I'm so glad you included Mrs Oliphant! She is one of my stable of go-to authors. _The Laird of Norlaw_ and the similarly themed _Brownlows_ are among my favourites. (I don't mean to be spamming your older videos, by the way, I'm just so excited to find content on Victorian literature.)
Hi, thanks for sharing underrated author Margaret Oliphant! I've read 2 of her books - Miss Marjoribanks and Kirsteen. Really loved reading Kirsteen! X
Your videos are so dangerous because it just makes me want to add all these long wonderful novels to me TBR. :) I recently read The Warden. While I didn't love it, I still plan on reading more books in that series, and I'm really looking forward to it!
Ha, thank you - I hope you find some more brilliant Victorian books to enjoy. The Warden is often people's least favourite book in the series, and I find the second much more compelling, so do carry on :)
I very much enjoyed The Warden. I was fascinated too to see how his descendant, Joanna Trollope, obviously very consciously wrote a modern day version.
This is such an excellent list of lesser-known Victorian authors, not just for beginners, but also for people who *think* they've run out of Victorian literature :-) (I've just requested George Gissing's "The Odd Women" from my library network.)
I can’t wait to read more George Gissing ❤️ I loved The Odd Women! I’m currently reading The Way We Live Now by Trollope and it feels like I’m reading a masterpiece. He is an amazing author.
I just started Mrs Marjoribanks. I'm only 50 pages in but thoroughly enjoying it. I agree with a lot of others that it has an 'Austen' feel to it. Although as a non English speaker I found the Austen novels easier to read. Mrs Oliphant demands more concentration. I'm not sure why because, as you mentioned, the language is rather simple. Maybe it is the longer sentences? Anyway I'm glad I picked it up.
It might be the longer sentences? I find Oliphant quite Austen-like in style and while I find most of her books fairly straight-forward in language, I stumbled over a lot of sentences when reading her Salem Chapel and, like you, couldn't quite work out why! I'm glad you're enjoying it though - I'm half way through currently and loving it.
Interesting recommendations, Katie. Six of the nine authors are new to me. I’m a subscriber from the U.S., so until I read The Odd Women, I was unaware of the imbalance of women in Britain that’s at the center of the novel. Are you aware any other fiction author from that era that addressed that imbalance? I recently purchased the Kindle version of a “travel” book by Trollope, called North America. Thank you, Katie, for making such interesting videos.
I haven't really noticed it mentioned in any other late Victorian books, but I am in general more familiar with early and mid-Victorian writers, so that may be why.
Highly informative. Thank you! Certainly second your appreciation of George Gissing, tremendous novels. I would also add, for those who feel an affinity for his Godwin Peak, to hunt down a copy of W N P Barbellion's extraordinary, The Journal of a Disappointed Man.
It's so interesting to see which Victorian authors have remained as canonical names, and which have been somewhat forgotten. I cannot believe that Queen Victoria's favorite authors, Margaret Oliphant, is one that most people have never even heard of! Even Thackeray, who was second only to Dickens during the Victorian Era, seems to only be remembered for Vanity Fair. This is a great group of underrated authors! Would you consider Wilkie Collins underrated as well? I find that it's hard for me to tell if Victorian authors are well-known or not since I've been exposed to so many of them through booktube and college courses.
I'm not sure about Wilkie Collins. He's one of those where he has a few very well-known books, but I'm not sure he's as well-known as some others. Maybe he occupies Trollope territory.
Exactly the video I needed to see!!💕 I am really liking Anthony Trollope so I think I will enjoy Gissing. Right now I am waiting for his book Rachel Ray to arrive in the mail. Look forward to reading some of these books by these authors this year. Not even waiting till Victober.😁
I kindled Lorna Doone and look forward to reading it, good list of recommendations. Just curious on your thoughts or any one else's on William Morris, he in a way, created the modern fantasy market, his passion for icelandic sagas and medievalism, led Tolkien, Lewis and a plethora of other authors down that particular literary path...
