Victorianophila

[bibliophile]

The recent resugence of the steampunk genre, the ever popular Girl Genius web comic, and even the playground's Victorian avatar week show that the Victorian era interests many. Why is it so popular?

Why do you like it?

[Nameless]

The recent resugence of the steampunk genre, the ever popular Girl Genius web comic, and even the playground's Victorian avatar week show that the Victorian era interests many. Why is it so popular?

Why do you like it?

I’m actually working on Steampunk for my Final Major Project in college.

It interests me because it mixes both the old and the futuristic together. Victorian and Steampunk aesthetics are also the opposite of contemporary design. Today, mainstream design focuses on the beauty in simplicity and covers everything up in a nice shiny plastic or metallic surface. The Victorians had a very different idea of beauty, they saw the beauty in complexity and in the mechanics itself. Steampunk takes this further and actually goes out of it’s way to emphasise the mechanics and show the beauty in the movements in clockworks and engines. This may be because the Victorians were a very proud people, much like the Romans, everything about them was big and grand. They wanted to show off to the world and prove that they were the best. Again, this is very different to how things are today. Today everyone must be equal, no one is better, we’re all the same.

So the simple answer is, because it makes a nice change.
And also because it's pretty.

[Superglucose]

I personally don't. Their attitude towards sex and relationships still has America totally messed up.

If I had to guess, the Victorian era was also pretty much the last era of a real aristocracy. Towards the end the riches people in the world were more and more often self-made men, like Rockefeller, rather than people who were born into money, titles, or power.

[bibliophile]

I personally don't. Their attitude towards sex and relationships still has America totally messed up.

Let's not get a thread 3 posts old shut down for politics, please.

[Superglucose]

That's... not politics but ok. I was talking about the pervasive opinion that sex was only "ok" if used for reproduction and that a woman enjoying sex was "bad."

[BisectedBrioche]

I personally don't. Their attitude towards sex and relationships still has America totally messed up.

If I had to guess, the Victorian era was also pretty much the last era of a real aristocracy. Towards the end the riches people in the world were more and more often self-made men, like Rockefeller, rather than people who were born into money, titles, or power.

You could go the other way and argue it was the begining of the "Self made man". Not to mention it was the time of the industrial revolution when things like standardisation (very important, even if people seem to overlook it), efficent, long distance transport and globalisation (which, like it or not, defines the modern world) appeared.

[Superglucose]

Yeah, like I said, it's just an idea, and not necessarily a particularly good one :smallbiggrin:

[Magnor Criol]

I personally don't. Their attitude towards sex and relationships still has America totally messed up.

If I had to guess, the Victorian era was also pretty much the last era of a real aristocracy. Towards the end the riches people in the world were more and more often self-made men, like Rockefeller, rather than people who were born into money, titles, or power.

Also, note Steampunk is not the same as the Victorian era. It's set at the same "technology level," in a way, and while many Victorian aspects are used by the steampunk genre, it's not the same.

For example, Girl Genius - there's a general social acceptance of the sex drive that seems to exist in that world - it's not like it's discussed around the dinner table with grandma, but having a sex drive doesn't automatically make you a floozy, and there's been several times where women have been somewhat scantily clad in public and weren't lynched or run out of town for it.

Also in Girl Genius, women have power, and aren't automatically assumed to be unfit for leadership simply by virtue of their, *ahem*, "plumbing".

Both of those things are significant differences from Victorian times. Steampunk uses Victorian times as an inspiration, but usually changes many aspects about it, such as the social sexism.

[bibliophile]

That's... not politics but ok. I was talking about the pervasive opinion that sex was only "ok" if used for reproduction and that a woman enjoying sex was "bad."


Not politics precisely, but roland can get strict.

Also, I don't think that was what they thought. They considered women physiologicaly incapable of enjoying sex. This is rather off topic however.

[Forever Curious]

I personally don't. Their attitude towards sex and relationships still has America totally messed up.


I was talking about the pervasive opinion that sex was only "ok" if used for reproduction and that a woman enjoying sex was "bad."

I'm not seeing how this view "messed up" America...

Still, I agree with the "sex as procreation" view. Plus, I personally really like the fashion of the era and the steampunk genre as a whole.

[bibliophile]

I personally really like the fashion of the era and the steampunk genre as a whole.

Anything in particular about the genre?

[Fifty-Eyed Fred]

Victorian aesthetics manage to be both based within the ancient and medieval past and utterly unique at the same time; they speak a lot about the era, and are very compelling to me.

