Петровська Ольга

Чернівецький національний університет імені Ю. Федьковича

Victorian society in the novel “French Lieutenant’s Woman” by John Robert Fowles

In this article we are going to make a survey of the influence of
dogmas and traditions of Victorian Age upon the life of people, their
actions and way of thinking. The novel “French Lieutenant’s Woman” may
give us a vivid picture of destructive power of the prejudices which
existed in the 19th century. The author in his novel compares two
different life-styles: the one which is contemporary for him and the one
typically Victorian. In this article we are going to concentrate
on the latter.

At that time title was as much respected as money, and many marriages
were arranged because of mutual benefit: one family had money, while the
other – title. Love wasn’t taken into consideration, except in case
that it was supported by one of those benefits. In 1867, the year during
which the events of the novel take place, Ch.Darwin’s “The Origin of
Species” (1859) was the talk of the town. Many people couldn’t agree with
the idea that “we are all descended from monkeys”, however many
supporters of this existed even at that time. Charles was one of them.
He even had an argue with Ernestine’s father (anti-booster of Darwin’s
ideas) concerning this matter. Here the essence of authentic Victorian
middle-class trader reveals: “He did say that he would not let his
daughter marry a man who considered his grandfather to be an ape. But I
think on reflection he will recall that in my case it was a titled ape.”

As we may guess from the novel, in the 19th century, like nowadays,
almost every representative of lower class wanted to become a
representative of the upper class. In the 7th chapter Fowles satirically
describes Sam – the new breed of Cockney servant: “His generation of
Cockneys were a cut above all that; and if he haunted the stables it was
principally to show that cut-above to the provincial ostlers and
potboys.” Funny, such people pretended to be respectful but there was
nothing in it but mere show-off.

Everyone wanted to look like a baron, count etc. But the most
interesting thing was that the majority did not understand that that
omni-honourable class was rotten. Just look at the author’s description
of Charles when he refuses Mr. Freeman’s offer to co-work: “to be sure
there was something base in his rejection—a mere snobbism, a letting
himself be judged and swayed by an audience of ancestors. There was
something lazy in it; a fear of work…there was something cowardly in it…
Charles was frightened by other human beings and especially by those
below his own class… But there was one noble element in his rejection: a
sense that the pursuit of money was an insufficient purpose in life. He
would never be a Darwin or a Dickens… he would at worst be a dilettante,
a drone, a what-you-will that lets others work and contributes nothing.
But he gained a queer sort of momentary self-respect in his
nothingness…to have nothing but prickles—was the last saving grace of a
gentleman; his last freedom, almost.” This shows us that to be a gentleman actually means to be a slacker. Later we can see Charles’s reflections concerning this: “He guessed now what Mr. Freeman really thought of him: he was an idler. And what he proposed for him: that he should earn his wife’s dowry.”  It doesn’t even occur to Charles that he has to work. He is a gentleman and the occupation of gentleman is entertainment, entertainment only.  Note how creatively Fowles uses the quotation by
Leslie Stephen, Sketches from Cambridge (1865): “But if you wish at once
to do nothing and be respectable nowadays, the best pretext is to be at
work on some profound study…” Charles is so used to doing nothing that
he cannot do anything.

One more of the illnesses of this Age was the pseudo-respectability.
Let’s make a short visit to Mrs. Poultney’s house. What do we see?
Marlborough House is dismal, repressed and full of hypocrisy. Cruelty
masked with propriety. Mrs. Poultney is a caricature of Victorian
respectability. Her Christianity is surface, she fears Hell, but note
how patronising she is to the vicar, who is her social inferior. Mr.
Forsythe suggests she employs Sarah Woodruff as a companion, out of
malice or real compassion for Sarah? At last Mrs. Poultney decides that
Sarah’s employing will pay her in double: she will surpass Lady Cotton
in her charity i.e. will be honoured by society and she will not be sent
to hell. The latter was the matter of great importance for her: “As she
lay in her bedroom she reflected on the terrible mathematical doubt that
increasingly haunted her; whether the Lord calculated charity by what
one had given or by what one could have afforded to give…She had given considerable sums to the church; but she knew they fell far short of the prescribed one-tenth to be parted with by serious candidates for paradise.” Doesn’t it show that
the most common feature of Victorian Age was affectation?

The repression of Victorian society, especially with regard to sexual
matters was ferocious. The issue of sex was not mentioned among the
representatives of upper classes. Sexuality was forbidden. Just pay your
attention to the twinges of remorse that Ernestina feels when she
thinks about this taboo and compare this young lady with Mary, the
servant of Aunt Tranter. The latter is seductive and overtly sexual, and
allowed to be so because of her station. She may do all the things
Ernestina and Sarah may not because of her social station as one of the
lower classes. The explanation of Ernestina's pursuit of Charles illustrates the rigid social conventions of mid-Victorian life. Respectable women could not show a preference except by hints; the game of courtship was very strict for the middle and upper classes. When Charles gives her the sprig of jasmine in the conservatory it becomes a symbol of the ephemeral nature of their relationship, as do the tears
she sheds after his declaration of intent to marry her. The natural sex
instincts were sublimated by the upper class. However, the author
states: “While conceding a partial truth to the theory of sublimation, I
sometimes wonder if this does not lead us into the error of supposing
the Victorians were not in fact highly sexed. But they were quite as
highly sexed as our own century—and, in spite of the fact that we have
sex thrown at us night and day (as the Victorians had religion), far
more preoccupied with it than we really are.”

Sarah (“French Lieutenant’s Woman”,  “French Loot’n’nt’s Hoer”) was the typical victim of Victorian prejudice. We cannot deny the fact that to some extent she wanted it, however, the fact remains. In 18th chapter Sarah asks for an assignation, for her confession of the events with Varguennes. At that time such a request was sinful in itself. It must be remembered that even communication of the most trivial kind would be enough to compromise Charles. Her reputation is so bad that he will be tainted by it even if he only speaks to her. Victorian society was cruel to fallen women. However, it was also only double-dealing. Fowles provides us with conclusive proof of this: “What are we faced with in the nineteenth century? An age where woman was sacred; and where you could buy a thirteen-year-old girl for a few
pounds—a few shillings, if you wanted her for only an hour or two. Where
more churches were built than in the whole previous history of the
country; and where one in sixty houses in London was a brothel (the
modern ratio would be nearer one in six thousand)…”

To conclude, the influence of Victorian society on a separate individual
was great. The traditions of Victorian Age presupposed that reputation
was above all the other virtues; money and title, but not personal
qualities, were the equivalents of respectability. That’s why people,
who wanted to be successful, lived according to all the decencies (i.e.
in hypocrisy); others – just eked out a living.

References:

1. Fowles Robert John, French Lieutenant’s Woman. Available on: fictionbook.ru