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Uk United Kingdom

 

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Uk United Kingdom

 

ECONOMY OF UK

The UK: the first country in the world to industrialize in the 18th and 19th centuries, and for much of the 19th century possessed a predominant role in the global economy. However, by the late 19th century, the Second Industrial revolution made the United States challenge Britain's role as the leader of the global economy. Despite a largely prosperous period 1950s - 1960s, the British economy recorded weaker growth than other European nations and by the 1970s: (the "sick man of Europe"). Although the 1980s saw a new economic boom was a continuation of sustained economic growth for more than 150 years, it ended in 2008 when the United Kingdom entered a recession bought about by the global financial crisis. The UK has the world’s largest current account deficit, despite significant oil revenues. This is mainly the result of a large deficit in the trade in manufacture goods.

At the start of the 21st century however, the UK still possesses a significant role in the global economy, due to its large Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and the financial importance that London possesses in the world.

The service sector is the dominant sector of the UK economy, a feature normally associated with the economy of a developed country. This means that the Tertiary sector jobs outnumber the Secondary and Primary sector jobs.

• a capitalist economy
• the fifth largest in the world in terms of market
• exchange rates
• the sixth largest
• by purchasing power parity ((PPP).
• GDP (Gross National Product): ninth highest level in European Union
• the strongest EU economies in terms of inflation, interest rates and unemployment, all of which remain relatively low.
• higher levels of income inequality than many European countries.
• The British Government owns very few industries or businesses – Royal Mail
• increases in taxation and regulation have tended to diminish the favorableness of the political-legal environment for UK industry.

Membership

• member of the G8, (forum for governments of eight nations of the northern hemisphere: Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, the United States;
• member of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (international organization of 30 countries that accept the principles of representative democracy and free-market economy economy. Most OECD members are high-income economies. It originated in 1948 to help administer the Marshall Plan for the reconstruction of Europe after WWII.
• Member of the European Union (1993); (European Economic Community 1973)

Agriculture, hunting, forestry, and fishing

Agriculture: subsidized by the European Union

• is highly intensive, highly mechanized, and efficient by European standards,
• produces about 60% of food needs with less than 2% of the labour force
• GDP contribution: 2%
• two-thirds of the production is devoted to livestock (cattle, chicken - the UK is the second largest poultry producer in Europe after France) and sheep
• one-third to arable crops.
• The main crops that are grown are wheat, barley, oats, oilseed rape, maize for animal feeds, potatoes and sugar beet.
• New crops are also emerging: linseed for oil and hemp for fibre production.

Fishing industry ranges from sole to herring.

Coastal towns that have fishing industry: Kingston upon Hull, Grimsby, Fleetwood, Great Yarmouth, Peterhead, Fraserburgh, Lowestoft

Manufacturing industry Although the manufacturing sector's share of both employment and the UK's GDP has steadily fallen, manufacturing output in terms of both production and value has steadily increased since 1945. This is a trend common in many mature Western economies. It accounts for:

• 16% of national output in the UK
• 13% of employment - a continuation of the steady decline in the importance of this sector to the British economy
• overseas trade, accounting for 83% of exports

Heavy industry used to employ many thousands of people and produce large volumes of low-value goods (such as steelmaking) has either become highly efficient (producing the same amount of output from fewer manufacturing sites employing fewer people- for example, or has been replaced by smaller industrial units producing high-value goods (such as the aerospace and electronic industries)

-        Engineering and allied industries comprise:

• transport equipment and car manufacturing: BMW (MINI, Rolls-Royce), Tata (Jaguar, Land Rover), General Motors (Vauxhall Motors), Honda, Nissan, Toyota and Volkswagen (Bentley)
• smaller, specialist manufacturers (including Lotus and Morgan) and
• commercial vehicle manufacturers (Leyland Trucks, LDV, Alexander Dennis, JCB, the main global manufacturing plant for the Ford Transit, Manganese Bronze and Case-New Holland)
• components for the sector, such as Ford diesel engine (Dagenham), which produces half of Ford's diesel engines globally.
• railway locomotives and other related components: Brush Traction and Haslet manufacture
• aerospace and defence equipment industries:
• private motor yachts.
• electronics, audio and optical equipment,
• a broad base of domestic firms, alongside a number of foreign firms manufacturing a wide range of TV, radio and communications products, scientific and optical instruments, electrical machinery and office machinery and computers.
• Chemicals and chemical-based products
• the pharmaceutical industry is particularly successful: GlaxoSmithKline; AstraZeneca
• major research and development and manufacturing facilities

Wholesale and retail trade includes

the motor trade, auto repairs, personal and household goods industries.

Financial intermediation

• London: the world's largest financial centre, with financial services based around two districts: 'The City' (the City of London) and the Docklands (particularly around Canary Wharf) - now home to the Financial Service Authority, as well as to several important financial institutions (such as Barclays Bank, Citygroup and HSBC).
• The Docklands began development in the 1980s and it has now over 500 banks. The majority of business in London is being conducted on an international basis, with established leads in areas such as Eurobonds, Foreign exchange markets, energy futures and global insurance.
• The alternative Investment market has acted a growth market over the past decade, allowing London to also expand as an international equity centre for smaller firms.

 

LONDON

 

The City houses:

• the London Stock Exchange (shares and bonds),
• London Metal exchange (Base Metal and Plastic futures),
• Lloyds of London (insurance), and the
• Bank of England

The United Kingdom financial exports contribute significantly towards the balance of payments. The UK has had an expanding export business in financial service, which has been influenced by a mixture of

• unique institutions,
• light regulation,
• highly skilled workforce.

A financial export is a business service provided by domestic firms to foreign firms within the scope of financial services. The growing international nature of finance means that many services are now being handled abroad or in financial centres, for a variety of reasons. Financial exports include a wide range of activities:

• insurance
• banking
• brokerage

Many smaller locations (such as Bermuda, Luxemburg Cayman Islands lack sufficient size of financial services, thus requiring them to look abroad for markets. The increasing competitiveness of financial services has meant that many countries which were self-sufficient or protectionist, have become increasingly reliant on financial service imports (such as the United States and Japan).

Edinborough: a long established financial industry,

• the fifth largest financial centre in Europe,
• the Royal Bank of Scotland (the second largest bank in Europe),
• HBOS (owners of the Bank of Scotland)
• Standard Life Insurance

Leeds: city region, home to

• large banks & building companies
• communication industry

Manchester also has a large financial sector:

• the Co-Operative Financial Services,
• the largest professional services

Real estate and lettings

The UK property market has been booming for the past seven years and in some areas property due to the

• sustained economic growth,
• expansion in household numbers (including high immigration into certain regions),
• low interest rates,
• the growth in property investment, and restriction in the supply of new housing (through planning restrictions, requiring builders to use brown field sites).

Currency: Until relatively recently there was debate over whether or not the UK should abolish its currency Pound Sterling and join the Euro. Public opinion pools have shown that a majority of Britons have been opposed to joining the single currency for some considerable time and this position has now hardened further.

- Scotland – has its own central issuing bank and currency

Taxation and borrowing

Taxation: may involve payments to at least two different levels of government:

• local government: (financed by grants from central government) funds, business rates, council tax and increasingly from fees and charges such as those from on street parking.
• central government revenues are mainly income tax, national insurance contributions, value added tax; corporation tax and fuel duty.

Economy of the USA

- the largest national economy in the world.

