A "delightful reader's companion" (The New York Times) to the great nineteenth-century British novels of Austen, Dickens, Trollope, the Brontës, and more, this lively guide clarifies the sometimes bizarre maze of rules and customs that governed life in Victorian England.
For anyone who has ever wondered whether a duke outranked an earl, when to yell "Tally Ho!" at a fox hunt, or how one landed in "debtor's prison," this book serves as an indispensable historical and literary resource. Author Daniel Pool provides countless intriguing details (did you know that the "plums" in Christmas plum pudding were actually raisins?) on the Church of England, sex, Parliament, dinner parties, country house visiting, and a host of other aspects of nineteenth-century English life-both "upstairs" and "downstairs.
An illuminating glossary gives at a glance the meaning and significance of terms ranging from "ague" to "wainscoting," the specifics of the currency system, and a lively host of other details and curiosities of the day.
Inhaltsverzeichnis
Contents
Introduction
Part One
The Basics
Currency
The Calendar
Hogsheads and Drams: English Measurement
England
London
The Public World
Precedence: Of Bishops, Barristers, and Baronets
The Titled
How to Address Your Betters
Esq., Gent., K.C.B., etc.
Status: Gentlemen and Lesser Folk
Society
Society and "The Season"
Basic Etiquette
How to Address the Nontitled
"May I Have This Dance?"
The Rules of Whist and Other Card Games
Calling Cards and Calls
The Major Rituals
Presentation at Court
The Dinner Party
The Ball
The Country House Visit
Money
Being Wealthy
Entail and Protecting the Estate
Bankruptcy, Debt, and Moneylending
Power and the Establishment
The Government
Britannia Rules the Waves
The Army
The Church of England
Oxford and Cambridge
Schools
"The Law Is a Ass"
Lawyers
Crime and Punishment
Transition
The Horse
Please, James, the Coach
The Railroad
The Mail
The Country
Life on the Farm
The Midlands, Wessex, and Yorkshire
Who's Who in the Country
Shire and Shire Alike: Local Government in Britain
"The Theory and System of Fox Hunting"
Vermin, Poachers, and Keepers
Fairs and Markets
The Private World
"Reader, I Married Him"
Sex
An Englishman's Home
Houses with Names
Furniture
Lighting
How the English Kept Clean
"Please, Sir, I Want Some More."
Pudding!
Tea
Drink and the Evils Thereof
Women's Clothing
Men's Clothing
Servants
The Governess
A Taxonomy of Maids
Victorian Recycling
The Grim World
The Orphan
Occupations
Apprentices
The Workhouse
Disease
Doctors
Death and Other Grave Matters
Part Two
Glossary
Bibliography
Index
