This thesis explores the relationship between orthodox Christianity, quasi-religious movements, pseudo-science and the supernatural in both a pre- and post-Darwinian world, tracing it through fiction and non-fiction, and in novels, novellas and short stories by canonical authors Charles Dickens, George Eliot and Thomas Hardy, by the lesser known writers Catherine Crowe, and Arthur Machen, and in the non-Sherlock Holmes stories by Arthur Conan Doyle Across this variety of literary forms, these very different authors all engage with the supernatural, with quasi religious creeds and with pseudo-science Chapter One focuses on the presence of the supernatural and the spirit world in Edward Bulwer Lytton's Zanoni (1846), and The Haunted and the Haunters; or the House and the Brain (1859), Catherine Crowe's The Night-Side of Nature (1848), and Charles Dickens' Christmas stories Chapter two explores George Eliot's use of superstition and medieval and Jewish mysticism in The Mill on the Floss (1860), and Daniel Deronda (1876), before considering Thomas Hardy's Anglo-centric approach to similar issues in The Return of the Native (1878), and "The Withered Arm" (1888) Chapter three discusses the late nineteenth century interest in spiritualism, Egyptology, and ancient religion as represented in Arthur Machen's The Great God Pan (1894) and Arthur Conan Doyle's "The King of Thoth" (1890) and "Lot No 249" (1894) Overall, the thesis is concerned with the way "rational" Victorian society is constantly undermined by its engagement with the supernatural: the nineteenth century desire for empirical evidence of life after death proves, paradoxically, Victorian irrationality

What lies beneath : orthodoxy and the occult in Victorian literature

terms they resonate thematically with the subject matter of each of the roughly chronological episodes from Ruskin’s life. The result of naming and structuring the creative work after the critical suggests that Matthew Arnold was in this respect right: criticism provides the stream of ideas for artists, quite literally. The opera also dramatizes art as criticism and criticism as art, almost as though the subject matter were Wilde’s “The Critic as Artist,” insinuating that the boundary between the two is meaningless.22 In addition the show implies that opera is structured like architecture23: it is meant to last, to be worthy of sacrifice, to be a monument and a living, inhabitable cathedral of music, meant as much for future generations as for us. In organizing their opera along the Seven Lamps, Lang and Hoelterhoff make a very grand claim. 97 Self and Other on the Millennial Stage Modern Painters, Santa Fe Opera, July 1995.Hans Fahrmeyer, photographer. Ann Panagulias as Effie, François Le Roux as John Ruskin. Weltman_CH4_3rd.qxp 3/2/2007 5:32 PM Page 97

Performing the victorian: john ruskin and identity in theater, science and education

The late nineteenth century saw a re-examination of artistic creativity in response to questions surrounding the relation between human beings and automata. These questions arose from findings in the 'new psychology', physiological research that diminished the primacy of mind and viewed human action as neurological and systemic. Concentrating on British and continental culture from 1870 to 1911, this unique study explores ways in which the idea of automatism helped shape ballet, art photography, literature, and professional writing. Drawing on documents including novels and travel essays, Linda M. Austin finds a link between efforts to establish standards of artistic practice and challenges to the idea of human exceptionalism. Austin presents each artistic discipline as an example of the same process: creation that should be intended, but involving actions that evade mental control. This study considers how late nineteenth-century literature and arts tackled the scientific question, 'Are we automata?'

Automatism and Creative Acts in the Age of New Psychology

Taking as it basis the longstanding alignment of men with an active, eroticised gaze and women with visual spectacle within Western culture, this thesis demonstrates the prevalence of this model during the Victorian era, adopting an interdisciplinary approach so as to convey the varied means by which the gendering of vision was propagated and encouraged. Chapter One provides an overview of gender and visual politics in the Victorian age, subsequently analysing a selection of texts that highlight this gendered dichotomy of vision. Chapter Two focuses on the theoretical and developmental underpinnings of this dichotomy, drawing upon both Freudian and object relations theory. Chapters Three and Four centre on women’s poetic responses to this imbalance, beginning by discussing texts that convey awareness and discontent before moving on to examine more complex portrayals of psychological trauma. Chapter Five unites these interdisciplinary threads to explore women’s attempts to break away from their status as objects of vision, referring to poetic and artistic texts as well as women’s real life experiences. The thesis concludes that, though women were not wholly oppressed, they were subject to significant strictures; principally, the enduring, pervasive presence of an objectifying mode of vision aligned with the male.

Cracked mirrors and petrifying vision: negotiating femininity as spectacle within the Victorian cultural sphere

Social justice and housing issues are clearly an area of concern for sociologists, yet preservation of older homes and buildings may seem to be the very antithesis, evoking images of homes of the n...

Historic Preservation: A Multilayered Inclusive Approach Honoring Immigrants Past and Present

Introduction, Michael Wheeler the discourse of natural beauty, Keith Hanley the city and the self, Phillip Mallet pollution, defilement and the art of decomposition, David Carroll \"mappa mundi, anima mundi\" - imaginative mapping and environmental representation, Denis Cosgrove \"A great entail\" - the historic environment, Gill Chitty the role of the railways, Jeffrey Richards the National Trust - preservation or provision?, John Walton environment and apocalypse, Michael Wheeler conclusion, Terry Gifford.

Victorian Photography, Painting, and Poetry: The Enigma of Visibility in Ruskin, Morris and the Pre-Raphaelites@@@Ruskin and Environment: The Storm-Cloud of the Nineteenth Century

Michael Wheeler

Papers

Victorian Photography, Painting, and Poetry: The Enigma of Visibility in Ruskin, Morris and the Pre-Raphaelites@@@Ruskin and Environment: The Storm-Cloud of the Nineteenth Century

Death and the Future Life in Victorian Literature and Theology