• gross domestic product (GDP) estimated as $14.2 trillion in 2008.
• a high level of output per person
• a stable overall GDP growth rate,
• a low unemployment rate,
• high levels of research
• capital investment funded by both national and, because of decreasing saving rates, increasingly by foreign investors.

Major economic concerns in the U.S. include:

• external debt,
• entitlement liabilities for retiring baby boomers who have already begun withdrawing from their Social security accounts accounts,
• corporate debt,
• mortgage debt,
• a low savings rate,
• falling house prices,

The economic history of the United States has its roots in European settlements in the 16th, 17th, and 18th centuries. The American colonies progressed from marginally successful colonial economies to a small, independent farming economy. In 230 years the United States grew to a huge, integrated, industrialized economy that makes up over a quarter of the world economy. The main causes were

• a large unified market,
• a supportive political-legal system,
• vast areas of highly productive farmlands,
• vast natural resources (especially timber, coal and oil), exploited efficiently due to a unique set of institutions designed to encourage exploration and extraction
• an entrepreneurial spirit and commitment to investing in material and human capital.

Economic policies

Many years after the great Depression of the 1930s, the danger of recession appeared most serious, and the government strengthened the economy by

• growing its spending heavily or
• cutting taxes so that consumers would spend more,
• fostering rapid growth in the money supply

In the 1970s, economic woes brought on by the costs of the Vietnam conflict, major price increases, particularly for energy, created a strong fear of inflation. As a result, government leaders came to concentrate more on

• controlling inflation than on combating recession
• limiting spending,
• resisting tax cuts,
• tight reining in growth in the money supply.

Ideas about the best tools for stabilizing the economy changed substantially in the 1960s and the 1990s when the government had great faith in fiscal policy by

• manipulating government revenues to influence the economy.

A period of high inflation, high unemployment, and huge government deficits weakened confidence in fiscal policy as a tool for regulating the overall pace of economic activity. Instead, monetary policy assumed growing prominence.

Since the stagflation of the 1970s, the U.S. economy has been characterized by somewhat slower growth. The worst recession in recent decades, in terms of lost output, occurred in the 1973-75 period of oil shock. Since the 1970s the US has sustained trade deficits with other nations.

In recent years, the primary economic concerns have centered on:

• high household debt
• high national debt
• high corporate debt
• high mortgage debt
• high unfunded Medicare liability
• high unfunded Social Security liability
• high external debt
• high trade deficit,
• deterioration in net international investment

 

New York City

 

Los Angeles

Main Characteristics of USA Economy

• economic freedom afforded to the private sector by allowing it to make the majority of economic decisions in determining the direction and scale of what the U.S. economy produces.
• relatively low levels of regulation and government involvement,
• a court system that generally protects property rights and enforces contracts.
• extensive waterways that helped shape the country's economic growth and bind America's 50 individual states together in a single economic unit.
• high productivity helps determine the health of the U.S. economy.
• steady growth in the labor force amount and qualification, (due to the growing immigration) a phenomenon both cause and effect of almost constant economic expansion.
• labor mobility has developed the capacity of the American economy to adapt to changing conditions.

Corporation legislation has emerged as an association of owners, known as stockholders, who form a business enterprise governed by a complex set of rules and customs. Brought on by the process of mass production, corporations, such as General Electric, have been instrumental in shaping the United States. Through the stock market, American banks and investors have grown their economy by investing and withdrawing capital from profitable corporations. Today in the era of globalization American investors and corporations have influence all over the world. The American government has also been instrumental in investing in the economy, in areas such as providing cheap electricity, and military contracts in times of war.

While consumers and producers make most decisions that mold the economy, government has a powerful effect on the U.S. economy in at least four areas. Strong government regulation in the U.S. economy started in the early 1900s with the rise of the Progressive Movement; prior to this the government promoted economic growth through protective tariffs and subsidies to industry, built infrastructure, and established banking policies, including the gold standard, to encourage savings and investment in productive enterprises..

Government intervention Regulation and control

Economic regulation

Traditionally, the government seeks to prevent monopolies from raising prices beyond the level that would ensure them extremely large profits by a complex system to stabilize prices for agricultural goods, which tend to fluctuate wildly in response to rapidly changing supply and demand, and in other industries such as trucking and, later, airlines to limit harmful price cutting.

• antitrust law seeking to prohibit practices or mergers that would unduly limit competition.
• bank regulations, highly fragmented as banking is regulated at both the federal and state level. The U.S also has one of the most highly regulated banking environments in the world; focused on
• privacy,
• disclosure,
• fraud prevention,
• anti-money laundering,
• anti-terrorism, anti-usury lending,
• promoting lending to lower-income segments.

Monetary policies:

control money supply through mechanisms such as changes in interest rates

relatively independent issuing central bank, known as the Federal Reserve, (1913) to provide a stable currency and monetary policy; the U.S. dollar has been regarded as one of the most stable currencies in the world and many nations back their own currency with U.S. dollar reserves.

fiscal policies - taxes and spending to maintain

low inflation,

high economic growth,

low unemployment

Social regulations

Since the 1970s, government has also exercised control over private companies to achieve social goals, such as

• improving the public's health
• safety
• maintaining a healthy environment by enforcement of standards and regulations to maintain resources of :
• air,
• water,
• land
• rules for drugs not to reach the market, and
• standards of disclosure for food products.

American policy makers grew increasingly satisfied that economic regulation protected efficient companies at the expense of consumers in industries such as airlines and trucking. At the same time, technological changes spawned new competitors in some industries, such as telecommunications, that once were considered natural monopolies. Both developments led to a succession of laws easing regulation.

In the 1990s, individuals, and eventually the government itself, sued tobacco companies over the health risks of cigarette smoking. The 1998 Tobacco Master Settlement Agreement provided states with long-term payments to cover medical costs to treat smoking-related illnesses.

Government Direct Services and Assistance

The federal government is responsible for

• national defense,
• research that often leads to the development of new products,
• space exploration,
• programs designed to help workers develop workplace skills and find jobs (including higher education).

The State governments are responsible for

• the construction and maintenance of most highways.
• financing and operating public schools
• police
• fire protection.

Direct assistance

Government provides many kinds of help to businesses and individuals.

• low-interest loans and technical assistance to small businesses,
• loans to help students attend college.
• home mortgages to be bought from lenders and turn them into securities that can be bought and sold by investors, thereby encouraging home lending
• promotes exports
• prevent foreign countries from maintaining trade barriers that restrict imports.

Social Security, which is financed by a tax on employers and employees, accounts for

• the largest portion of Americans' retirement income.
• medical care for low-income families.
• mentally ill or people with severe disabilities.  
• food stamps to help poor families obtain food,
• welfare grants to support low-income parents with children.

USA produces:

Agriculture - products: wheat, corn, other grains, fruits, vegetables, cotton; beef, pork, poultry, dairy products; forest products; fish

Exports - commodities: capital goods, automobiles, industrial supplies and raw materials, consumer goods, agricultural products

Imports - commodities: crude oil and refined petroleum products, machinery, automobiles, consumer goods, industrial raw materials, food and beverages

Manufacturing

USA is the leading manufacturer in the world with a 2007 industrial output of US$2,696,880 millions. Main industries are

• petroleum,
• steel,
• motor vehicles,
• aerospace,
• telecommunications,
• chemicals,
• electronics,
• food processing,
• consumer goods,
• lumber,
• mining.

External debt: Liabilities to foreigners

It is an accounting entry that largely represents US domestic assets purchased with trade dollars and owned overseas, largely by US trading partners.

