I am OBSESSED with your channel atm, a booktuber talking eloquently about Victorian authors and Jane Austen non-stop is basically all I have been needing in life. Eliot is my favourite Victorian writer, I still have two of her novels (Romola and Felix Holt) yet to read only because I don't want to run out.
+JescGirl Ha thank you so much :D Now I have mixed feelings on Eliot so perhaps you can help me - I've read Middlemarch and Silas Marner but I didn't love either of them as much as I thought I would. Where should I go now?
I just love this series and all the wonderful things you have to say. You know so much about classic literature, it amazes me! I can't wait to watch your next video :)
+Elizabeth Anne Books Aw thank you :) Even though I can assure you I had to do some googling and research to top up my knowledge before filming this video :P
I have Lorna Doone on my shelf. I don't know what it is about this book but ever since childhood I have been fascinated by it! Again I don't know why I have no idea what the story is about I just have an attraction to the book! I have the same fascination with Tess of the d'urbevilles too, although I do know that story and love it. Wind in the willows was one in childhood where I had to have multiple copies of! I adored toad and the adventures he got into! Great video by the way! I can't wait until next week!!!
+Sarah Hall Thank you :) Lorna Doone is such a great book, I really do want to reread it :) Wind in the Willows too, it's been years and years since I read that one...
So I think I am a bit addicted to buddy reading at the moment but if you do end up reading Daniel Deronda soon I actually only got 60 pages into it back in January and would love to read it with you (if you don't end up wanting to read it soon that is cool too). I also need an excuse to finally read Lady Audley's Secret if you have any interest in buddy reading that (anytime, doesn't need to be soon). Kaley from Books for MKs raves about No Name by Wilkie Collins if you are trying to figure out what book of his to read next. I wanna re-read AIW and TTLG before the new movie comes out :) Please say Gaskell will be in your Part 2? excellent video! I love when you make super long videos about Victorian literature :D
just did some research and apparently the Alice sequel is veering quite far off from the original TTLG plot but it is still a great excuse for a reread :)
+BBCgirl520 But of course - I wouldn't dare to do a Victorian author video without talking about Gaskell! We should definitely do a buddy read of Lady Audley's Secret and Daniel Deronda at some point - maybe in the summer? I feel like I'd like to dedicate August or September to just Victorian novels. And No Name is definitely on my life for Wilkie Collins :)
Katy, what do you think about the BBC recent serialisation of Great Expectations which seems to have its own plot details different from the original. There seems to be a slight trend to what I might call Dickens reimagined, like the Muooets Christmas Carol or one on TV in a recent Christmas where Dickens characters like Sarah Gamp, Scrooge, Fagin, and Bill Sykes all congregate at a pu b called The Three Cripples and develop twists and turns of Dickens type plots. A sppof Wild Saragosse Sea.
I studied several of these authors in small snippets for my classes a decade ago and I'm now wishing you had been the teacher because, honestly, many of them were so difficult to keep straight and get through...I feared for my grade (I actually made almost an A in that class...but it was difficult and involved more note cards than my first novel...)
+Elizabeth Tyree Aw thank you :) There certainly are a lot of authors to get your head round in the Victorian period, some with more engaging narrative styles than others!
Another enjoyable video, thanks. Dickens only wrote 14 novels, lazy bugger!!! You have certainly encouraged me to read more Dickens - I have 9 novels to go - so I might aim for 2 a year. Due to your inspiration I am reading Anne Bronte's The Tenant of Wildfell Hall and enjoying it. Must say I cannot recall a Victorian novelist I haven't liked. Gissing's New Grub Street is a very good read.
such an interesting video again Katie. thankyou. I've read all the Bronte girls novels, but apart from Jane Eyre ( which I have read fairly recently) and wuthering heights which I studied for my ba, I can't remember a thing about them. I think I read them as a late teen while I studied my a-levels and that was 20 yrs ago. I have them all on my shelf so I think I need to add them to my huge tbr list.
You might like to read King Leopold's Ghost, non-fiction about Belgium's colonization of the Congo. I read that and haven't read Heart of Darkness, but Heart of Darkness is discussed in it.
I should warn you that the book describes serious brutality and is hard to read. I had to read it in small bits, with some days in between, but it was worth it.
