Category: Education

Feminist Approaches in International Relations

Feminism is the advocacy of the rights of women. It explains that women were deprived in comparison to men and are subordinate to men due to a gadget of patriarchy.

`Patriarchy’ is a gadget of social systems and practices via which men dominate and take advantage of women. It ought to be clear that it’s miles a social, now no longer organic characteristics. For feminism the factor of reference is the query of Gender and now no longer of intercourse.Feminism evaluation equations of masculinity and feminity.It has not anything to do with the organic male-female differences.’Masculinity’ is related to autonomy, sovereignty, and the ability for cause and objectivity, while feminity is related to the absence of those characteristics. These are known as gender identities. Under gender construction, navy offerings are regarded because the herbal area of masculinity.The first feminist withinside the global is “Christine de Pisan”. Every man isn’t always in a function of domination, and each female isn’t in a function of sub ordination. The feminist motion entails battle for political and felony rights and same possibilities for ladies. The feminist method to International members of the family is a phenomena of the post-bloodless conflict period. In the 1980s feminist Scholars start studies in diverse instructional disciplines, from literature to psychology to history.Some of th outstanding feminist students consist of Joshua S Goldstein,Peterson Spike and Anne Sisson Runyan,Ann Tickner and Jill streans. Feminist argue that the bounds of nation have ancient excluded women from home and global political life, and feature dealt with International members of the family because the Exclusive keep of men, wherein masculinity prospers via domination over women. According to feminists, the phenomenon,of own circle of relatives Subordination and male domination has constantly stay unchanged, whether or not from the guaranteed to the current nation, or from feudalism to capitalism or from nature-nation to international governance.The International members of the family idea favours men and excludes female due to the fact it’s miles guys who’s recognized with nation. Feminist writers locate fault with this Approach.Further it’s miles argued that global members of the family have completely targeted on struggle and anarchy, as additionally on worry and competitions, exactly due to the fact women lives and stories don’t have any been well researched.Feminist is an out increase of the notion that on account that attributes like humility, peace, tenderness, compassion and forgiveness are related to female who’ve been historically ignored, the examine of global members of the family has constantly remained targeted on strife and anarchy.

Three Strands of Feminism-While all feminist students agree at the primary published that gender is important, there may be no unmarried feminist method to global members of the family. There are numerous such tactics or ‘strands’ of the idea of global members of the family. There are 3 strands as highlighted through Goldstein-

1.Difference Feminism-This strands of feminism attempts to price the precise contribution of female as female. These feminists do now no longer assume that female do all matters in addition to guys do.The contrary is likewise genuine in sure different activities. Thus, due to their more revel in with nurturing and human members of the family, female are visible as doubtlessly greater powerful than guys in resolving conflicts and in group-choice making.

2.Liberal Feminism-The arguments of Difference feminists are rejected through liberal feminist as being primarily based totally on stereotyped gender roles.They see ‘crucial distinctions’ withinside the competencies of males and females as trivial or non existent. For liberals, guy and female are same.They condemn the exclusion of female from function of power,however do now no longer consider that inclusive of female could alternate the character of the International Relations.

3.Postmodern Feminism-Postmodern feminists have attempted to deconstruct the language of realism, particularly because it displays impacts of gender and intercourse. For example- the primary atom bombs have been male.They have been named as’Fat guy’ and ‘Little boy’.The coded telegram despatched to US government approximately the hydrogen bomb without a doubt said ‘it’s miles a boy’ however the plane that dropped the atom bomb on Hiroshima changed into known as ‘Enola Gay’, a lady gender. It changed into named after the pilot’s mother.These efforts locate intercourse and gender all through the sub-textual content of realism.

John Milton

John Milton was an English poet and intellectual who served as a civil servant for the Commonwealth of England under its Council of State and later under Oliver Cromwell. He was born in Bread street, Cheapside, London. His father was a money scrivener, an occupation that combined the duties of the modern banker and lawyer. As a child, John Milton attended St. Paul’s School, and in his lifetime he learned Latin, Greek, Italian, Hebrew, French, and Spanish. He attended Christ’s College, Cambridge, graduating in 1629 with a Bachelor of Arts degree, and 1632 with a Master of Arts.

After Cambridge, Milton spent six years living with his family in Buckinghamshire and studying independently. During his period of private study, Milton composed a number of poems, including “On the Morning of Christ’s Nativity,” “On Shakespeare,” “L’Allegro,” “Il Penseroso,” and the pastoral elegy “Lycidas.” In May of 1638, Milton began a 13-month tour of France and Italy, during which he met many important intellectuals and influential people, including the astronomer Galileo, who appears in Milton’s tract against censorship, “Areopagitica.” Milton was a Puritan who believed in the authority of the Bible, and opposed religious institutions like the Church of England, and the monarchy, with which it was entwined. He wrote pamphlets on radical topics like freedom of the press, supported Oliver Cromwell in the English Civil War, and was probably present at the beheading of Charles I. Milton wrote official publications for Cromwell’s government.

L’Allegro by John Milton

It was during these years that Milton married for the first time. In 1642, when he was 34, he married 17-year-old Mary Powell. The two separated for several years, during which time Milton wrote The Divorce Tracts, a series of publications advocating for the availability of divorce. The couple reunited and had four children before Mary died in 1652. It was also in 1652 that Milton became totally blind. In 1656, he married Katherine Woodcock.

