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MATERTIALISM & CAPITALISM - Coggle Diagram
MATERTIALISM & CAPITALISM
(R) CONTEXT
Less politically engaged or, at least, outspoken then peers such as Elizabeth Barrett Browning BUT, other than in Goblin Market, explored the effects of capitalism and industrialism in relation to love, sexuality and the institution of marriage
Victor Roman Mendoza: "issues of sexuality and gender are always intimately intertwined with those of Victorian buisness"
Also explored in relation to desire and renunciation
(W) CONTEXT
DANDYISM
relied on commodity culture so as to successfully "market themselves"
Society came to be increasingly financially segregated and classist as a consequence of industialism, emerging capitalism and materialism (despite wave of egalitarianism)
Dandies adhered to this feudal idea
Charles Baudelaire, dandyism was to him,
"symbolic of the aristocratic superiority of mind"
AESTHETE
flamboyant dress style; extravagant bow ties and hats
- Question of as to whether or not Wilde was using appearance and fashion as a means to politically protest or if this dandified appearance just satisfied his aesthetic principles and desired lifestyle?
Victorian Dress Reform
restrictive
highly formalised
means of displaying wealth and social standing
battleground of different political ideas
Key proponent of the Aesthetic Movement, lecturing on it in America in 1881
Quotes:
(Lecture in 1884) "One should either be a work of art or wear a work of art."
"When I was young I thought that money was the most important thing in life; now that I am old I know that it is"
WILDE'S LIFE
Wilde's supported Parnell despite at it being at a great financial cost to the family following the death of Sir William Wilde
declared bankrupt after going to Reading Jail - Constance and children lost house and possessions
Wilde lived a largely reckless life and wasted great sums of money on himself and Bosie, depsite his mother being impoverished and sickly in her Paddington appartement, without, as she said, a shilling in the world.
publication of
The Soul of Man under Socialism" (1891)
Summary:
Current economic system makes poverty inevitable
Critical of the futility of Charity -
keeping alive and amusing the poor is an "aggravation of the difficulty. The proper aim is to try and reconstruct society on such as basis that poverty will be impossible.”
reflects on the nature of individuality in relation to finance
https://www.supersummary.com/the-soul-of-man-under-socialism/summary/
Industrial Revolution spanned from approximately 1760 to 1840
Panama Canal Scheme
Between 1882 and 1888, six bonds of
781 million
francs were issued, only 40% of which went into digging as huge salaries were paid to the directors and financial journals so as to ensure good publicity
later ordered the Panama Canal Company be liquidated
at the court trial, 510 members of parliament charged with bribery from the Panama Canal Co
Baron Reinach
was the company's financial advisor (committed suicide before the trial)
(R) POEMS
Goblin Market
Marxist Critical Perspective:
“The increasing value of the world of things proceed in direct proportion the devaluation of the world of men.”
"The worker has become the commodity."
Bougeoise prey on the Proletariat until they have no choice but to buy into/sell themselves the industrial system - "Buy from us with a golden curl."
+
seductive and alluring affects of advertising, "pomegranates full and fine", Goblin's "sugar-baited words" and iterated jingle
Rossetti may have been ahead of the time in the sense that she anticipated postmodernist consumerism
Explores wealth but in the sense that women have become the commodity - alluding the prostitution
"Buy from us with a golden curl"
"Toss'd them her silver penny"
sexual subtext to the natural imagery
"She suck'd until her lips were sore"
Jeanie's tragic death is suggested to be due to some past sexual misdemeanour
" She pined and pined away"
Same/similar in relation to drugs - proliferation of opioid usage in the Victorian age/1800s.
Personally signifigant for Rossetti considering her sister-in-law, Elizabeth Siddle (Dante's wife) died as a result of overdosing on Laudanam (an opium derivitive)
corruptive effects on men as they are no longer chivalrous gentlemen, but (sexually) aggressive goblins
"cross-grained and uncivil"
"leering at each other"
Winter; My Secret
- Just as in Goblin Market, we see the use of superfluous and exuberant vocabulary and rhyme schemes in conjunction with a more sinister/cynical subtext. Coupled with sense of duplicity/scheming
"Or, after all, perhaps there's none"
Remember (1849)
- "When you can no longer hold me by the hand" - unwelcome restraint + sense of ownership
Married Women's Property Acts (1870 and 1882), and this was written much sooner than these two acts, evidences the lack of financial as well as social/personal autonomy of women.
"You tell me of our future that you plann'd" - imbalance of power
(W) AN IDEAL HUSBAND
A Faustian Pact
- relates to Wilde's other works. E.G Lord Henry Wotton and Dorian Grey (Picture of Dorian Grey), Baron Arnheim and Sir Robert & General Arbuthnot and Lord Illingworth (A Woman of No Importance)
SUBVERT
Lord Goring
religiously conscious when referring to to/commenting on wealth "a throughly shallow creed"
(Faustian pact) "How could you have sold yourself for money?" - mindful of one's eternal soul (thinking In this Christian framework)
Although Goring's lifestyle and aesthetic may appear extravagant and that he is not financially mindful, when viewed through a contextual sense of this was another in which he could rebel in light of dress in the Victorian Era being restrictive and formalised, this characteristic is inkeeping.
Lady Chiltern
- "Money? We have no need of that! And money that comes from a tainted source of degredatioin."
UPHOLD
Baron Arnehim:
expounds the "Gospel of Gold"
However, clarifies that wealth is only signifgant if it helps one attain power - "power over the world was the one thing worth having"
Baron Arnheim exploited Sir Robert Chiltern's juvinillity - corrobertating the emerging belief, post IR, that capitalism and the pursuit of wealth was a corruptive and ubiquitous influence.
Mrs Cheveley
Devastating and perverse effects on females (more shocking/scanalous In light of women being the guardians of the nation's morals and "paragons of purity")
upholds these capitalistic principles in light of them being advantagous to her and her position socially (able to challenge and subvert the patriarchy)
interesting that corruption and avarice are "unifying" in a society so classist and segregated
although her schemes do not come to fruition, argument against women being politically involved, telling that it is Baron Arnheim with whom the blame is primarily placed, as he "advised her to do such a foolish thing" - this suggesting that men are the primary perpetrators and drivers of this economic structure
Robert Chiltern
- confused and contrary opinions on his past behaviour.
While critical of himself for having acted outside of the law (evidenced by the fact he has "payed conscious money many times") and regrets/rews the consequences of his actions (particularly on his marriage) MORE critical of the culture and the society in which he is part
NECESSARY:
"double misfortune of being well born and poor"
-"I felt that I had fought the century with it's own weapons and won"
In the denouement of the play, Robert Chiltern is offered a cabinet seat. The backwards resolution, which is vaguely ironic, highlights the need for social and political reform, founded in the deconstruction of morality and idolatry.