I am reading Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Bronte. It is quite interesting. I also hope to read Shirley by Charlotte Bronte this year because it's the last of the industrial novels I intend to read (but maybe Sybil belongs on the list too). I recently finished Daniel Deronda. It's a book with two very different strands. I was very intrigued by some articles I read afterwards that explained why the heroine was like she was.
+Kevin Varney I'm currently reading Shirley and strongly recommend it - Sybil's an interesting industrial novel too, but I think Shirley or Gaskell's works are probably stronger. I am certainly curious to read Daniel Deronda.
Kate which one would you recommend more of Collins novels the woman in white or the moonstone ? I am currently reading the woman in white, and I am curious to know which one of the two you like more.
Hi Ziad - I really like both and think both of them are great starting places. I probably prefer the Woman in White overall, but I started with the Moonstone - there's not much in it :)
It amazes me how all the Bronte sisters were writers. It feels as if it ran in their family. I've gotten some of their novels and hope to get more soon.
Books and Things None as of yet, but Wuthering Heights is on my TBR list (after I finish the novel I'm reading, of course). I'm going to get Jane Eyre soon enough as well. I am considering getting Agnes Grey, though. I've heard many good things about it.
Books and Things It piques my interest (as the Brontes are wont to do). I hope to read it as soon as possible. My TBR list is rather extensive, though, so I'll have to hold back on obtaining a copy lol.
Where's Arnold Bennett?!!!!?? (Joking xD) Edward Bulwer-Lytton & Samuel Butler were wholly unknown to me if I may say so; thank you for the discovery. I might venture to say that I think the Bronte pseudonyms were more masculine oriented than neutral, since well, you know women authors were quite discriminated by some. I can feebly recollect reading Currer and Acton as male names at least once. I've read somewhere too, although I wouldn't swear on it, that Wilkie Collins was friends with Dickens in order for the latter's popularity to rub a bit on the former, but who knows. That's some serious Victorian gossip for you Katie right here! Cramming the Victorian novelists in two videos is rather a bold move from you, and you have only reached 'E'! Gosh, there are so many Victorians out of prints these days. I may recommend Elliot's 'The Mill on the Floss' if you want more of her. You're right though, she is hit-and-miss at times. Can't wait for next week and wish you well!! (Sorry for late comment)
+IAmBroke Thank you! And Arnold Bennet is not on here because the vast majority of his writing was Edwardian, I think just one book of his published in Victorian times (nothing at to do with the fact I hadn't heard of him at all :P ) The Miss on the Floss is on my list. I've seen a film of it, which I didn't overly enjoy plot-wise, but I am curious to read the book.
+Books and Things Off Topic: You finally made me pick up HP! BookTube as a whole worships those books like a Bible so I thought if Katie liked it why the hell not? Yes, her prose & plot are clumsy and rather weak (OMFG, people compliment her as the 21st century Dickens; er - no, Dickens she ain't - see what I did there!!). Reading it as an adult and in the original (I still have the feeling that some phrases were omitted or completely changed in the translation I've read it years ago) I can almost see why people really like it. The fast pacing is addictive and the simple narrative aids the story in a tight way. It's definitely not the cradle of literature, but it isn't a bad read either (if you don't nick-pick it to death) that the haters make it seem. I shall see if I might move on to the next volumes. And the stereotypes, cliches and awful similes are pouring everywhere like rain, said I darkly, as I stood still as a statue (what does 'darkly' even mean??) By-the-by I found NN in a library charity sale and bought it right away! (Along with Virgil's Aeneid) There was even a 1874 cheap edition of OT that I was so tempted to purchase. And OMF was missing from the shelf! I suspect you and the reading group you've created Katie!!! I don't know what's up with me today; I just felt sharing my day's experiences.
+Books and Things You are right about him; I assumed because he was born during the V. Era, his work was included in it. Messed up the chronology. Should've done me homework first xD.
Hi, I'm pretty new to your channel and I'm working my way through your videos and have to say that I'm enjoying them very much. I thought that Charlotte Bronte died from the effects of hyperemesis gravidarum, I don't think she lived far enough into her pregnancy to die in childbirth? It's frightening to think that pregnant women at this time died from a condition that although still serious to pregnant ladies today, can now be treated. We don't realise how lucky we are. I love a lot of things from the Victorian period, but health care isn't one of them! Keep up the good work! xx
Lovely job as always! Lorna Doone is definitely my top priority. I've started and not finished The Woman in White and the Moonstone and I don't know why!
