Pictorial Victorians : the inscription of values in word and image

"Pictorial Victorians focuses on two of the most popular mid-nineteenth-century genres - illustration and narrative painting - that blurred the line between the visual and the textual. Illustration negotiated text and image on the printed page, while narrative painting juxtaposed the two media in its formulation of pictorial stories." "Pictorial Victorians surveys a range of material, from representations of the crinoline, to the illustrations that accompanied Harriet Beecher Stowe's novel Uncle Tom's Cabin and Tennyson's poetry, to paintings of adultery. It demonstrates that the space between text and image is one in which values are both constructed and questioned."--BOOK JACKET. Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved The Victorians were image obsessed. The middle decades of the nineteenth century saw an unprecedented growth in the picture industry. Technological advances enabled the Victorians to adorn with images the pages of their books and the walls of their homes. But this was not a wholly visual culture. Pictorial Victorians focuses on two of the most popular mid-nineteenth-century genres-illustration and narrative painting-that blurred the line between the visual and textual. Illustration negotiated text and image on the printed page, while narrative painting juxtaposed the two media in its formulation of pictorial stories. Author Julia Thomas reassesses mid-nineteenth-century values in the light of this interplay. The dialogue between word and image generates meanings that are intimately related to the Victorians' image of themselves. Illustrations in Victorian publications and the narrative scenes that lined the walls of the Royal Academy reveal the Victorians' ideas about the world in which they lived and their notions of gender, class, and race. Pictorial Victorians surveys a range of material, from representations of the crinoline, to the illustrations that accompanied Harriet Beecher Stowes novel Uncle Tom's Cabin and Tennyson's poetry, to paintings of adultery. It demonstrates that the space between text and image is one in which values are both constructed and questioned. This volume surveys a range of visual material from the Victorian Era, from representations of the crinoline, to the illustrations that accompanied Harriet Beecher Stowe's novel Uncle Tom's Cabin and Tennyson's poetry, to paintings of adultery. It demonstrates that the space between text and image is one in which values are both constructed and questioned. The Victorian era of British history was the period of Queen Victoria's reign from 1837 until her death in 1901. It was a long period of peace, prosperity, refined sensibilities and national self-confidence for Britain. The author examines the dialogue between their words and images, and the meanings that are intimately related to the Victorians' view of themselves. Illustrations in Victorian publications reveal the Victorians' ideas about the world in which they lived and their notions of gender, class, and race War and peace: word and image in mid-Victorian culture -- Picturing slavery: Uncle Tom's cabin and its early illustrations -- Pictures, poems, politics: illustrating Tennyson -- Crinolineomania: Punch's female malady -- Nation and narration: the Englishness of Victorian narrative painting -- A tale of two stories: Joseph Noel Paton's in memoriam -- Telling tales: adultery and maternity in past and present