The large net external debt is created by

the value of foreign assets (debt and equity) held by domestic residents which is less than the value of domestic assets held by foreigners. As foreigners buy property in the US, this adds to the external debt. When this occurs in greater amounts than Americans buying property overseas, US becomes debtor nation.

The external debt represents foreign ownership of domestic assets, the result is that –

• rental income,
• stock dividends,
• capital gains and
• other investment income

is received by foreign investors, rather than by U.S. residents.

As the trade imbalance puts extra dollars in hands outside of the U.S., these dollars may be used to invest in –

• new assets (foreign direct investment, such as new plants) or
•  buy existing American assets such as stocks, real estate and bonds.

Leading to a mounting trade deficit, the income from these assets increasingly transfers overseas.

Imports and exports

The United States is the most significant nation in the world when it comes to international trade. For decades, it has led the world in imports while simultaneously remaining as one of the top three exporters of the world.

As the major epicenter of world trade, the United States enjoys leverage that many other nations do not. For one, since it is

• the world's leading consumer,
• number one customer of companies all around the world
• the top export market for almost 60 trading nations worldwide
• the world's leading importer
• U.S. dollar as the world's most stable currency.

Many businesses compete for a share of the United States market. In addition, the United States occasionally uses its economic leverage to impose economic sanctions in different regions of the world. The stable U.S. economy and fairly sound monetary policy has led to faith in the US currency. In order to fund the national debt (also known as public debt), the United States relies on selling U.S. treasury bonds to people both inside and outside the country, and in recent times the latter have become increasingly important. Much of the money generated for the treasury bonds came from U.S. dollars which were used to purchase imports in the United States.

The military expenditure

Most economic models have shown that military spending by the United States Government has diverted resources from productive uses such as consumption and investment, which has ultimately slowed growth and reduced employment. Proponents of the military actions of the United States reference the cost of the wars as a percent of national GDP.

 

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BRITISH EMPIRE TIME LINE

1558-1603 = The foundations of the British Empire = the name given to United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and the former dominions, colonies and territories that owed allegiance to the British Crown up until the 20th century

- laid during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I. At its height, the British Empire controlled more than 20 per cent of world's territory, and ruled more than 400 million of its people. Today, Ireland is politically divided into two regions: The Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland, which remains within the UK.

1580 Sir Francis Drake is the first Englishman to sail around the world.

1585 British Empire's first attempt at colonization by Sir Walter Raleigh at Roanoke Island, off the North American eastern coast. The settlement doesn't survive and the English make no further attempts until it makes peace with Spain.

1600 Overseas commercial trade interests are established in the form of the English East India Company.

1607 Jamestown = the first English settlement in North America

1620 the Pilgrims landed in Massachusetts Bay and founded Plymouth Colony, the first permanent Puritan settlement in New England. From the 1630s onward, other religious colonies were established in Rhode Island, Connecticut and Maryland.

1600s and 1700s the first British Empire, which focuses on the Americas and to a lesser extent India. Mercantilism, an economic policy based on protected trade monopolies and governmental manufacturing, is an important factor in Britain's growth. The intent is to keep the country's exports higher than the amount of imports.

1623 The first foothold in the West Indies transforming the tobacco boom into a sugar kingdom, plantation economy is based on slavery, which gives rise to the slave trade.

1651 The English Parliament passes the Navigation Act, which states imports into English harbors and colonies could only be carried on English vessels or ships of the producing company.

1655 England conquers the Spanish colony of Jamaica and it is the first English colony taken by force.

1664 English presence increases along North America's East Coast, and in 1664 New Amsterdam was seized from the Netherlands and renamed New York.

1670 The Hudson's Bay Company is established and holds a monopoly over trade of the region and streams flowing into Hudson Bay in Canada. It is also the year England and Spain sign the "Treaty of Madrid," and Spain acknowledges English possessions in the Caribbean.

1672 The Royal Africa Company is formed and imports large numbers of African slaves to the Caribbean.

1688 Continued war with France leads to further English expansion, and colonies in New England grow rapidly with the Hudson's Bay Company actively participating in the fur trade.

1700s Public interest in overseas affairs fades, and during his long premiership Sir Robert Walpole adopts a policy of laissez-faire, in which the government does not interfere in economic affairs. A movement of free trade ensues. Despite this, sugar becomes the main import into Britain, fuelling the West Indian plantation economy, and also brings 70,000 slaves annually across the Atlantic.

1701-1714 During the War of the Spanish Succession, England (by now Great Britain) and its allies fought France and Spain, and British forces captured Acadia and Newfoundland, as well as the Spanish Islands of Gibraltar and Minorca giving Britain territorial presence in the Mediterranean Sea. The Peace of Utrecht (1713) resolved the war and affirmed the British Empire's victory.

1707 Social instability in India; Britain and France fight for power during the Carnatic Wars which focused on the Carnatic region on the east coast of South India.

1756-1763 = the Seven Year's War are fought over control of Germany, colonial North American and India. Britain makes enormous imperial gains during the war, largely at the expense of France. In North America, conflict is known as the French and Indian War, which is described as the harbinger of the Seven Year's War and the fight for the greater empire - Britain attacked French possessions in North America and in 1759 Quebec was captured, ending the presence of France in Canada. The Treaty of Paris ends the Seven Year's War and the French and Indian War, and as a result Britain gives Guadeloupe and Martinique back to France but retains control of Canada. The treaty confirms British dominance in India and North America.

1765 The British government wants to tap into American revenues and therefore increases taxes through the Stamp Act, and colonists see this as a violation of their rights so the act is repealed. However, other taxes are imposed to compensate, which results in riots by colonies. In 1776, the United Continental Congress establishes the Declaration of Independence and eventually Britain loses its American colonies in 1783.

1769 The French East India Company loses France's financial support and the British East India Company gains commercial monopoly. This year also marks Europe's Industrial Revolution.

1783 Britain loses American colonies but its imperial influence increases elsewhere in the world and its economy is hugely bolstered by the advent of the Industrial Revolution. 1785 In an attempt to consolidate control over its territory in India and Canada, the India Act is established and subjects the East India Company to board control, and the administration of India is placed into the hands of professional civil service.

1791 The Canada Act is established in an attempt to ease tensions between the French and British by separating the region into primarily English Upper Canada and French Lower Canada.

1799-1815 Britain's Mediterranean position and its route to the East were secured during the Napoleonic Wars, largely because of the naval prowess of British Admiral Horatio Nelson. Nelson's victories during the Battle of the Nile, which resulted in British control of the entire Mediterranean, and the Battle of Trafalgar, which prevented French fleets from entering Italy, secured British naval superiority for much of the 19th century. The British Empire remains a stronghold in Canada, South Africa, India and other Asian regions.

1801 The United Kingdom of Britain and Northern Ireland is officially formed, including regions of Great Britain, Ireland and Scotland.

1800s-1900s the second British Empire = India, Canada and Australia. By this time it controls roughly 20 per cent of the world's territory and some 400 million people, but growing nationalism among colonies eventually weakens the empire. In 1824, Britain occupies Burma (Myanmar) to protect its interests in India, and the empire also begins to grant what's known as "responsible self-government." In 1867, Canada confederates, which allowed Britain to withdraw its military presence in the country but retain control of foreign affairs and external defense.

1804 Louis Napoleon Bonaparte, or Napoleon III, becomes Emperor of France by popular acclaim, and sets out to build a great empire in an attempt to conquer the world.

1854 British and French forces join the Ottoman Empire against Russia in the Crimean War (1853-1856), which broke out due to the so-called Eastern Question and the region of the frail Ottoman Empire (Turkey).