I would argue that George MacDonald created the modern fantasy market, he probably had a great influence on Tolkien-and certainly on Lewis-than Morris did (though Lewis certainly read and was impacted by Morris as well.) If you read Lewis's autobiography Surprised by Joy, you'll see something of the enormous impact MacDonald had on CSl, who called the Scotsman his "master" and said his novel Phantastes "baptised his imagination." Tolkien also mentions him in his essay "On Fairy Tales" and in the intro to Smith of Wooton Major. The influence of GM's The Princess and The Goblin on The Hobbit is unmistakable, and everything Lewis wrote (no exaggeration) has traces of MacDonald in it. I'd strongly recommend watching the new documentary The Fantasy Makers about all three authors, and the influence of MacDonald on the other two. You can see the trailer here: ua-cam.com/video/UOg_BgCkgqU/v-deo.html
Hi Katie, I 100% agree with you about Anthony Trollope. I really enjoyed his Barsetshire series but my favorite is his Palliser series. I just love it!! I recently bought the BBC adaptation and that's pretty awesone too. I think you would really enjoy both the books and the mini-series 😊
I've managed to get hold of a second hand copy of the half sisters so I'm looking forward to getting into that. I think they should do a free kindle edition of her work- we should campaign 😄 xx
So I guess I now have some Sheridan le Fanu and George Gissing coming my way. This Victober has sent my Victorian literature TBR pile rocketing. What a shame!
I very much enjoyed The Woman in White and The Moonstone when I read them about 10 years ago, but don't remember them very well now. I've just finished the Two Destinies, which was a weird one, and I'm not quite sure what I think of it...
What about William Harrison Ainsworth, a historical novelist? I read parts of Rookwood and Preston Fight because I was writing historical fact about topics which these books deal with in a fictional way. I think the author outsold Dickens for a time. I have never read any of Disraeli's novels and as a front rank politician who was also a novelist he was surely quite a rare beast.
RD Blackmore! So incredibly underrated from the 19th. I have a slight bias since Blackmore and Lorna Doone has a connection to my family but it truly is a great book, and the cool thing with Blackmore is he often travelled and lived in the places he wrote about (in this case, Devon). So you really get a feel for landscapes.
George Moore sounds intriguing. There were famous Irish writers like Jonathan Swift, Oscar Wilde, Bram Stoker and Sheridan Le Fanu, but few of them seem to set their stories in Ireland.
Wilkie Collins' No name" and "Armadale" are excellent.I enjoyed them as much as the Woman in White.And the Vicar of Bullhampton by Trollope is one of his best.Ex prime minister Tony Blair's favorite novelist is Trollope.
Most readers of contemporary fiction would find Wilkie Collins literal.But in his time he wasn't considered so.Collins was not philosophical or poetic.He didn't describe landscapes in detail like other Victorian writers or make social or political commentary.His novels are much more plot driven when compared to his contemporaries.Reading Wilkie Collins is like watching a soap opera which has a cliffhanger after every episode.You're dieing to know what will happen next!
Tell me you didn't just mention THREE Georges among the most underrated Victorian novelists without mentioning George MacDonald! G K Chesterton (perhaps himself one of the most underrated 20th century authors) said "If we test the matter of originality of attitude, George MacDonald was one of the three or four greatest men of the 19th century." It's hard to argue with him, given the influence MacDonald had on Chesterton himself, C S Lewis, J R R Tolkien, W H Auden, Madeliene L'Engle, Elisabeth Goudge and others. You should at least give him as much of a try as George Eliot, who I notice from your other video you've given a fair crack of the whip but didn't enjoy. Eliot is a major gap in my own reading, but I love some of the others you've mentioned in your reviews-Dickens, all the Brontes, Conan Doyle, Stevenson among them. You've read a lot more of the Victorians than I have, as I do tend to stick to my favourites and probably need to branch out more, but you definitely need to bump MacDonald right to the top of your list! :)
R u going to do underrated Vic authors II? Underrated Vic poets? Dramatists? This is '17, 116 yr after Vic period ended. Why are some Vic authors still famous whereas others have suffered partial eclipse, espec. if the best of 'em are as brilliant as u say they are? Do u feel the best of these underrated Vic authors will have a resurgence in popularity? If these writers are so good why don't they make syllabuses & get made into BBC miniseries?