I hope you like Lady Audley's Secret when you get to it 😊 I read it as one of my two Victorian lit courses at uni and really enjoyed it! Loving this series 🙂
They are The Collector's Library editions. This was previously an independent publisher - they've since been acquired by Pan Macmillan and have changed design.
The How to Speak Victorian is a very informative series of videos, Katie. I hope you enjoy Middlemarch more the next time you read it. I think you appreciate a well written love story, and there are two in Middlemarch. There are three marriages that are less than ideal. I like the 1994 BBC production of Middlemarch. Watching professional actors bring to life the characters and dialogue Eliot created helped me appreciate the complexity and the beauty of the story. As a Dickens fan, you may have already read that he had determined by reading an early story she wrote, that the writer George Eliot was actually a woman. www.brainpickings.org/2013/11/22/charles-dickens-fan-mail-george-eliot/
I love how passionate you are! Glad I found your channel
Thanks :)
I am OBSESSED with your channel atm, a booktuber talking eloquently about Victorian authors and Jane Austen non-stop is basically all I have been needing in life.
Eliot is my favourite Victorian writer, I still have two of her novels (Romola and Felix Holt) yet to read only because I don't want to run out.
+JescGirl Ha thank you so much :D Now I have mixed feelings on Eliot so perhaps you can help me - I've read Middlemarch and Silas Marner but I didn't love either of them as much as I thought I would. Where should I go now?
+Books and Things your plan of trying Daniel Deronda sounds good imo, it is hard to for me to say who just think Middlemarch is everything.
I just love this series and all the wonderful things you have to say. You know so much about classic literature, it amazes me! I can't wait to watch your next video :)
+Elizabeth Anne Books Aw thank you :) Even though I can assure you I had to do some googling and research to top up my knowledge before filming this video :P
I have Lorna Doone on my shelf. I don't know what it is about this book but ever since childhood I have been fascinated by it! Again I don't know why I have no idea what the story is about I just have an attraction to the book! I have the same fascination with Tess of the d'urbevilles too, although I do know that story and love it. Wind in the willows was one in childhood where I had to have multiple copies of! I adored toad and the adventures he got into! Great video by the way! I can't wait until next week!!!
+Sarah Hall Thank you :) Lorna Doone is such a great book, I really do want to reread it :) Wind in the Willows too, it's been years and years since I read that one...
Loving this series- great to hear about some lesser-known Victorian authors :)
+A Hermit's Progress Thanks Victoria :)
So I think I am a bit addicted to buddy reading at the moment but if you do end up reading Daniel Deronda soon I actually only got 60 pages into it back in January and would love to read it with you (if you don't end up wanting to read it soon that is cool too). I also need an excuse to finally read Lady Audley's Secret if you have any interest in buddy reading that (anytime, doesn't need to be soon). Kaley from Books for MKs raves about No Name by Wilkie Collins if you are trying to figure out what book of his to read next. I wanna re-read AIW and TTLG before the new movie comes out :) Please say Gaskell will be in your Part 2? excellent video! I love when you make super long videos about Victorian literature :D
just did some research and apparently the Alice sequel is veering quite far off from the original TTLG plot but it is still a great excuse for a reread :)
+BBCgirl520 But of course - I wouldn't dare to do a Victorian author video without talking about Gaskell! We should definitely do a buddy read of Lady Audley's Secret and Daniel Deronda at some point - maybe in the summer? I feel like I'd like to dedicate August or September to just Victorian novels.
And No Name is definitely on my life for Wilkie Collins :)
+Books and Things that all sounds great to me :)
Katy, what do you think about the BBC recent serialisation of Great Expectations which seems to have its own plot details different from the original. There seems to be a slight trend to what I might call Dickens reimagined, like the Muooets Christmas Carol or one on TV in a recent Christmas where Dickens characters like Sarah Gamp, Scrooge, Fagin, and Bill Sykes all congregate at a pu b called The Three Cripples and develop twists and turns of Dickens type plots. A sppof Wild Saragosse Sea.