1858 Britain assumes direct authority of India through the British East India Company.

1869 The completion of the Suez Canal facilitates trade with India, leading to the British occupation of Egypt.

1871 Prussian victory over France marks the rise of the German Empire.

1899-1902 The British defeat the Dutch Boers of the Transvaal and the Orange Free State in southern Africa, the strongest opponents to British expansion. However, the British government grants South Africa self-government in 1907, which paves the way for the Union of South Africa in 1910.

1914-1918 During World War I the British Empire remains largely united, though many colonies express desire for independence. For example, the Easter Rebellion in Ireland on April 24, 1916, reflects this discontent by Irish nationalists.

1919 The Treat of Versailles, which essentially ends the First World War I, gives Britain most of the German Empire in Africa, while the collapse of the Ottoman Empire in the Middle East had led to the British acquisition of Palestine and Iraq in the previous year. After the war, British government grants independence or constitutional autonomy for many of its colonies.

1931 The Statute of Westminster eliminates control by the British Parliament over dominion governments, and also establishes the British Commonwealth of Nations (later the Commonwealth of Nations) as an association of equal and independent states united by common allegiance to the British Crown.

1939-1945 Japan conquers some British possessions such as Hong Kong and Burma during the Second World War. In 1941, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill joins with United States President Franklin D. Roosevelt in signing the Atlantic Charter, which declares the right of self-determination for all countries. Afterward, many colonies gain independence such as India and Pakistan in 1947 and Ceylon, Burma and Palestine in 1948. Many African nations gain independence swiftly during the 1950s and 1960s.

1949 = the Republic of Ireland completely disavows itself from the British Crown and the Commonwealth of Nations.

1997 Hong Kong remains under British control until July 1, 1997, when it is returned to the People's Republic of China and is now officially known as the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.

Today there are 54 nations included in the Commonwealth.

GEOGRAPHY OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE

 

 

The North American colonies: the First British Empire

 

The 13 American colonies attracted religious emigrees, farmers and merchants from the British Isles. They would be augmented by Europeans and would also start the importation of slaves from Africa. Together, these colonists would build one of the most commercially successful realms in the British Empire.

The War of Independence was a complicated affair caused by the interests of the colonisers being pitted against the interests of the Imperial government; generally, over land and money. A long, drawn-out campaign, with French and Spanish interventions, saw the eventual humiliation of the Imperial government as it was forced to relinquish control over these colonies. The financial and diplomatic costs of this disaster would curb any British interest for Imperial endeavours for years to come.

The coast of Canada was initially colonised in much the same way as the 13 American colonies, but with the added complication of the presence of the French. The War of Independence shaped Canada in that it acted as a safe haven for loyalists fleeing from the rest of the Americas. This massive influx of British subjects tilted the delicate balance with the French and helped to turn Canada into a most loyal colony.

 

 

 

South America

 

The British didn't need to exert formal control over the countries and peoples of this continent. The Monroe doctrine imposed by America, served British interests quite well enough.

 

 

The Monroe Doctrine: - United States policy introduced in 1823, by President James Monroe which said that further efforts by European governments to colonize land or interfere with states in the Americas would be viewed by the United States as acts of aggression requiring U.S. intervention. It became a defining moment in the foreign policy of the US. and one of its longest-standing tenets, invoked by U.S. presidents.

 

Africa

The continent of Africa provided some of the earliest and many of the latest colonies of Empire. The earliest colonies, on the West Coast of Africa, were a legacy of the fabulous fortunes that could be made out of the Slave Trade in that area. Gold and ivory were other lures for early traders of all European countries. Fortunately for many Africans the climate and naturally occurring diseases meant that most Europeans found it difficult to live in the equatorial areas of Africa. Malaria was the chief barrier to early colonization.

Advances in technology eventually provided Europeans with the means to colonise Africa at a time of peculiarly intense competition between the European powers. Hence, the scramble for Africa provided the British Empire with a substantial increase in her African territories. The already impressive African presence was further added to with the defeat of Germany in the Great War and the confiscation of her colonies.

The Dark Continent held intense fascination for many of the British public. Missionaries and explorers brought back stories and tales of wonderful beasts, colourful peoples and incredible geography. It is not hard to see why Victorians were so keen on expansion of Empire into this the most mysterious of continents.

 

 

Asia

Asia provided one of the first commercial reasons for establishing and maintaining an Imperial presence through the hugely rewarding spice trade. From the sixteenth century, European ships could make fortunes carrying exotic foodstuffs from the Orient back to the cities and peoples of Europe. A combination of European state rivalry and technical expertise over the local populations made the extension of Imperial control possible and commercially desirable. The Dutch, Spanish, French and Portuguese all vied with Britain for access to these rich commodities that could often fetch their weight in silver and gold back in the European market.

Over time, increased size and speed of ships reduced the value of these products as supply approached the demand for the spices. However, Asia maintained its commercial viability by the existence of the enormous economic powerhouses of both China and India. Textiles, Tea and Opium would provide economic incentives for trade throughout the eighteenth, nineteenth and even up to the twentieth century. Control over the sources of these commodities and naval bases to protect the shipping lanes meant that Imperial control was taken as economically and strategically necessary. Asia was always the most commercially successful area of Imperial endeavor.

 

 

South East Asia

 

 

 

 

Pacific

Sheer distance did not prevent the British from establishing a strong presence in the Pacific region. The seafaring nation appreciated the strategic importance of islands and bases to re-supply her ships in. The combination of vast distances, isolation from Europe and the strength of the Royal Navy meant that Britain was in a prime position to establish dominance in the region.

The name of Captain Cook is synonymous with British history in this region. His cartographic endeavours filled in some of the last missing pieces of the world map jigsaw puzzle. The beautiful islands and lands that he described would spur intrepid explorers and Christian missionaries to the region. These two groups of British society were often the shock troops of Imperial advance; disrupting local societies through challenging local customs and authority figures and dazzling locals with the products of Industrial Europe. The isolation of the pacific islands also meant that local peoples could offer little or no resistance to even a single British ship.

The remoteness and isolation of Australia actually contributed to her Imperial usefulness, by providing a suitable location to dump Britain's undesirables in. The pleasant climate of New Zealand was to attract a different class of British immigrant throughout the nineteenth century. Together, these two colonies would transform themselves into two of the most successful of Britain's colonies.

 

The Commonwealth of Nations (the Commonwealth or the British Commonwealth)

- Intergovernmental organization of fifty-three independent member states.

Most of them were formerly parts of the British Empire. They co-operate within a framework of common values and goals: promotion of democracy, humanitarian rights, good governance, the rule of law, individual liberty, egalitarianism, free trade, multilateralism, world peace.

A Commonwealth Realm is any one of the sixteen sovereign states within the Commonwealth of Nations that recognize Elisabeth II as their respective monarch.These countries are independent kingdoms, and the sovereign is separately monarch of each state; thus, the Commonwealth Realms are in personal union with one another.

Current Commonwealth Realms Flag Country Antigua and Barbuda Australia The Bahamas Barbados Belize Canada Grenada Jamaica New Zealand Papua New Guinea Saint Kits and Nevis Saint Lucia Saint Vincent Solomon Islands Tuvalu United Kingdom

 

Commonwealth Realms Map

 

 

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The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland uses as its national flag the royal banner locally known as

 

The "Union Flag" or "Union Jack"

 

 

The current design of the Union Flag dates from the Union of Ireland and Great Britain in 1801.

