up. Family run businesses dominate West Main Street, like Coia sweet shop, Peking House Chinese take away, Talking Heads hairdressers and Allure beauty salon, as well as bigger, more established businesses like the Co-operative, Lloyds Pharmacy and Ladbrokes. Other similarities to City Road are the variety of people from which the community is made up. During the day the street seems to be overrun by the elderly and mums with young children who may be there to run errands, while at night the only businesses open are the take aways and public houses and so the majority of people using West Main Street change.
“The one on my right was a colossal affair by any standard – it was a factual imitation of some Hotel de Ville in Normandy, with a tower on one side, spanking new under a thin beard of raw ivy, and a marble swimming pool, and more than forty acres of lawn and garden…My own house was an eyesore, but it was a small eyesore, and it had been overlooked, so I had a view of the water, a partial view of my neighbor’s lawn, and the consoling proximity of millionaires…”
A main factor in the storyline is the way the writer portrays society's attitude to poverty in the 18th century. The poor people were treated tremendously different to higher classed people. A lot of people were even living on the streets. For example, "He picked his way through the hordes of homeless children who congregated at evening, like the starlings, to look for the most sheltered niche into which they could huddle for the night." The writer uses immense detail to help the reader visualise the scene. She also uses a simile to help the reader compare the circumstances in which the children are in. This shows that the poor children had to live on the streets and fend for themselves during the 18th century. Another example involves a brief description of the city in which the poor people lived in. This is "nor when he smelt the stench of open sewers and foraging pigs, and the manure of horses and mules" This gives a clear example of the state of the city. It is unclean and rancid and the writer includes this whilst keeping to her fictional storyline.
To appreciate a row house neighborhood, one must first look at the plan as a whole before looking at the individual blocks and houses. The city’s goal to build a neighborhood that can be seen as a singular unit is made clear in plan, at both a larger scale (the entire urban plan) and a smaller scale (the scheme of the individual houses). Around 1850, the city began to carve out blocks and streets, with the idea of orienting them around squares and small residential parks. This Victorian style plan organized rectangular blocks around rounded gardens and squares that separated the row houses from major streets. The emphasis on public spaces and gardens to provide relief from the ene...
...The Sidney estate is remarkable in its humbling and simplistic nature. The social classes all live harmoniously because of respect and understanding of what each class brings. The peasants, servants, Jonson himself, Sidney’s, and the King all have differing social statuses. It is the ability to not look down upon one another that makes the social order so remarkable. In a sense it is a paradigm of a typical English society, and conversely a watered down utopia for all who knows Penshurst to be a part of. Jonson’s “To Penshurst” is a staple of country house poetry and reflects the magnificence of the natural beauty of the estate. Furthermore, Penshurst incorporated a heartwarming community that managed to capture Johnson’s attention by providing a humbling and inviting experience to all of those who inhabit the beautiful Sidney estate known as Penshurst.
In contrast, the other houses in the neighborhood show signs of economic downturn and poverty. The houses show signs of wear and tear and are beginning to deteriorate. The lawns are filled with weeds and the sod is patchy. The gutters to the house in front of Walt’s are falling down. Quality
“This issue was also a concern of Jane Jacobs, author of The Life and Death of Great American Cities. In her book, Jacobs accused Le Corbusier, one of the pioneers of the movement, of an inhumane planning process that did not properly consider those who were to live in the planned developments. She claimed the modernist aesthetic to be dull, and her writing promoted the street, in particular the pavement, as a place where a community can meet, socialize, and control their own privacy.” -- The rise and fall of modernist architecture, By Hayley A. Rowe 2011, vol. 3 no. 04 | pg.
Many researchers have theorized why the wealthy desire to move back into the city. Schwirian believes that many wealthy people are drawn to the architectural design of some of these old houses in urban areas (Schwirian 96). Harvey believes in a number of theories, and ...
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...
Firstly, I will say how the families appear to us and the how the environment and physical features gives us an impression of the characters. To start with, we know that the Birling family are of a high social class, considering the fact that they have ‘a fairly large suburban house’ and also the fact that they have ‘solid’ furniture which proves that they are secure and have a ‘solid’ amount of money. Even though their house is ‘heavily comfortable’ which
In your post you stated that the setting is important. I agree with you but I also believe that the symbols used by Glaspell’s are important. The setting and symbols were a crucial aspect to consider because it allowed the reader to have a deeper understanding of the characters and convey the authors theme. Some of the specific aspects of the house that helped the reader to understand the theme and characters were the disorganized kitchen, the cold weather, and Mrs. Wright’s jars of preserves. In the beginning of the play the kitchen was described as “The kitchen in the now abandoned farmhouse of John Wright, a gloomy kitchen, and left without having been put in order--unwashed pans under the sink, a loaf of bread outside the bread-box, a dish-towel on the table” (Lines 1-2). Glaspell’s descriptions of the setting of the unkempt kitchen revealed to the reader how Mrs. Wright felt. For instance, the description tells the reader that Mrs. Wright had rebelled against her duties. In this era women were expected to keep their house nice and clean. However, Mrs. Wright chooses to not comply with her expected womanly duties.
of the structure itself. This class "took immense pride in their homes which they saw as a reflection of status" ("BBC Homes"). The styles were excessively ornamental and took their influence from Gothic styles, rococo, styles, the Orient, and developments from their own industrialization. With owning such ornately decorated residences they had to show them off; this was done so through dinner parties and balls. People of course could not be outmatched by the rich styles of their houses and therefore doled out large amounts of money for clothes and transportation.