The Victorian era in Britain also represents both the height of our power and the glory days of the British Empire, alongside the manifold problems of a society undergoing massive change. It's an age of glorious scientific progress and social evolution; to put it another way, picture the Georgian era, and then the Edwardian era. Quite the leap, isn't it?

All of this amounts to an era of fascinating contradiction and change, which is both familiar and alien to our lives in modern Britain, and also happens to contain some rather fine design work.

[Forever Curious]

Anything in particular about the genre?

The thrusting together of older styles of design with present-day/futuristic mechanics.

See also, this:
http://www.petersen.org/images/Exhibitimages/hannibal8-1965greatrace.jpg

[Mando Knight]

Also in Girl Genius, women have power, and aren't automatically assumed to be unfit for leadership simply by virtue of their, *ahem*, "plumbing".

Though in Girl Genius, if you aren't a Spark, you're not in power. If you are a Spark, then trying to stop you from gaining power is stupid unless the opponent is "Sparkier" than you.

[Nameless]

The Victorian era in Britain also represents both the height of our power and the glory days of the British Empire, alongside the manifold problems of a society undergoing massive change. It's an age of glorious scientific progress and social evolution; to put it another way, picture the Georgian era, and then the Edwardian era. Quite the leap, isn't it?


Not even that, if you just compare how much things changed within the Victorian era. Never before had Britain changed so much so fast. If you compare the Early Victorians, people were coming out of the renaissance, then compare it with the middle of the Victorian era, to the late Victorians nearing the end of the 19th Centaury. So much had changed; fashion, art, the Empire, warfare and most of all science. Like you said, the scientific progress was immense.
I can't argue that society wasn't exactly great as far as class and gender rolls go, but it was getting better. We can sit here and discuss how awful it must've been, but they were certainly better off then some of the older empires and if you criticize them just for that, we can also sit here and criticize every other empire and most other civilisations. Heck, even the modern world which still sees as much of it all today in some parts. Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't the Victorians abolish slavery? Or was that before? My history is a little blurry.

[bibliophile]

The Victorians did indeed abolish slavery, and the British used their considerable navel power to suppress the slave trade. The Renaissance ended around 1600, not the early Victorian era by far.

[Nameless]

The Victorians did indeed abolish slavery, and the British used their considerable navel power to suppress the slave trade. The Renaissance ended around 1600, not the early Victorian era by far.

Their was a seconed renaissance in fashion before the victorians I believe.

First Renaissance:
http://www.renaissance-spell.com/Images/Renaissance-Fashion/Renaissance-Fashion-Catherine.jpg

Seconed Renaissance:
http://janeaustensworld.files.wordpress.com/2009/01/tight_lacing-or-fashion-before-ease-john-collet-1770-1775.jpg

Though as you can see, it wasn't quite the same.

[Fifty-Eyed Fred]

Well...

Slavery was banned in the early 19th century, but prior to the Victorian Era. But yes, looking back on the Victorian era, you effectively move from the 'squirarchy' (think Pride and Prejudice) to a modern, industrialised nation within the space of 64 years. It's small wonder that the Victorians felt themselves to be on the cutting-edge of progress; they pretty much were.

The Renaissance started and ended depending upon where you were in Europe; in England it started in the reign of Henry VII and ended at some point in the late 16th or early 17th century, depending on how you define its end.

Ah. The Renaissance was much broader than fashion; it encompasses the cultural and scientific transition from the Medieval to the Early Modern era, in which the cultures and texts of Ancient Rome and Greece were uncovered and rediscovered, and the advanced mathematics and knowledge within came into the general knowledge of the population.

[Hazkali]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't the Victorians abolish slavery? Or was that before? My history is a little blurry.

Slavery had been de facto abolished on the British mainland since the 1770s, the trade of slaves was abolished in 1807, and slavery was fully abolished in 1833, with certain exceptions.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abolition_of_slavery_timeline

For me, I don't like how "olde" people consider the Victorian era- Dickensian dramas are especially bad at this. If you look at the science and technology that was already around at the start of Victoria's reign it makes the 1850s seem positively modern.

Personally, I'm more of a fan of the Georgian/Regency "Napoleonic" period, which is still surprisingly modern in its outlook. Mostly I like it for the whacking great big war they had, though. Terrible, I should note, but interesting to learn about.