• King James VI of Scotland inherited the throne of England and Ireland and was crowned James I of England in 1603, the crowns of
• the Kingdom of England, including:
• the Kingdom of Ireland, which, by the Crown of Ireland Act in 1542 made King Henry VIII of England and his successors Kings of Ireland
• Wales, which had been annexed by Edward I of England in 1282) and
• the Kingdom of Scotland were united in a personal union through him
• Despite this union of the Crowns, each kingdom remained independent
• In 1606, a new flag to represent this regal union between England and Scotland was specified in a royal decree, according to which
• the flag of England (Saint George’s Cross) and
• the flag of Scotland (Saint Andrew’s cross) would be "joined together forming the flag of Great Britain and first union flag

 

 

 

 

This royal flag was at first only for use at sea on civil and military ships of both Scotland and England.

• The Act of Union (1800) which merged the Kingdom of Great Britain and the kingdom of Ireland to create the

United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland

 

• Placing the flag upside down is considered lèse majesté offense

Flag days are the days when the Union Flag is flown from government buildings all over the UK

• The Union Flag is flown from Government buildings at half mast in specific situations

 

 

14 June 1777: The Stars and Stripes is adopted by Congress as the Flag of the United States.

Today the American flag consists of:

• thirteen horizontal stripes, seven red alternating with 6 white, (representing the original 13 colonies)
• the stars represent the 50 states of the Union

The colors of the flag are symbolic as well:

• Red: Hardiness and Valor
• White: Purity and Innocence
• Blue: Vigilance, Perseverance and Justice

The custom of special folding is reserved for the United States Flag alone. The flag is lowered daily at the last note of retreat. The Flag is carefully folded into the shape of a tri-cornered hat, emblematic of the hats worn by colonial soldiers during the war for Independence.

 

Standards of respect

• The flag should never be dipped to any person or thing, unless it is the ensign responding to a salute from a ship of a foreign nation.
• The flag should not be used for any decoration (exception for coffins).
• The flag should never be drawn back or bunched up in any way.
• The flag should never be used for any advertising purpose.
• It should not be embroidered, printed, or otherwise impressed on such articles as cushions, handkerchief, napkins, boxes, or anything intended to be discarded after temporary use.
• The flag should not be used as part of a costume or athletic uniform

• The flag should never be stepped on
• The flag should not be draped over the hood, top, sides, or back of a vehicle, railroad train, or boat.
• When the flag is lowered, no part of it should touch the ground or any other object; it should be received by waiting hands and arms.
• The flag should always be permitted to fall freely

 

 

 

 

The Official Coat of Arms of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland

The coat features both the motto of British Monarchs:

Dieu et mon droit

(God and my right)

(The motto was first used by King Richard I in 1198 and adopted as the royal motto of England in the time of Henry VI).

 

and the motto of the Order of the Garter:

Honi soit qui mal y pense

('Evil to him who evil thinks')

Royal Coat of Arms

Royal coat of arms of the United Kingdom

• Richard the Lionheart chose three lions to represent England, to be immediately identified in the midst of battle.
• The full version of the Royal Coat of Arms is now used only by the Queen in her capacity as the Sovereign.
• The Queen has a separate version of her arms for use in Scotland, giving the Scottish elements pride of place.

 

The official birthday of the Sovereign is marked each year by a military parade and march-past, known as Trooping the Colour.

It takes place each June on Horse Guards Parade, Whitehall, in front of crowds of onlookers and is enjoyed by millions world-wide. The troops participating in the parade are drawn of fully trained, operational troops from the Household Division.

The Queen's Colour of a battalion of Foot Guards is 'trooped' (carried along the ranks) each year before the Sovereign. Only one colour can be trooped at a time, and the five Household Regiments - Grenadier, Coldstream, Scots, Irish and Welsh Guards take their turn each year.

The ceremony derives from two old military ceremonies, Trooping the Colour and Mounting The Queen's Guard. The origin of the ceremony goes back to the early eighteenth century, and possibly even earlier, when the guards and sentries for the Royal Palaces and other important buildings in the capital were mounted daily on the parade ground by the Horse Guards building.

The Queen inspects her Guards in Queen Victoria’s ivory mounted phaeton of 1842

The Queen's Guard and Queen's Life Guard are the names given to contingents of infantry and cavalry soldiers charged with guarding the official royal residences in London. The British Army had regiments of both Horse Guards and Foot Guards predating the English Restoration (1660), and since the reign of King Charles II these have been responsible for guarding the Sovereign Palaces.

 

 

The New Guard, formed from the Grenadier Guards, marches out of Buckingham Palace to St James' Palace

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A sentry of the Royal Regiment of Scotland posted on the Esplanade outside Edinburgh Castle

 

The Changing of the Guard at Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington,

established during the American Civil War on the grounds of Arlington House, formerly the estate of the family of Robert E. Lee's.

EMBLEMS OF BRITAIN

Each country in Britain has its own patron saint and floral emblem:

 

 

 

 

The leek, vegetable; its edible part is a bundle of leaf sheaths which is sometimes called a stem or stalk.

 

 

 

The Queen and the UK

 

• The Queen is Head of State in the United Kingdom
• constitutional monarch
• provides continuity and focuses on national unity
• identifies with every section of society, including minorities and special interest groups.
• Her Majesty does not 'rule' the country, but fulfils important ceremonial and formal roles with respect to Government
• fount of Justice, Head of the Armed Forces and has important relationships with the established Churches of England and Scotland

 

 

Oxbridge

• originally a fictional composite of the University of Oxford and the University of Cambridge
• now used to refer to them collectively, often with implications of perceived superior intellectual or social status

• They are the two oldest universities in continuous operation in England. Both were founded more than 800 years ago and continued as England's only universities until the 19th century
• they both have educated a large number of Britain's most prominent scientists, writers and politicians, as well as noted figures in many other fields
• they have established similar institutions and facilities such as:
•  printing houses (Oxford University Press and Cambridge University Press),
• botanical gardens
• museums (the Ashmolean and the Fitzwilliam),
• legal deposit libraries (the Bodleian and the Cambridge university Library), and
• debating societies (the Oxford Union and the Cambridge union).
• Rivalry between Oxford and Cambridge also has a long history, dating back to around 1209 when Cambridge was founded by scholars taking refuge from hostile Oxford townsmen, and celebrated to this day in varsity matches such as the Oxford and Cambridge Boat race.
• Each has a similar collegiate structure, whereby the University is a co-operative of its constituent colleges, who are responsible for:
• supervisions/tutorials (the principal teaching method)
• pastoral care
• They are the top-scoring institutions in cross-subject UK university rankings, so they are targeted by ambitious pupils, parents and schools. Entrance is competitive and some schools promote themselves based on their achievement of Oxbridge offers
• Both universities comprise many buildings of great beauty and antiquity, sited on level terrain ideal for cycling, near slow-moving rivers suitable for rowing and punting
• Oxford and Cambridge have common approaches to undergraduate admission:
• top graduates at A level,
• interviews are usually used to check whether the course is well suited to the applicant's interests and aptitudes,
• look for evidence of self-motivation,
• independent thinking, academic potential and ability to learn through the tutorial system

The word Oxbridge may also be used pejoratively:

• as a descriptor of social class (professionals who dominated the intake of both universities at the beginning of the twentieth century),
• an elite that "continues to dominate Britain's political and cultural establishment,"
• describes a "pressure-cooker" culture that attracts and then fails to support overachievers "who are vulnerable to a kind of self-inflicted stress that can all too often become unbearable" and high-flying state school students who find "coping with the workload very difficult in terms of balancing work and life" and "feel socially out of [their] depth."