I don't know Victorian drama and poetry very well, so probably not. I think it's partly a product of popularity - if you make a BBC miniseries of Jane Eyre, lots of people will watch it because they've heard of Jane Eyre, but not so much with The Half Sisters, brilliant though it is. It's the same with books staying in print and being publishing - Penguin Classics, etc, know people will buy copies of Jane Eyre, but not so much with the Half Sisters. It's a cyclical thing I think, and a real shame. Luckily e-readers and kindles mean a lot more is accessible.
I wanted to really catch all you were saying but you talk SOOOO FAST.😐 Appreciate you sharing the names of the authors in the links below though so we can look them up.
I'm so glad you included Mrs Oliphant! She is one of my stable of go-to authors. _The Laird of Norlaw_ and the similarly themed _Brownlows_ are among my favourites. (I don't mean to be spamming your older videos, by the way, I'm just so excited to find content on Victorian literature.)
She's great. I must read more of her work :) And yes, please do feel free to comment on my older videos - I do still get the notifications :)
Hi, thanks for sharing underrated author Margaret Oliphant! I've read 2 of her books - Miss Marjoribanks and Kirsteen. Really loved reading Kirsteen! X
Your videos are so dangerous because it just makes me want to add all these long wonderful novels to me TBR. :) I recently read The Warden. While I didn't love it, I still plan on reading more books in that series, and I'm really looking forward to it!
Ha, thank you - I hope you find some more brilliant Victorian books to enjoy. The Warden is often people's least favourite book in the series, and I find the second much more compelling, so do carry on :)
I very much enjoyed The Warden. I was fascinated too to see how his descendant, Joanna Trollope, obviously very consciously wrote a modern day version.
This is such an excellent list of lesser-known Victorian authors, not just for beginners, but also for people who *think* they've run out of Victorian literature :-)
(I've just requested George Gissing's "The Odd Women" from my library network.)
Thanks :) I hope you like the Odd Women! Every time I think I'm running out of Victorian literature, I discover a whole new heap of books!
I can’t wait to read more George Gissing ❤️ I loved The Odd Women!
I’m currently reading The Way We Live Now by Trollope and it feels like I’m reading a masterpiece. He is an amazing author.
Oh, I'm so, so glad you're enjoyed it - what an incredible, incredible book! :D
George Gissing's New Grub Street might be my all time favorite novel.
It is amazing!
I just started Mrs Marjoribanks. I'm only 50 pages in but thoroughly enjoying it. I agree with a lot of others that it has an 'Austen' feel to it. Although as a non English speaker I found the Austen novels easier to read. Mrs Oliphant demands more concentration. I'm not sure why because, as you mentioned, the language is rather simple. Maybe it is the longer sentences? Anyway I'm glad I picked it up.
It might be the longer sentences? I find Oliphant quite Austen-like in style and while I find most of her books fairly straight-forward in language, I stumbled over a lot of sentences when reading her Salem Chapel and, like you, couldn't quite work out why! I'm glad you're enjoying it though - I'm half way through currently and loving it.
Thank you so much for such a good list! I've wanted to read Camilla for a while, but I just haven't gotten there yet :)
I highly recommend it :)
Interesting recommendations, Katie. Six of the nine authors are new to me. I’m a subscriber from the U.S., so until I read The Odd Women, I was unaware of the imbalance of women in Britain that’s at the center of the novel. Are you aware any other fiction author from that era that addressed that imbalance? I recently purchased the Kindle version of a “travel” book by Trollope, called North America. Thank you, Katie, for making such interesting videos.
I haven't really noticed it mentioned in any other late Victorian books, but I am in general more familiar with early and mid-Victorian writers, so that may be why.
Highly informative. Thank you! Certainly second your appreciation of George Gissing, tremendous novels. I would also add, for those who feel an affinity for his Godwin Peak, to hunt down a copy of W N P Barbellion's extraordinary, The Journal of a Disappointed Man.
