Three best Victorian-era novels every student must read

Victoria era was the golden time of British history during which many arts flourished under the patrons of knowledge and connoisseurs of fine arts. Over this period, the British were at the same time expanding their political boundaries along with increasing their cultural influence on the world. The English elite class had developed a particular taste for romanticism of everything antique or with some historical importance attached to it. They found ways of capturing the old time by bringing idealistic styles in architecture, building great libraries and museums, securing their footprints on the path of history till the eternity.

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This was the era when novel writing saw its zenith and great writers such as Charles Dickens, Sir Walter Scott, Jane Austen and countless others came to the forefront and produced legendary pieces of art, etching the British history on the slate of times forever. Their legacy was continued into the modern times by the academic writers who are not only adding more colours to the literary horizon of English language but are also providing Essay Help UK to many others in need.

Below is a list of three good reads, every student enrolled in a UK college should buy at their first opportunity, and devour on the next.

1. Great Expectations

This novel, penned by the great essayists of his time; Charles Dickens, revolves around the life of a poor and orphan boy who went on to establish himself as a gentleman with better means of living. This story depicts a great contrast between the wealthy and the poor, friendship and enmity, vanity and simplicity, truthfulness and hypocrisy; prevalent in the lower strata of British society.

The main character observes and narrates how he fared on the journey of life, and despite finding fortune and opportunity for realising his ‘great expectations’, he was still a loner and an empty-handed fellow at the end. This novel gives a student an insight into the conformist ways of the British society which are still in vogue and has both positive and negative implications for a student.

2. Oliver Twist

This masterpiece novel authored by Dickens is in every aspect a true picture of the life of a commoner in the nineteenth century Britain. The story is of a weak orphan boy who opened eyes in the poverty-stricken rural England which was badly exploited by the religious clergy. Dickens made issues such as child labour, youth crime, child trafficking and other social problems as his target, and painted a wonderful picture of a person who survived through great hardships, achieving his reward of greatness in the end. This novel adopts the typical Dickens style of showing the struggle between the good and evil and the ultimate victory of virtue over vice.

3. Pride and Prejudice

If you want to learn the delicate ways of British culture and how they took form, then this novel is a must-read for you. This novel was written by Jane Austen who belonged to the same school of romanticism and sentimentalism that many great writers of her age did. If you want to get an inside knowledge of the feminine mindset and preferences in the matters of love and marriage, then you should definitely get your hands on this one!

Agreed that unless you are a literature student, you might hardly have the time of reading out of the curriculum, but these books tell you the working knowledge of how to move in the British society, and the inspiration gathered always comes in handy in many walks of life.