Palace of Westminster/Houses of Parliament/Westminster Palace

 

The Palace of Westminster, also known as the Houses of Parliament or Westminster Palace, in London, is where the two Houses of the Parliament of the United Kingdom

• the House of Lords and the
• House of Commons meet
• it lies on the north bank of the River Thames in the London Borough of the City of Westminster, close to the government buildings of Whitehall
• it contains around 1,100 rooms, 100 staircases and 3 miles (5 km) of corridors. Although the building mainly dates from the 19th century, remaining elements of the original historic buildings include
• Westminster hall, used today for major public ceremonial events such as lyings in state, and
• the Jewel Tower
• Control of the Palace and its precincts was for centuries exercised by the Queen's representative, the Lord great Chamberlain. By agreement with the Crown, control passed to the two Houses in 1965. Certain ceremonial rooms continue to be controlled by the Lord Great Chamberlain.

 

 

 

Statue of King Arthur (designed by Albrecht Dürer)

• legendary British leader who, according to medieval histories and romances, led the defence of Britain against the Saxons invaders in the early 6th century
• details of Arthur's story are mainly composed of folklore and literary invention
• The legendary Arthur developed as a figure of international interest largely through the popularity of Geoffrey of Monmouth's fanciful and imaginative 12th-century (History of the Kings of Britain); he defeated the Saxons and established an empire over Britain, Ireland, Iceland, Norway and Gaul
• some Welsh and Breton tales and poems relating the story of Arthur date from earlier than this work;
• Many elements and incidents appear in Geoffrey's Historia, including Arthur's father Uther Pendragon, the wizard Merlin, the sword Excalibur
• In the 12th-century French writer Chrétien de Troyes, who added Lancelot and the Holy Grail to the story, began the genre of Arthurian romance that became a significant strand of medieval literature. In these French stories, the narrative focus often shifts from King Arthur himself to other characters, such as various Knights of the Round table
• In the 21st century, the legend lives on, both in literature and in adaptations for theatre, film, television, comics and other media

 

 

 

Uk United Kingdom new article :

 

 

 

The Victorian Age

(1837-1901)

 

Historical Context

 

The Victorian age usually covers in literary histories a period of time longer than the actual reign pf Queen Victoria, stretchinf from 1832 (the year of the first Reform Bill) to 1902 (the end of the Boer War).

This is a period of expansion and prosperity, of industrial development and unceasing scientific and technological progress. England enjoyed several decades of unequalled walth and power, and a new wave of optimism began to sweep over the country.

 

• Queen Victoria

 

When King William IV died, he was succeeded by his niece Victoria, who was only 18. She became soon very popular because of her strong sense of duty and her simplicity.

The constitution under Queen Victoria did not differ from the one we know today.

Her inexperience facilitated the British two-party system. The reign was politically administered by a series of grat Prime Ministers: Peel and Disraeli among the Tories (Conservatives), Palmerston and Gladstone among the Whigs (Liberals).

In 1867 the Liberals proposed the Second Reform Bill, who passed under Conservative Government, which gave the right of vote to the town labourers, but left the agricultural labourers and miners still unfranchised.

Only in 1884, with the Third Reform Bill, the electorate was extended to all male workers.

Il 1892 the Indipendent Labour Party was founded and became in 1900 the Modern British Labour Party.

 

• Industrialisation

The process of industrialisation, started in the eighteen century, reached the height.

 

• Chartist Movement

The Chartist Movement started in 1837 and ended in 1848. It aim was to obtain full democratic participation of the working classes in politics. This group was composed by radicals and workers, who in 1839 presented to Parliament a document called "People's Charter"; in six points it asked for:

• universal suffrage
• vote by ballot
• annual Parliaments
• payment of members of Parliament
• abolition of the property qualification (that comported a partecipation in Parliament for the working class)
• equal electoral districts

But the Charter failed and his objectives were taken again by the Reform Bill (1867) and by the Trade Union Act (1875), which finally sanctioned the legality and importance of the Trade Union Movement.

 

• Corn Laws

The Corn-Laws were reason of discontent in workers and middle-classe people, because they fixed a too hight price for the foreign corn. Infact, these ones were imposed during Napoleonic Wars to protect British agriculture and never more repealed. In 1846 the Corn Laws are repealed and the consequences were:

• the Whigs replaced Tories to power; infact the repeal caused much discontent inside Conservative Party, because it represented a victory of the industrial interests agianst the agricultural ones of the landowners.
• reduction of the bread price;
• application of new techniques in agricolture;
• the discontent reduced and England wasn't upset by 1848 movements.

 

• Free trade

A policy of free trade was adopted by the Prime Minister Peel, and it was supported bt industrial middle class. Because of the limited foreign competition, there was no need to impose tariffs to protect English manufacturers. These uncontrolled commercial transactions between nations were important for the European economic grown.

 

• Ireland

In 1845 a famine killed thousands of people because of the failure of the potato crop. This caused also a massive emigration. Moreover Irish Roma Catholics demanded the same political and civil rights as Irish Protestants. 

 

• The Crimean War

From 1854 till 1856 England together with France was engaged in the Crimean War to check Russia's expansion. From Waterloo, for Britain this has been the only international conflict during the century; but this did not touche people at home very much.

 

• The British Empire

British colonisation of East and West Africa dates back to the 1880 and at the end of the century covered a quarter of the earth's landsurface and a third of its population.

• the Boer War:

The Boers were the descendants of Dutch farmers who has settled in South Africa. In 1899 their interests clashed with those of the British: the conflict ended two years later with victory for the British

 

In British Parliament there were two different conceptions about colonies' treatment:

• those who didn't want to give any freedom for the colonies;
• those who prefered to grant the colonies some degree of indipendence to preserve the Empire.

The second one prevailed and colonies began to converting them-selves into self-governing states.

England also tried to enlarge Indian territories, but this caused the Indian Mutiny (1856): the consequences were that India passed under British Government and East India Company was abolished. So, in 1877, Queen Victoria became Empress of India.

Social Context

• Oxford Movement

Great Britain underwent a gradual process of democratization, know as Oxford Movement, composed by a group of Catholics who asked some reforms in favour of the Church of Rome.

 

• Evangelicalism

It was a religious movement who contributed to the abolition of slavery and to the First Reform Bill. But they had also a puritanic view of life, so they advocated the abolition of some public entertrainments.

 

• Urbanisation

England passed from an agricultural country to an industrial one. This caused a migration of rural people to the industrial areas in search of jobs. So population in industrial cities as London doubled and more people lived in towns and cities than in the countyside.

People in cities lived in intolerable situation, in bad sanitary condition that contributed to the diffusion of typhus and cholera.

 

• the Utilitarianism and Liberalism

Whigs' government under Gladstone, was influenced by the politcal philosopher John Stuart Mill. He agreed to the basic principle of Utilitarianism (the pursuit of the gratest happiness for the greatest number of people), but he also accepted a balance between individual freedom and state intervention.

x

A series of Parlamentary Acts that contributed to a modernisation in services and institutions.

 

Liberalism was a politic philosophy that defended individual freedoom from any external intervention in industry or commerce, and the free trade.

 

• Exploitation of workers

Workers lived in extreme poverty and had to work sometimes up to 14 or 16 hours. Also women and children were employed in harmful and at hight risk occupations. There were two nations: one of the poors and the other one of the rich.