[Fifty-Eyed Fred]

The Victorian era is also well-known for its great, romanticised feats of engineering, such as the construction of the railways.

That's another draw for people; it's become a rather romanticised period; the famous literature and art probably helps.

[ClockShock]

Also in Girl Genius, women have power, and aren't automatically assumed to be unfit for leadership simply by virtue of their, *ahem*, "plumbing".


Do enlighten me if i'm missing something major - as i haven't the chance to study the Victorian era as much as i would like - but we are all aware who this era was named after yes?

[GrlumpTheElder]

Yes, Her Majesty Victoria, by the Grace of God, of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland Queen, Defender of the Faith, Empress of India.

(a.k.a Queen Victoria)


It's scary to think that when she was my age, she was already queen!

[Fifty-Eyed Fred]

Do enlighten me if i'm missing something major - as i haven't the chance to study the Victorian era as much as i would like - but we are all aware who this era was named after yes?

Yes, we are - a certain monarch of Great Britain, who was a traditionalist, against women's suffrage and wanted women to stay in their place.

[golentan]

Personally, I find Victoriana appealing simply for the Aesthetics. The architecture, the clothing, and the metallurgy and technology of the time appeal to me far more than t-shirts and jeans, big glass skyscrapers, and the minimalist appearance of iPods. I like the darker colors, the polished wood and brass. I like the very formal suits, and the prevalence of hats (not baseball caps: please don't wear logos on clothes).

I can't say I'm fond of the society and mores of the time, but at the same time a certain implication of progress and adventure and of new horizons both physical and technological to push was fascinating.

[WarBrute]

It's scary to think that when she was my age, she was already queen!

*Checks GrlumpTheElder profile* There's no age listed... :smallannoyed: Now I have to go check Wikipedia :smalltongue:

On another note,

In our world of ipods, iphones and ipads where everything is small, sleek and appears to work like magic it's nice to imagine a world full of the raw power of massive steam engines and the intricate movements of thousands of gears working as one. At least that's my thoughts anyway.

[Dr.Epic]

The recent resugence of the steampunk genre, the ever popular Girl Genius web comic, and even the playground's Victorian avatar week show that the Victorian era interests many. Why is it so popular?

Why do you like it?

Recently reading the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen has given me an interest in late 19th English literature. The next two novels I want to pick up are the Strange Case of Dr. Jerkyll and Mr. Hyde and 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. I do expect the characters to be written differently.

[ForzaFiori]

Not being a british historian, or a british citizen, my own interest in Victorian England comes from the fact that aside from a brief study on England when America was colonized, and another during the Revolution, the Victorian period is one of the only ones studied, and (at least in my school) the only one studied in depth.

[Rutskarn]

Victorians are perceived as being dressed to the nines at all times. This is untrue, but if you look at steampunk fashions, they tend to focus only on fashions found among the affluent. You don't see too many work shirts, flannels, aprons, or handkerchiefs in most steampunk settings.

Basically, some of the aesthetic's appeal stems from the belief that formal clothing is more badass than the alternative. There's some truth to this: there's a reason James Bond doesn't wear Big Dog t-shirts and dungarees, after all. Steampunk's a good excuse to dress any character up in fine silk hats, sharp black coats, and dresses that weigh more than a sack of mud.

[Nameless]

Victorians are perceived as being dressed to the nines at all times. This is untrue, but if you look at steampunk fashions, they tend to focus only on fashions found among the affluent. You don't see too many work shirts, flannels, aprons, or handkerchiefs in most steampunk settings.

Basically, some of the aesthetic's appeal stems from the belief that formal clothing is more badass than the alternative. There's some truth to this: there's a reason James Bond doesn't wear Big Dog t-shirts and dungarees, after all. Steampunk's a good excuse to dress any character up in fine silk hats, sharp black coats, and dresses that weigh more than a sack of mud.

Not true. I have seen Steampunk models and characters dressed in a more casual or work-like outfits.
However, Steampunk is a fantasy, and most Steampunk artists or people who like to dress in the fashion tend to go for what you were talking about because it tends to be more visually pleasing. Myself included. :smalltongue:

[Icewalker]

Recently reading the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen has given me an interest in late 19th English literature. The next two novels I want to pick up are the Strange Case of Dr. Jerkyll and Mr. Hyde and 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. I do expect the characters to be written differently.

Like this.

When it comes to steampunk, not just Victorian era, one of the reasons that I at least find it so interesting is that it's the first science fiction. Jules Verne! :smallbiggrin:

[EmeraldRose]

The music from Arcanum.