I studied several of these authors in small snippets for my classes a decade ago and I'm now wishing you had been the teacher because, honestly, many of them were so difficult to keep straight and get through...I feared for my grade (I actually made almost an A in that class...but it was difficult and involved more note cards than my first novel...)
+Elizabeth Tyree Aw thank you :) There certainly are a lot of authors to get your head round in the Victorian period, some with more engaging narrative styles than others!
Another enjoyable video, thanks. Dickens only wrote 14 novels, lazy bugger!!! You have certainly encouraged me to read more Dickens - I have 9 novels to go - so I might aim for 2 a year. Due to your inspiration I am reading Anne Bronte's The Tenant of Wildfell Hall and enjoying it. Must say I cannot recall a Victorian novelist I haven't liked. Gissing's New Grub Street is a very good read.
such an interesting video again Katie. thankyou. I've read all the Bronte girls novels, but apart from Jane Eyre ( which I have read fairly recently) and wuthering heights which I studied for my ba, I can't remember a thing about them. I think I read them as a late teen while I studied my a-levels and that was 20 yrs ago. I have them all on my shelf so I think I need to add them to my huge tbr list.
+Emily Curnow Thank you! I strongly recommend rereading the Bronte novels, especially Villette and the Tenant of Wildfell hall - they're brilliant!
I liked how when you were talking about Eliot you couldn't help talking about Dickens :P You just can't help yourself! And rightly so :)
+Amanda Center (IntrovertX) Dickens always crops up in everything :P
omg, you are, as always, overwhelming. I envy that energy and mass of knowledge of yours.
+William Baker Ha thank you :D
You might like to read King Leopold's Ghost, non-fiction about Belgium's colonization of the Congo. I read that and haven't read Heart of Darkness, but Heart of Darkness is discussed in it.
I'll have to look it up :)
I should warn you that the book describes serious brutality and is hard to read. I had to read it in small bits, with some days in between, but it was worth it.
I am reading Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Bronte. It is quite interesting. I also hope to read Shirley by Charlotte Bronte this year because it's the last of the industrial novels I intend to read (but maybe Sybil belongs on the list too). I recently finished Daniel Deronda. It's a book with two very different strands. I was very intrigued by some articles I read afterwards that explained why the heroine was like she was.
+Kevin Varney I'm currently reading Shirley and strongly recommend it - Sybil's an interesting industrial novel too, but I think Shirley or Gaskell's works are probably stronger. I am certainly curious to read Daniel Deronda.
Kate which one would you recommend more of Collins novels the woman in white or the moonstone ? I am currently reading the woman in white, and I am curious to know which one of the two you like more.
Hi Ziad - I really like both and think both of them are great starting places. I probably prefer the Woman in White overall, but I started with the Moonstone - there's not much in it :)
It amazes me how all the Bronte sisters were writers. It feels as if it ran in their family. I've gotten some of their novels and hope to get more soon.
It is incredible. Which have you read so far?
Books and Things None as of yet, but Wuthering Heights is on my TBR list (after I finish the novel I'm reading, of course). I'm going to get Jane Eyre soon enough as well. I am considering getting Agnes Grey, though. I've heard many good things about it.
Jane Eyre is great - I highly recommend. Agnes Grey is not my favourite but is a good place to start :)
Books and Things It piques my interest (as the Brontes are wont to do). I hope to read it as soon as possible. My TBR list is rather extensive, though, so I'll have to hold back on obtaining a copy lol.
Where's Arnold Bennett?!!!!?? (Joking xD)
Edward Bulwer-Lytton & Samuel Butler were wholly unknown to me if I may say so; thank you for the discovery.
I might venture to say that I think the Bronte pseudonyms were more masculine oriented than neutral, since well, you know women authors were quite discriminated by some. I can feebly recollect reading Currer and Acton as male names at least once.
I've read somewhere too, although I wouldn't swear on it, that Wilkie Collins was friends with Dickens in order for the latter's popularity to rub a bit on the former, but who knows. That's some serious Victorian gossip for you Katie right here!
Cramming the Victorian novelists in two videos is rather a bold move from you, and you have only reached 'E'! Gosh, there are so many Victorians out of prints these days.