 

• Victorian society
• aristocracy (landowners);
• middle class
• working class

This period marked the triumph of the industrial middle classes, with their confidence in progress, their belief in the theory of laissez-faire in economics and utilitarianism in philosophy, their generic philanthropism and sentimentalism, their conventional religious faith and their morality observant of exterior forms and conventions characterised by a prudery that often bordered on the ridiculous.

This is what has been called Victorian compromise, that is the utilitarian compromise of a large section of English society that saw industrial development only as a source of prosperity and progress, while it tended to ignore the many social conflicts and problems raised by it.

But not all the Victorians accepted the current optimistic interpretation of the new industrial civilization; indeed, many of them attacked its contradictions. They realised that it left unsolved the problem of the distribution of wealth, a problem that increased social injustice.

 

• The values

Their values were respectability, good manners, hard work, probity, family, the unquestioned father's authority.  "Respectability" was the key word of Victorianism: manners and language became very sober, and word connected with sex was considered a taboo.

Queen Victoria proved a very prolific mother (nine children) and encouraged big families. In family the father was more authoritarian than before and the mother was submissive.

 

• Women's conditions

Middle-class women had to adhere to a strict code: they had to do only respectable jobs, as teaching, writing or doing social activities, learning to play the piano, to dress very formal clothes also in privicy.

 

• Victorian House

The house represented a status symbol for victorian society: outside it was generally imposing and pretentious, inside overcrowed with ornaments and decorations.

 

• Reforms

Several bills tried to improve lower classes' conditions:

• Factory Acts (they regulated child labour in factories);
• Ten Hours' Act (which limited the working hours to ten a day for both the sex);
• Mines Act (it regulated employement of children und ten and women);
• Public Health Act (wich improved health conditions);
• Education Act (it provited a system of state primary schools);
• Parlamentary Reform (about introduction of the secret ballot);
• Emancipation of all religious sects (by which Catholics were allowed to enter universities and work in government jobs);
• Adoption of the famous English week (by which Saturday afternoon was devoted to pleasure and entertainment an Sunday deprived of all sorts of amusement).

 

• Socialism

The revolutionary socialism in Europe didn't involve Britain, because of its politics based on a gradual reform movement. So British Socialism is represented by the Fabian Society (1884), an intellectual's group that based their activity on conferences and pamphleteering.

It was founded by Sidney and Beatrice Webb, and it was ispirated by Marx's doctrine and advocated gradual reforms.

 

• Philosophical currents
• Jeremy Bentham: He is the preacher of Utilitarianism. He stated that only what is useful is good, and all has to be directed to create the greatest good for the gratest number of person.
• Charles Darwin: In 1859 it was published his book On The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection. His theory of evolution says that man has a natural origin from apes and that world is regulated by the law of natural selection. So he denied that man is the result of God's creation.
• Karl Marx: He based his theories observating British economy. He advocated a new social organisation and an equal distribution of wealth.
• Arthur Schopenhauer: He was a pessimist who believed that God and soul's immortality are human illusions.
• Auguste Compte: He is the founder of Positivism.
• Hyppolite Taine: For him man is the product of three factors, "la race", "le milieu" and "le moment".

Cultural Context

 

• The genres

The novel is the most widespread genre in that period and also the most apprecieted by middle-class. Nolvels were often read aloud by a member of the family to all the household. Books' diffusion was favourited by :

• circulating libraries;
• better ways of communication, which made it easier to bring reading material;
• the invention of new printing machinery, which made this material cheaper;
• the fact that prose fiction became also a vehicle to ask and to support the ideas.

Victorian novelists are divided into "Early Victorians" and "Late Victorians".

 

Early Victorian Novel

There is a determinant factor which contributed to modify the structure of the novel: this is the publication in serial instalments. The consequences were:

• more reader among the lower classes, because books printed separately costed a lower price (one schilling);
• the plot was constructed according to a defined structure;
• episodes could be unlimited;
• this method originated a "mass literature".

Types of novels:

• sensation novel: The features were the recourse to the "sensational", mystery, compicated plot, drama. Some of sensation novels' writers are Dickens and Collins.
• imaginative romantic novels: as the novels of the Bronte Sisters.
• historical novels and romances;
• fantastic novels: the ones written by Lewis Caroll.

 

• The reading public

The Victorian age reader wanted to find realistic aspects and fiction at the same time, to allowed himself to escape from routine life. Stories shouldn't be complicated, it shouldn't have any reference to sex and it had to be in according to Christian morality.

 

• The Aesthetic Movement

Developed in 1880, it claimed that art should not have any moral, social or political purpose, because this is not necessary to true art and real beauty. This theory was adopted by artists and writers who believed that themselves and their works were non-conformist and dedicated to sexual pleasure

 

 

When Victoria died, her son Edward VII ascended the throne. He had a good relationship with neighbouring countries; only in German the king's efforts for peace were not successful, because German emperor wanted to extend German influence over all Europe.

 

Charles

Dickens

LIFE

 

Dickens was born on the South Coast of England in 1812. He was a son of a clerk in the Navy Pay Office.

• childhood: At the age of 12 an event marked him deeply: because of debts, his father was imprisoned in the Marshalsea (the debtors' prison), and Charles was obliged to leave school and to go working in a blacking factory. This experience contributed to identificate himself with poors and oppresseds.
• education: After four months he left the factory and retourned at school.
• employments:
• clerk in a lawyers'office;
• he learnt shorthand and became a parliamentary reporter;
• journalist.
• travels: He travelled in America, Switzerland, France and Italy, and he wrote accounts of his journeys.
• family: He married the daughter of a colleague, Mary Hogarth, but they separated after 22 years. When he was 46 he felt in love with an 18 years old actress, Ellen Ternan, and set-up an establishment for her. But this fact, for his Victorian mind, was often a source of doubt and depression.
• interests: Dickens was also an amateur actor and theatrical producer.
• social commitment: He commited himself to a variety of social causes, as the rehabilitation of prostitues or the improvement of London sewerage.

 

He died prematurely in June 1870, and was buried in Westminster Abbey.

 

 

WORKS

He wrote:

• 14 novels: He is the best representative of the Victorian Novel: infact his production is mainly made up of novels, all published in serial form.
• Oliver Twist: It is the story of an orphan boy. By this novel, Dickens makes a critic of the workhouse system and denounces the degradation of slum life.
• Nicolas Nickleby: It is an adventure novel which represents an attack on the mismanagement of private school.
• The Old Curiosity Shop: It is a pathetic story about the ill-treatment of children in the industrial age.
• Barnaby Rudge: It is a historical novel set in 18th century.
• Martin Chuzzlewit: It was written after Dickens's visit to the United States and it is a satire on American vulgarity.
• Dombey and Son: It talks about the decline and fall of a capitalist who loses his money but finds his heart.
• David Copperfield: It is an autobiographical novel, based on his painful experiences during the hard work in factory.
• Bleak House: This novel is against the law's delays. For this novel he drawed from his experience in the Law Courts.
• Hard Times: It is a denunciation of the wrongs of society and the terrible conditions of industrial workers.
• Little Dorrit: Is is mainly set in the Marshalsea prison and represents a denunciation of prisoners' sufferings, because they lived in horrible conditions.
• A Tale of Two Cities: It takes place in London and Paris during French Revolution.
• Great Expectations: It is considered his masterpiece; it talks about the dramatic experiences of a young boy during his life.
• Our Mutual Friends: It represents a protest against the poor laws.
• The Mystery of Edwin Drood: It's a crime story left unfinished because of his death.