Thanks! George Gissing is amazing - I need to read more by him.
It's so interesting to see which Victorian authors have remained as canonical names, and which have been somewhat forgotten. I cannot believe that Queen Victoria's favorite authors, Margaret Oliphant, is one that most people have never even heard of! Even Thackeray, who was second only to Dickens during the Victorian Era, seems to only be remembered for Vanity Fair. This is a great group of underrated authors! Would you consider Wilkie Collins underrated as well? I find that it's hard for me to tell if Victorian authors are well-known or not since I've been exposed to so many of them through booktube and college courses.
I'm not sure about Wilkie Collins. He's one of those where he has a few very well-known books, but I'm not sure he's as well-known as some others. Maybe he occupies Trollope territory.
I have Lorna Doone on my TBR! I really need to get to reading it. Love all your videos!
Thank you! Lorna Doone is great - enjoy!
Exactly the video I needed to see!!💕 I am really liking Anthony Trollope so I think I will enjoy Gissing. Right now I am waiting for his book Rachel Ray to arrive in the mail. Look forward to reading some of these books by these authors this year. Not even waiting till Victober.😁
Thanks! Gissing is amazing - I hope you like his work.
I've just begun my Anthony Trollope journey. I finished The Warden and immediately started Barchester Towers. I am loving it so far.
Glad to hear it!
I kindled Lorna Doone and look forward to reading it, good list of recommendations. Just curious on your thoughts or any one else's on William Morris, he in a way, created the modern fantasy market, his passion for icelandic sagas and medievalism, led Tolkien, Lewis and a plethora of other authors down that particular literary path...
I haven't read any William Morris fiction, though I've enjoyed some of his non-fiction. I'd love to read some of his work.
I would argue that George MacDonald created the modern fantasy market, he probably had a great influence on Tolkien-and certainly on Lewis-than Morris did (though Lewis certainly read and was impacted by Morris as well.) If you read Lewis's autobiography Surprised by Joy, you'll see something of the enormous impact MacDonald had on CSl, who called the Scotsman his "master" and said his novel Phantastes "baptised his imagination." Tolkien also mentions him in his essay "On Fairy Tales" and in the intro to Smith of Wooton Major. The influence of GM's The Princess and The Goblin on The Hobbit is unmistakable, and everything Lewis wrote (no exaggeration) has traces of MacDonald in it. I'd strongly recommend watching the new documentary The Fantasy Makers about all three authors, and the influence of MacDonald on the other two. You can see the trailer here: ua-cam.com/video/UOg_BgCkgqU/v-deo.html
Hi Katie,
I 100% agree with you about Anthony Trollope. I really enjoyed his Barsetshire series but my favorite is his Palliser series. I just love it!! I recently bought the BBC adaptation and that's pretty awesone too. I think you would really enjoy both the books and the mini-series 😊
I'm really excited to start the Palliser series once I've finished the Barsetshire Chronicles :)
I've managed to get hold of a second hand copy of the half sisters so I'm looking forward to getting into that. I think they should do a free kindle edition of her work- we should campaign 😄 xx
Enjoy :) And yes, they really, really should!
So I guess I now have some Sheridan le Fanu and George Gissing coming my way. This Victober has sent my Victorian literature TBR pile rocketing. What a shame!
I highly recommend both of those authors :)
So, so, so, so looking forward to you reading 'The Unclassed'. I'm in love with Ida Starr
I'm very excited for it!
Curious if you've read much Wilkie Collins? I LOVED The Woman in White- one of my all-time favorites!
I very much enjoyed The Woman in White and The Moonstone when I read them about 10 years ago, but don't remember them very well now. I've just finished the Two Destinies, which was a weird one, and I'm not quite sure what I think of it...
I've just re-read Eve's Ransom for the umpteenth time. I know it's not his masterpiece but I was always drawn to it.
Sounds very intriguing!