[Danne]

Victorians are perceived as being dressed to the nines at all times. This is untrue, but if you look at steampunk fashions, they tend to focus only on fashions found among the affluent. You don't see too many work shirts, flannels, aprons, or handkerchiefs in most steampunk settings.

That's not always true. Check out Castle in the Sky for a good example. The main characters are a pair of orphaned kids and a ragtag group of flying pirates, with most of the extras being either soldiers or citizens of a mining town. Work shirts, aprons, and patched clothing abound. Only the villains are rich enough to dress in a more stereotypical steampunk/aristocratic manner.

I'll grant you that's the exception, though, not the rule.

For me, there's a lot of reasons why I love steampunk. Partly it's the cool factor; can it get much better than giant steampowered airplanes or clockwork flamethrowers? I'm also a bit of a history buff, and I enjoy seeing stories that put "what if...?" spins on history. Partly it's because steampunk lends itself pretty well to urban fantasy, another favorite of mine; you can get zepplins and old gas lights tossed in with magicians and demons and the like. It's just got a nice feel to it.

Also, you're mistaken that all steampunk is based on the Victorian Era. That's the classic setting, and it's where steampunk got it's start, but I've seen steampunk settings in Oriental societies (e.g. Meiji Japan, Opium War-era China) and even a couple in places like Africa or India. There's no limit! Pick your favorite historical time period and add steam engines or giant robots, and let your imagination go wild.

[Nameless]

Let's not forget that Steampunk also has some awesome music (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YPH1OoTobtk)! :smallbiggrin:

[Thufir]

Let's not forget that Steampunk also has some awesome music (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YPH1OoTobtk)! :smallbiggrin:

Indeed (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zBFtWyvRMOk) it does. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u4YuqjsVhfo)

[Lioness]

Pretty dresses.

That is all.

[Danne]

I would like to add to my previous post that sometimes I like steampunk because of the limitations of the historical setting off of which it's based. Yeah, in the Victorian Era women (and minorities, and orphans, and pretty much anyone who wasn't white and reasonably well off) had a hard time in the civil rights department. So if I want to write a historical novel with the themes I want (e.g. a woman soldier or scientist) it could come off as unrealistic in historical fiction, but anything flies in steampunk. (Plus I can give her nifty gadgets, which is always fun.)

[GolemsVoice]

I like the Victorian era/Steampunk for several reasons:

The gentleman. While I am very much aware that society back then would likely make me retch for it's bigotry and the amount of what went wrong back then, but I deliberatly shut my eyes to that. The gentleman is a man that values style over simplicity, elegance over pragmatism. He is truthful, a man of his word, educated and witty. He is charming with the ladies and sporting with his fellow gentlemen. Also, I just like the decorum, the rituals, the elegance that I dream this era had.

The wild opposites. Rich, towering mansions and smoke-blackened shacks, elegant gentlemen and poor street urchins. Everything is ladden with tension, society is just waiting to boil. Will it turn into open rebellion, or will it continue to stagnate? You can also tell all manenr of stories. Intrigue and duells in the morning? The hardships of daily labour for incredibly low wages? Adventure! at the borders of civilization? Science! at the borders of human understanding?

The Spirit of Adventure! Of course, again, this is heavily romanticized, but back then, men of adventure could change the face of the world. Either cut your way into uncharted wilderness or give a rousing speech in Parliament convincing the oldfashioned nobles of the plight of the poor.

Also, the Music (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7snyJ_mNBM)

STEAMPRIEST

[JDMSJR]

I found this cool picture of a "Victorian" computer

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Steamtop.jpg

I'd buy one.

[Mauther]

I think there are multiple reasons. First is pure style. The Victorian era is identified as a very “classy” period, fancy dress proper etiquette and all that. Even the soldiers dressed nice. In many cases it’s a perfect example of form over function. In the USA, this same general era is called the Gilded Age, mocking the ostentatious displays that were common. So you have all of the delightful pomp and ceremony, arches and grand bridges, corsets/jersey dresses and cummerbunds/waist coats. Take all of the glory of the Regency and Georgian era’s, take them up a notch, expand the access from the nobility to include the upper class and some of the middle class (giving it at least a veneer of egalitarianism), and then expand it to include much of Europe plus the US and Canada. This even carried over into social interaction, so you have all of the manners and politeness and rigid social conventions that are largely missing from our modern society.