 

• short stories:
• A Christmas Carol: It is a ghost story set in Christmas time.

 

• two periodicals:
• Household Words;
• All the Year Round.

 

 

FEATURES AND THEMES

 

• humour: Dickens had a natural sense of humour, remarkable in character drawing, in dialogue and in whole episode. His greatest comic novel is The Pickwick Papers: each episode is pure humour, he put characters in funny situations. His characters are endowed with common sense and with a certain philosophy of life.
• pathos: Often humour is mingled with pathos: this makes the reader smiling through the tears.
• characters: Dickens's characters are not heroes and heroines. He drew most of them from reality.
• portrayat of English life: In Dickens's works sets are always richly detailed, because of the personal observation of the author. He particulary observated the parts of Londons where the poors lived, and he described the British homelife, the school system, the domestic life, the middle-class people, with every detail of manners, appearance and dress.
• Christmas: In many of his novels we find the recreation of the merry atmosphere, with all the traditional feature (music, dancing, the holly, the turkey, the ghost stories).

 

 

VALUES

 

Dickens's novels are defined as social or humanitarian novels, because he used the fiction to denounce the injustices if Victorian society. But he didn't suggest any specific means of reform, because he never questioned the basic values of his time. For him the happiness consisted in hard work, romantic love and family life.

 

 

LIMITATION AND MERITS

 

Negative aspects:

• stories are often too full of unlikely events;
• main characters are often superficially portrayed;
• there is an excessive sentimentalism;
• comic scenes are often exaggerated, so as to became grotesque;
• too melodramatic tragic scenes.

 

Positive aspect:

• his powerful imagination has contributed to create a large number of situations;
• a large variety of characters, expecially the minor ones;
• the style is fluent and effective;
• his occasional use of symbolism is striking;
• he created vivid and memorable pictures.

 

 

REASONS FOR POPULARITY

 

Charles Dickens is the most representative writer of the Victorian Novel. His typical victorian profile and his genius as a story-teller, made him appreciated by millions of people all over the world.

 

 

 

The Bronte Sisters

LIFE

 

Charlotte, Emily and Anne Bronte were daughters of the Reverend Patrick Bronte, an Irishman who lived in Haworth, a village on the Yorkshire. He was a very intelligent man, but also an eccentric, and he used to spend much of his time studying. So his children were often left to themselves.

 

 

Emily Bronte

She spent all her life at Haworth and died of consumption in 1848.

Emily had a very closed character and didn't have many social contacts.

She wrote only one novel, which is her masterpiece: Wuthering Heights, published in 1847. It is more original than the ones written by her sisters, because there are not any autobiographical elements.

 

• critical essay

The work didn't obtain an immediat succes, because it was considerated too violent and immoral, with any moral purpose.

 

• the characters
• Heathcliff

He is the central hero. He seems to have a devil nature. He is a mysterious figure, a solitary and bad-tempered man.

 

• Catherine

Her personality is characterised by contrasting elements.

 

• the plot

The structure of the plot is very different from the standars of the 19th century's novels:

• the narration doesn't follow a chronological order, infact the book opens with the end of the story. Emily used very often memories and flashbacks.
• the plot involves two generations:
• the first is centred around Heathcliff and Catherine, which is the most romantic and imaginative part;
• the second one, centred around Cathy and Hareton, who live a more natural and mature love.
• use of two narrators: Nelly (who represents a world which has disappeared), and Mr Lockwood (a city man who represents the world which doesn't belong to the novel and the changes happened in the second generation).

 

• the language

It is very strong, sometime violent, and full of images that appeal to the reader's imagination.

 

• the theme

It is the power of human emotion and the destructive force of love and revenge. Love between the two heros is a creative and a destructive impulse at the same time.

 

• romantic aspects

They are the love theme, the nature, the dark and daemonic hero, defined as Byronic hero (Emily probably was ispired by her brother Branwell).

 

• realist aspects

They are in the description of the setting, in the conflict between two social classes, the complexity of the characters.

 

• gothicism

It is represented by dreams, belief in ghost, superstitions, supernatural presences.

 

Thomas

Hardy

LIFE

• FAMILY

He was born in 1940 in Dorset. He grew up as a solitary boy and inclined to meditation.

His father trasmitted the interest for architecture and the love for music, ballad and folk to his son; while his mother influenced his love for reading, for the classics and for literature in general.

 

• MARRIAGE
• Emma Gifford (1874): she had a very different character from him. She died 1912.
• Florence Dugdale (1912): she was a more congenial wife for him. She was a writer of children's books and became his biographer after his death.

Both marriage were childless.

 

• PERIODS

 

• first literary period (1871-1897):
• he wrote 15 novels;
• at first the predominant element was irony, then tragic element became more insistent.
• second period (1897-1909):
• he stopped writing novels;
• he wrote a verse drama on the Napoleonic Wars, "The Dynasts".
• third period (1909-1928 his death):
• he was devoted to poetry.

 

 

WORKS

Hard's literary production can be divited into 3 periods:

 

• Novels of Character and Environment;

They are also know as Wessex Novels.

In Britain Wessex was one of the 7 kingdoms, which covers the southwestern part of the country. Hardy exhumed the old name of his country, that became the imaginary setting of his works. Wessex represents an unifying element and a link between past and present.

The most famous novel is "Tess of the D'Urbervilles".

the plot

• Tess is a 16 years old girl, daughter of a poor Wessex peddlar; she finds out that she is the descendant of an ancient family, the D'Ubervilles. When their horse dies, she goes for help to Alec D'Uberville, who seduces her; Alec represents the rich whom the law will not punish for seducing a peasant girl. They have a child, who dies after few months.
• Some years later, while Tess was working in a farm, she falls in love with Angel Clare and thet married; Angel represents the well-meaning young man of progressive views, who is still attached to sexual prejudice and hypocrisy.
• When Tess confesses her past to Angel, he abandons her and goes to Brazil.
• As Alec returns, Tess becomes his mistress.
• Angel understands the depth of Tess' love, because he realises that true love is not related to social and moral code. So Angel returns and Tess murders Alec.
• Angel and Tess spend together only few happy days, than she is arrested. The arrest takes place at Stonehenge.

 

features

• Tess is presented as a pure woman, also if she has broke the moral conventions of the time.
• the conclusion is tragic and melodramatic, and semms to be anticipated by premonitory incidents.
• Stonehenge has a symbolic meaning: it was the place where sacrifices were made in prehistoric times. Tess, who slepps on a stone, is like a victim on the sacrificial stone, while the policemen are like the priests attached to the sacrifice. This means that human justice punishes her for a crime that she has done for a series of unfortunated circumstances.
• the author has a pessimistic outlook on life: he doesn't believe in a loving God, because men are subjected to endless sufferings.

 

• Romances and Fantasies;

 

• Novels of ingenuity.

 

 

FEATURES

• NATURE

Hardy is one of the gratest writers about rural life in English. The presence of nature is an essential part of the story: at first nature is friendly, than turns into a hostile power.

 

• LOVE

Love often ends in disillusion and is destroyed by marriage, or society, or by Fate.

 

• PESSIMISM

He thinks that universe is indifferent to man, who is tormented by a malicious force.

 

• FATALISM AND DETERMINISM

In his works man is often victim of an obscure fate, because of a predestination to failure and to unhappiness.

 

• CHARACTERS

Hardy is interested to suffering people.

 

• TECHNIQUE

As an architect he knows how to give unity to his novels, and he is "cinematic" because of his abilty in descriptions of objects and scenes.

 

 

 

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