rec requests: Regency and Victorian novels, and novels set during the English Regency/Victorian

[coraa]

Since I've gotten wonderful responses when I asked about cookbooks and steampunk novels (and many thanks to everyone who suggested things -- I've enjoyed many of the books!), I'll try again. I've a hankering for things set in the English Regency and early- to mid-Victorian period (the absolute hard cutoff is that it needs to be pre-WWI). The caveat is: I'm looking for things that focus on social life, society, and -- where possible -- the life of women. IE, I'm looking for Emma, not Kidnapped!; Middlemarch, not King Solomon's Mines. ;) (I say this because the vast scope of Victorian Novels! will swamp me, but focusing on society makes it at least a little bit easier a mouthful to bite off.... Also, because that's frankly what interests me. Society! Relationships! Women!)

I'd be happy to read things actually written during these periods (as long as they're about contemporary society; not so much Ivanhoe), as well as Regency/Victorian historical fiction. Also, Regency romance and category mysteries, as long as they're good! And if you know of good Regency/Victorian fantasy that focuses on social life, please! Suggest!

What I've read (and some examples of what I'm looking for): You don't need to mention Jane Austen; that's covered. ;) I've also read Sorcery and Cecelia and The Grand Tour, by Wrede and Stevermer (the first one many times, even), though I haven't got round to reading the third book in the series. (In fact, S&C is why I got interested in this in the first place, probably.) Also, To Say Nothing of the Dog by Connie Willis; Silas Marner, by George Eliot; The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton; Lady Windemere's Fan, The Importance of Being Earnest, and The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde; Tooth and Claw by Jo Walton; and, um, this is embarrassing, but the Samantha books by the American Girl Company, which realistically is probably the actual reason for my interest in the period.

What I am already planning to read: Madeleine Robins' Point of Honor; George Eliot's Middlemarch; William Thackeray's Vanity Fair. Also, I am aware of Georgette Heyer, Anthony Trollope, and Charles Dickens, though I'd love suggestions on which books to start with. (I have read David Copperfield.) More Wilde. Ruby in the Smoke, by Philip Pullman. The Temeraire books, though I suspect they're more adventure/military than society-and-culture, and society-culture is what I want. Three Men in a Boat, by Jerome K. Jerome. Tess of the d'Urbervilles, by Thomas Hardy. (This planning-to-read is heavy on stuf written during the period in question, but I am looking also for modern fiction written about the period; I just don't know as much of it to put on the list.)

Also, if you know of any good nonfiction (I've enjoyed What Jane Austen Ate and Charles Dickens Knew, and I wish I could find another copy of Austen's household book) that focuses on society/culture, I'd love to hear that too. And please feel free to point other people to this for more suggestions....

Thank you, everyone!

Comments

[fairmer.livejournal.com]

There's a book called Lady Elizabeth's Comet that purports to be a Regency romance, but it's so damn funny and atypical for the genre that I think it's just something else. (It's about a female astronomer who discovers a comet, and the love story is a friendship story, really.)

The Brontes focused on women's lives, of course! Anne Bronte's Tenant of Wildfell Hall has a section in it that reminds me incredibly much of Austen, and I am so sad that Anne didn't live longer and write loads more. (The rest of the book is typical Bronte bluster and drama.)

Non-fiction: The Gentleman's Daughter: Women's Lives in Georgian England by Amanda Vickery...

Oh, and if you have a chance, watch Regency House Party. It's fantastic! There's a book that goes with it, and you just learn so much about the time period.

Oh, and in the "unsung Regency romance" category is any of the early series by Marion Chesney. They're very popular in public libraries, and they usually have some fantastic nuggets of historical information amidst their tremendously light/silly plots.

Uhm... I have so many more thoughts, but I have to pause for now...

[thegreatgonz.livejournal.com]

You might (or might not) prefer earlier Hardy (e.g. Far from the Madding Crowd). Late Hardy is ... bleak.

How about some of the Bronte sisters?

Temeraire is actually fairly heavy on society/character stuff, though I found it to be not entirely successful in that regard; it felt almost like Austen fanfic to me.

[fairnymph.livejournal.com]

Age of Innocence - Wharton
Summer - Wharton
but avoid Ethan Fromme - suckage!

The Turn of the Screw - Henry James
The Portrait of a Lady - James
I've heard good things about Wings of the Dove, but not read it. I hated The Golden Bowl.

I love all Dickens, favourites would be Oliver Twist or Hard Times.

The Season of Loving by Helen Archery is my favourite period romance EVER. I devour it every time.

[zalena.livejournal.com]

Letters to Alice Upon First Reading Jane Austen by Fay Weldon

Possession by A.S. Byatt

[morganlf.livejournal.com]

Victorian books are some of my favorites to read for fun!!

From the Period:

Great Expectations by Dickens

Age of Innocence by Wharton

Mary Barton and North and South Elizabeth Gaskell

Daisy Miller, Turn of the Screw and Portrait of a Lady by James

Victorian books are some of my favorites to read for fun!!