Thematically, you have the peculiar sense of “now” that seems to pervade Victorian society and culture. Prior to the Victorians, society was focused on the past, on where we as a people (and the British in particular) had come from. On the line of kings and queens, their accomplishments and conflicts. While this was fading by the Georgian and Regency, it finally faded away in the last half of the 19th century. After the Victorian era, or more correctly after the Edwardian era and the Great War, the focus shifts to the future, whether in dread or hope. But the Victorian era, especially the late Victorian era was focused on the greatness of the present. The British Empire was at its greatest in terms of size, power and wealth and no one seriously foresaw that changing in the near future. It was kind of presumed that history had kind of plateaued at that point and there’d be no fall. And the long reign and relative peace of Victoria’s reign and the Pax Britannica only reinforced that assumption.

Probably the greatest joy of the Victorian era for me, is the presence of the gentleman adventurer. Before the Victorian era adventurers were generally rogues and cads like Cortez or Raleigh. After the Victorian era adventurers were nationalized (so they were agents of a nation state like Armstrong or Gagarin) or trivialized (niche explorers like the first person to travel the Outback east to west solo on camel only - Davidson). But the Victorian era had these larger than life honest to god adventurers who went all over the world and did the impossible, and then came back to relate the stories over tea and cake to St Mary’s Womens Auxillery. Livingston/Stanley, John Rae, Isabella Bird, these are grand adventurers. Then step it up a notch with giants like Charles George “Chinese” Gordon (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_George_Gordon) (general for China, India, Egypt and Britain, abolitionist, peacemaker, minister, governor) or Richard Francis Burton (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Francis_Burton) (English explorer, translator, writer, soldier, orientalist, ethnologist, linguist, poet, hypnotist, fencer and diplomat; known for his travels and explorations within Asia and Africa as well as his extraordinary knowledge of languages and cultures; according to one count, he spoke 29 European, Asian, and African languages). And just read the biography of Sir Samuel Baker (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Baker) and his wife Florence Baker, Hollywood couldn’t afford to make a movie showing his adventurers. They guy marries a girl he rescues from a slave market, with a genuine maharaja in tow, then galavants around the world and to every continent hunting, building railroads, fighting slavers, etc. Its this over the top sense of adventure, but adventure with style that makes it so appealing. Whether its Sherlock homes with his hat and pipe, Stanley’s casually understated “Livingston I presume” or Michael Caine’s Lt Bromhead quietly approving as his men sing “Men of Harlech” at the advancing Zulu horde; it’s a very unique, special style.

[Manga Shoggoth]

The Victorian era is also well-known for its great, romanticised feats of engineering, such as the construction of the railways.

And since someone has already mentioned plumbing, the London Sewers.

[Ormur]

I'm not much of steampunker but I can understand the fascination for the aesthetic and spirit of Victorian age. It's in some instances a very modern period, with the advent of industrial society, organised science and modern fashion (for males at least). On the other hand it's before modernism displaced the classical and completely threw the past out of the window. So we have a mix of modern society and classical, elegant aesthetics. The Victorians to name an example invented the modern suit but it was still kind of aristocratic, with all the cool accessories like monocles, canes, pocket watches, waistcoats, top hats etc. They built houses, indeed entire cities in the classical European style (adding to it neo-gothic) with modern building methods. The Steampunk connection comes with things like big beautiful brass engines perhaps even housed in classical buildings (I'm thinking of a hydroelectric powerplant from the early 20th century, not strictly Victorian but pre-modernist).

Basically I think it's a combination of modern science and industry and classical aesthetics. Modernism in the middle of the 20th century displaced all that by rejecting the aesthetics of the past in favour of "functionality". Now the continuum is lost and we're stuck with post-modernism which can only imitate the past as a caricature. Even steampunk, which takes the Victorian blend of modern and classical to the max, suffers a bit from that and is more post-modern than classical but I still like it.

Although I'm a bit bitter towards modernist aesthetics I still prefer modernity in most other respects, gender roles, egalitarianism, emancipation and technology.

[Agamid]

i like the fashion of the victorian era, and i just loooove Art Nouveau. but that's just about where my like of steampunk ends.

there is a rather large steampunk subculture in brisbane (where i spend the last 13 years) and i always found the people to be really elitist and two-faced, and a little too obsessed with the steampunk fantasy, to the extent where i thought some of them needed reminding that is was just a fantasy.