This week’s image is taken from Thomas Hood’s “Hood’s Own: or, Laughter from Year to Year” (1855) and aptly depicts the shenanigans of Fagin’s gang in Dickens’ Oliver Twist (1838). In a humorous vignette in Chapter 10, The Artful Dodger and Charley Bates show off their pickpocketing prowess to an amused but naive Oliver… “When the breakfast was…
Insult of the Week: “An extraordinary specimen of human fungus”
In chapter 26 of Charles Dickens’ Bleak House (1853), Mr. George Rouncewell and his assistant Phil Squod are busy preparing for a day of work in the shooting gallery when they are interrupted by the unexpected arrival of Grandfather Smallweed and his granddaughter Judy. Mr. Smallweed describes their engagement of a hackney cab for the journey and…
The 5 Least Important Characters in Pride and Prejudice
Two weeks ago we sent out a call to fans of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, to come answer a survey on how they rate the importance of the characters in the novel. And the results are in! While we’re not going to release the full list of rankings just yet, I can assure you…
Puzzling racial humour from the 1890s
The Irish Tourist Development guidebook Visit Ireland, compiled in 1892 by F. X. Crossley and available in scanned form from the British Library Labs, contains a variety of useful information for the traveller of the 1890s, including timetables for railway, trams and steamer sailings, seasonal dates for game, estimates for how much you might expect…
Insult of the Week: “You double-distilled ould sthrap”
This week’s insult is provided by William Carleton’s The Black Prophet: A Tale of Irish Famine (1847). Following Condy Dalton’s admission of love for another woman, a furious Sarah M’Gowan returns home where her stepmother Nelly pushes her to boiling point… “You’re all out of it,” replied Nelly; “her blood’s up, now, an’ I’m not prepared…
Literary birthdays in April
April was a busy month for 19th-century birthdays! Many happy returns are due to Katherine Cecil Thurston, author of Max, who celebrated her 141st birthday on April 18th! Congratulations also to the wonderful Charlotte Brontë, author of Jane Eyre, on April 21st – the 200th anniversary of her birth! Finally, we wish a very merry 201st…
Warning! Women on bikes
This week’s image collection is inspired by Kate Beaton’s fabulous cartoons riffing on vintage cautionary literature for ladies, although these velocipedestriennes don’t seem too concerned about The Dangers of Cycling… I think this last image is my favourite, though…
These Three Weird Tricks Will Help You Write 47 Victorian Novels
As I journeyed across France to Marseilles, and made thence a terribly rough voyage to Alexandria, I wrote my allotted number of pages every day. On this occasion more than once I left my paper on the cabin table, rushing away to be sick in the privacy of my state room. It was February, and…
Insult of the Week: Women are a decorative sex. They never have anything to say but they say it charmingly.
This week’s insult is provided by Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890). While discussing Dorian’s apparent interest in the actress Sibyl Vane, Lord Henry Wotton states: “My dear boy, no woman is a genius. Women are a decorative sex. They never have anything to say, but they say it charmingly. Women represent the triumph of…
Image of the Week: Clongowes College in 1898
In Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (1916), Stephen Dedalus recalls his schooldays, spent at the boarding school Clongowes Wood College: It would be better to be in the study hall than out there in the cold. The sky was pale and cold but there were lights in the castle. He wondered from…
Pride and Prejudice and People
Are you one of Jane Austen’s legion of obsessive fans? Have you read Pride and Prejudice once, or occasionally, or until the covers are falling off? Do you know your Sir Lewis de Bourghs from your apothecary shopboys? If so, we need your help! We’ve put together a survey which contains the full list of…
Discerning drinkers?
While the Temperance Movement gained ground in the nineteenth century, authors writing about Ireland were sure to include references to drinking. In The Nun’s Curse, however, one of Charlotte Riddell’s characters is disappointed with her Guinness, while the locals are disappointed with her disappointment. Great effects spring, we know, from little causes; and had Miss Dickson, mourning…
The Sea of Books 