I may recommend Elliot's 'The Mill on the Floss' if you want more of her. You're right though, she is hit-and-miss at times.
Can't wait for next week and wish you well!! (Sorry for late comment)
+IAmBroke Thank you!
And Arnold Bennet is not on here because the vast majority of his writing was Edwardian, I think just one book of his published in Victorian times (nothing at to do with the fact I hadn't heard of him at all :P )
The Miss on the Floss is on my list. I've seen a film of it, which I didn't overly enjoy plot-wise, but I am curious to read the book.
+Books and Things Off Topic: You finally made me pick up HP! BookTube as a whole worships those books like a Bible so I thought if Katie liked it why the hell not?
Yes, her prose & plot are clumsy and rather weak (OMFG, people compliment her as the 21st century Dickens; er - no, Dickens she ain't - see what I did there!!). Reading it as an adult and in the original (I still have the feeling that some phrases were omitted or completely changed in the translation I've read it years ago) I can almost see why people really like it. The fast pacing is addictive and the simple narrative aids the story in a tight way. It's definitely not the cradle of literature, but it isn't a bad read either (if you don't nick-pick it to death) that the haters make it seem. I shall see if I might move on to the next volumes. And the stereotypes, cliches and awful similes are pouring everywhere like rain, said I darkly, as I stood still as a statue (what does 'darkly' even mean??)
By-the-by I found NN in a library charity sale and bought it right away! (Along with Virgil's Aeneid) There was even a 1874 cheap edition of OT that I was so tempted to purchase. And OMF was missing from the shelf! I suspect you and the reading group you've created Katie!!!
I don't know what's up with me today; I just felt sharing my day's experiences.
+Books and Things You are right about him; I assumed because he was born during the V. Era, his work was included in it. Messed up the chronology. Should've done me homework first xD.
2 parts & only get to E in the 1st? Wait until Gissing, Gaskell et al hear about this! :-D
+TimeAndChance And yet I've spoken about the same amount of novelists in each part - there's just a lot of Victorians beginning with B, C and D!
Hi, I'm pretty new to your channel and I'm working my way through your videos and have to say that I'm enjoying them very much.
I thought that Charlotte Bronte died from the effects of hyperemesis gravidarum, I don't think she lived far enough into her pregnancy to die in childbirth?
It's frightening to think that pregnant women at this time died from a condition that although still serious to pregnant ladies today, can now be treated. We don't realise how lucky we are. I love a lot of things from the Victorian period, but health care isn't one of them!
Keep up the good work! xx
Thanks! And yes, I think you may be right about Charlotte Bronte. And it is frightening to think of the healthcare problems of the Victorian period...
Lovely job as always! Lorna Doone is definitely my top priority. I've started and not finished The Woman in White and the Moonstone and I don't know why!
+Kate Howe All three are good books I recommend :) I think you'd enjoy Lorna Doone.
I hope you like Lady Audley's Secret when you get to it 😊 I read it as one of my two Victorian lit courses at uni and really enjoyed it! Loving this series 🙂
+chboskyy Thank you :) I do definitely want to try and pick it up at some point - I hear many good things!
Did the Victorians use to be interested in History? Any good books on England or U.K. history written by a true Victorian?
Not really my area of expertise I'm afraid.
Books and Things that's alright thanks for your reply love your videos 👍
Can we talk about the British Empire perhaps in private?
What editions are your small hardbacks?
I mean the ones that are in the photo linked to the video
They are The Collector's Library editions. This was previously an independent publisher - they've since been acquired by Pan Macmillan and have changed design.
Erewhon - pronounced Air-ra-won
The How to Speak Victorian is a very informative series of videos, Katie. I hope you enjoy Middlemarch more the next time you read it. I think you appreciate a well written love story, and there are two in Middlemarch. There are three marriages that are less than ideal.
I like the 1994 BBC production of Middlemarch. Watching professional actors bring to life the characters and dialogue Eliot created helped me appreciate the complexity and the beauty of the story.
As a Dickens fan, you may have already read that he had determined by reading an early story she wrote, that the writer George Eliot was actually a woman.
www.brainpickings.org/2013/11/22/charles-dickens-fan-mail-george-eliot/
Thanks for that letter - what an interesting one to read! I'm really looking forward to rereading Middlemarch this summer.