From the Period:

Great Expectations by Dickens

Age of Innocence by Wharton

Mary Barton and North and South Elizabeth Gaskell

Daisy Miller, Portrait of a Lady and The Turn of the Screw Hardy

Lady Chatterley's Lover by Lawrence

Sybil by Disraeli

About the period:

Arcadia by Tom Stoppard

The Fig Eater Jodi Shields (I read this book last year and LOVED it.)

I second Byatt's Possession. You may also want to try The Virgin in the Garden.

If you want something more pulpy, try:

The Secret History of the Pink Carnation by Lauren Willeg

Also, if you want to delve into some German in translation, E.T.A. Hoffmann, Schiller, and Kleist!!!

[ceph.livejournal.com]

Not that I have any actual content to add, but I had a Samantha doll when I was a sprog. I must say, in hindsight, the whole historical/educational aspect was a brilliant marketing scheme.

[coraa.livejournal.com]

The Brontes! I knew I was missing someone big.

Thank you -- the recs look wonderful. (And Regency House Party does look great! Adding it to my wishlist, for certain.)

[coraa.livejournal.com]

Oh, good to know. Perhaps I'll try Far from the Madding Crowd first -- bleak isn't my favorite thing ever.

(Hm. Austen fanfic. Well, I'm not necessarily unamenable to fanfic, so that may work out as a backhanded recommendation....)

[coraa.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

I had forgotten Turn of the Screw; I actually did read that one in college (and quite liked it).

[coraa.livejournal.com]

Oooh. Thank you. Particularly for reminding me of Posession -- I know I've thought I ought to read it a couple of times, but never quite have.

[coraa.livejournal.com]

*squee*

Thank you! This is a great list.

[coraa.livejournal.com]

Hah, yes, wasn't it? Samantha was probably my first fairly-expensive gift (my big-ticket Christmas present the year I was six or so). And probably partly because my parents were sold on the idea of a semi-hemi-demi-educational present (as well as a doll that could, at least, theoretically be the kind of thing that might last for my own daughters).

I loved Sam to pieces.

[zalena.livejournal.com]

Possession is late Victoriana; more Pre-Raph than Regency. But it definitely sweeps over one. I haven't read it since my freshman year of college and am thinking I'm about due, again.

Also, the new translation of Anna Karenina (Volokhonsky and Pevear) is really great. If you haven't read Tolstoy it has a fantastically engaging quality.

Oh yes, and while I'm thinking about it: The French Lieutenant's Woman by John Fowles might appeal to you.

[thegreatgonz.livejournal.com]

You should talk to 2gouda4u about Hardy sometime. She has a whole rant about him.

Note that I didn't say good Austen fanfic. It seemed almost Mary-Sue-ish to me, in that it centers on a small society within Regency England that just happens to have completely modern attitudes to things like social class, sex, and the role of women, while still allowing for balls, country houses, and other superficial trappings of Regency romance. Nonetheless, I don't want to dissuade you. It's not a bad book, it just wasn't as authentic as I'd been led to believe from the things I'd heard about it.

[coraa.livejournal.com]

Ah, that does change things somewhat. I'm frequently frustrated by the number of fantasy and historical novels in which the main characters rebel against their culture's societal mores in a way that is suspiciously convenient in its similarity to an average modern reader's mores. Often I can overlook it as a minor flaw, in an oh-well-fluffy-novel-what-can-you-do kind of way, but in the worst cases it actively annoys me, both for its dismissal of the reality of historical social pressures and for the way the technique tries to get the advantages of both a cool! rebel! hero and of not challenging the modern reader's perceptions too much.

(Especially -- though from what I've heard this isn't as much a problem with the Temeraire books -- when there's a smarmy undertone of 'my, weren't those historical folk stupid! clearly my protagonist cannot be stupid like them.')

I'll probably still read it, but thanks for the heads-up.

[coraa.livejournal.com]

I read Anna Karenina in high school, and loved it. (I'm probably about due for a reread, in fact; thank you for the heads-up on the new translation.)

Victoria novels

[tirzah-serach.livejournal.com]

I'm a big fan of Anthony Trollope, and I rejoice in the knowledge that he wrote 47 novels in addition to his nonfiction works. I was introduced to his work by the Masterpiece Theatre adaptation of the first two Barchester novels. I recommend the production highly. Donald Pleasance is a perfect Warden Harding, and Susan Hampshire steals every scene she is in as Mme. Vesey-Neroni. If you want a single novel to start with, I recommend The Way We Live Now. I think it is the best of his work.

All of Trollope's books revolve around society/culture/money, and he is wonderfully sympathetic to the plight of an intelligent woman who is expected to do nothing more than marry well and produce children. He punishes characters who coldbloodedly marry for money. Plot is not his strong suit, and there is hardly any suspense at all. Sometimes he will write his own spoilers up front, telling the reader how the story turns out. The point is not what happens, but why, and how the characters come to act the way they do.

He is my favorite author, and my dream is to own the complete set of his works someday.