Victorian Objectivity

Lest you come away thinking that the Victorians were wholly ruled by sentiment, it’s worth noting the counter-trend represented by clinical detachment, often under the mantle of science. This was a great era for empirical observation: Darwin’s 1851 On the Origin of Species mobilized bird beak measurements to shake the foundations of religious faith. And while sentimentality dominated in the arts, some poets and painters adopted the cold clinical pose of the scientist:

• Robert Browning, “My Last Duchess” (1842): a dramatic monologue written from the point of view of Alfonso II d’Este, a Duke of the Italian Renaissance suspected of having killed his wife (details here).
• Thomas Eakins, The Andrew Clinic, an unflinching painting of a surgery performed in front of an audience of medical students. Strickland has a sidebar presenting this remarkable painting on p86; I also recommend the close reading of the painting found here.