What about William Harrison Ainsworth, a historical novelist? I read parts of Rookwood and Preston Fight because I was writing historical fact about topics which these books deal with in a fictional way. I think the author outsold Dickens for a time. I have never read any of Disraeli's novels and as a front rank politician who was also a novelist he was surely quite a rare beast.
RD Blackmore! So incredibly underrated from the 19th. I have a slight bias since Blackmore and Lorna Doone has a connection to my family but it truly is a great book, and the cool thing with Blackmore is he often travelled and lived in the places he wrote about (in this case, Devon). So you really get a feel for landscapes.
He is a great author and I'm looking forward to reading more by him :)
Fan fact: Gissing wrote a book on Dickens!
I know - I own it and really need to read it!
George Moore sounds intriguing. There were famous Irish writers like Jonathan Swift, Oscar Wilde, Bram Stoker and Sheridan Le Fanu, but few of them seem to set their stories in Ireland.
George Moore is definitely fascinating - Drama in Muslin was a very interesting and unique Victorian novel.
I envy u for having many classics on u're bookshelf 😊
Thanks for the video, so much new information for me , lol.
Thanks :)
Wilkie Collins' No name" and "Armadale" are excellent.I enjoyed them as much as the Woman in White.And the Vicar of Bullhampton by Trollope is one of his best.Ex prime minister Tony Blair's favorite novelist is Trollope.
I'm looking forward to reading more Collins in the future.
Most readers of contemporary fiction would find Wilkie Collins literal.But in his time he wasn't considered so.Collins was not philosophical or poetic.He didn't describe landscapes in detail like other Victorian writers or make social or political commentary.His novels are much more plot driven when compared to his contemporaries.Reading Wilkie Collins is like watching a soap opera which has a cliffhanger after every episode.You're dieing to know what will happen next!
Books and Things I mean literary,not literal
Another writer of real interest, notable albeit contentious, is Edward Bulwer-Lytton. Worth investigating.
He's definitely one I'd like to read sometime.
Tell me you didn't just mention THREE Georges among the most underrated Victorian novelists without mentioning George MacDonald! G K Chesterton (perhaps himself one of the most underrated 20th century authors) said "If we test the matter of originality of attitude, George MacDonald was one of the three or four greatest men of the 19th century." It's hard to argue with him, given the influence MacDonald had on Chesterton himself, C S Lewis, J R R Tolkien, W H Auden, Madeliene L'Engle, Elisabeth Goudge and others. You should at least give him as much of a try as George Eliot, who I notice from your other video you've given a fair crack of the whip but didn't enjoy. Eliot is a major gap in my own reading, but I love some of the others you've mentioned in your reviews-Dickens, all the Brontes, Conan Doyle, Stevenson among them. You've read a lot more of the Victorians than I have, as I do tend to stick to my favourites and probably need to branch out more, but you definitely need to bump MacDonald right to the top of your list! :)
You know.....you..talk..very..very... fast.
R u going to do underrated Vic authors II? Underrated Vic poets? Dramatists?
This is '17, 116 yr after Vic period ended. Why are some Vic authors still famous whereas others have suffered partial eclipse, espec. if the best of 'em are as brilliant as u say they are? Do u feel the best of these underrated Vic authors will have a resurgence in popularity? If these writers are so good why don't they make syllabuses & get made into BBC miniseries?
I don't know Victorian drama and poetry very well, so probably not. I think it's partly a product of popularity - if you make a BBC miniseries of Jane Eyre, lots of people will watch it because they've heard of Jane Eyre, but not so much with The Half Sisters, brilliant though it is. It's the same with books staying in print and being publishing - Penguin Classics, etc, know people will buy copies of Jane Eyre, but not so much with the Half Sisters. It's a cyclical thing I think, and a real shame. Luckily e-readers and kindles mean a lot more is accessible.
I wanted to really catch all you were saying but you talk SOOOO FAST.😐 Appreciate you sharing the names of the authors in the links below though so we can look them up.
Sorry - believe me, I can't help the way I talk. If you go to settings in the corner of the video, you can change the speed to 0.75x.
First.