Some aspects of landscape in selected works of three Victorian authors

Abstract

This dissertation aims at exploring some of the implications of landscape in the fiction of the three Nineteenth Century authors mentioned below, with reference to one of their works. The primary texts that will be examined in the course of this thesis are: 1. Wuthering Heights [Emily Bronte, 1847] 2. Adam Bede [George Eliot,1859] 3. Far From the Madding Crowd [Thomas Hardy, 1874] The dissertation will attempt to demonstrate the various shades of importance of landscape within each of the novels. It proposes to analyse the three texts under several aspects, one of which will be that of Realism vs. the Imagination. It will attempt to show that while some authors try to mirror nature in their landscapes, others prefer creativity to realism. In this dissertation, the 'landscape' being scrutinized is a rural/pastoral one. This does not mean that the three landscapes are in any way similar. Indeed, even within the same novel, we find great contrasts such as that of Storm versus Calm in Emily Bronte's two main settings of Wuthering Heights and Thrushcombe Grange.