In 1667, he published Paradise Lost in 10 volumes. It is considered his greatest work and the greatest epic poem written in English. The free-verse poem tells the story of how Satan tempted Adam and Eve, and their expulsion from the Garden of Eden. In 1671, he published Paradise Regained, in which Jesus overcomes Satan’s temptations, and Samson Agonistes, in which Samson first succumbs to temptation and then redeems himself. A revised, 12-volume version of Paradise Lost was published in 1674.

Many of his works have religious, political, and personal themes. For example, instances of imagery of light and darkness and good and evil can be found in several works, including the annotated examples given in the section below. Milton came to face his own battle with inevitable darkness as he began to lose his sight. In order to keep writing, he employed assistants. One of the most well known of his assistants is fellow writer Andrew Marvell. When the monarchy was restored in England in 1660, Milton was imprisoned, but later pardoned. He spent the rest of his life writing.

John Milton died in England in November 1674. There is a monument dedicated to him in Poet’s Corner in Westminster Abbey in London.    

High Court

The High Court is under the Supreme Court but operates above the Inferior Court. The High Court holds the highest position in the state’s judicial administration. The establishment of the High Court began in India in 1862, when the High Court was established in Calcutta, Bombay and Madras.

Articles 214-231 of the Constitution of India deal with the organization, independence, jurisdiction, authority, procedures, etc. of the High Court. Currently, there are 25 High Courts in the country. Of these, only three High Courts have jurisdiction over multiple states. In all Union Territories, there is an independent High Court in Delhi alone. The Union Territories of Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh have a common High Court.

Composition of the High Court- Each High Court consists of the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court and other judges appointed by the President. It seems necessary from time to time.

High Court judges are appointed by the President. The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court is appointed by the President after consultation with the Chief Justice of India and the relevant Governor. The appointment of other judges shall also apply to the Chief Justice of the relevant Supreme Court in two or more states, and the governors of all relevant states shall be consulted by the President. The 2014 Amendment Article 99 and the 2014 National Judicial Appointment Commission Act replaced the university system for appointing judges in the Supreme Court and the High Court with a new organization called the National Judicial Appointment Commission.

Judge Qualification – A person appointed as a judge in the High Court must have the following qualifications:

1. He must be an Indian citizen.

2. He should have served the judiciary for 10 years on the sovereign territory of India.

3. He is said to have been a Supreme Court lawyer for 10 years.

From the above, it is clear that the Constitution does not set a minimum age for a judge in a higher court.

Judge’s Oath -Anyone appointed as a judge in the High Court must take an oath before taking office.

1. Have true faith and loyalty to the Constitution of India.

2. Support India’s sovereignty and integrity.

3. Perform office duties properly and honestly, without fear or favor, and to the best of my knowledge and beliefs.

4. Support the Constitution and the law.

Judge’s term -The Constitution does not set a term for judges in the High Court. However, there are four provisions in this regard:

1. He will be in office until he is 62 years old.

2. He can resign in writing to the President.

3. At the suggestion of Congress, the President may dismiss him.

4. When appointed as a judge of the Supreme Court, he resigns from his post.

Who is Chaucer?

Geoffrey Chaucer was an English poet, author, and civil servant. The date of his birth is uncertain, but it is now generally accepted as being 1340. He was born in London. Chaucer’s family was of the bourgeois class, descended from an affluent family who made their money in the London wine trade. According to some sources, Chaucer’s father, John, carried on the family wine business. Geoffrey Chaucer is believed to have attended the St. Paul’s Cathedral School, where he probably first became acquainted with the influential writing of Virgil and Ovid. He entered the household of the wife of the Duke of Clarence (1357), and saw military services abroad, where he was captured.

The chief characteristics of Chaucer’s works are their variety in subject matter, genre, tone, and style and in the complexities presented concerning the human pursuit of a sensible existence. Yet his writings also consistently reflect an all pervasive humour combined with serious and tolerant consideration of important philosophical questions. From his writings Chaucer emerges as poet of love, both earthly and divine, whose presentations range from lustful cuckoldry to spiritual union with God.

Chaucer’s body of best-known works includes the Parliament of Fouls, otherwise known as the Parlement of Foules, in the Middle English spelling. Some historians of Chaucer’s work assert that it was written in 1380, during marriage negotiations between Richard and Anne of Bohemia.The poem uses allegory, and incorporates elements of irony and satire as it points to the inauthentic quality of courtly love. Chaucer was well acquainted with the theme firsthand during his service to the court and his marriage of convenience to a woman whose social standing served to elevate his own.

Chaucer is believed to have written the poem Troilus and Criseyde sometime in the mid-1380s. Troilus and Criseyde is a narrative poem that retells the tragic love story of Troilus and Criseyde in the context of the Trojan War. Chaucer wrote the poem using rime royal, a technique he originated. Rime royal involves rhyming stanzas consisting of seven lines apiece. Troilus and Criseyde is broadly considered one of Chaucer’s greatest works, and has a reputation for being more complete and self-contained than most of Chaucer’s writing, his famed The Canterbury Tales being no exception.

The Canterbury Tales is by far Chaucer’s best known and most acclaimed work. Initially Chaucer had planned for each of his characters to tell four stories a piece. The first two stories would be set as the character was on his/her way to Canterbury, and the second two were to take place as the character was heading home. Apparently, Chaucer’s goal of writing 120 stories was an overly ambitious one. In actuality, The Canterbury Tales is made up of only 24 tales and rather abruptly ends before its characters even make it to Canterbury. The tales are fragmented and varied in order, and scholars continue to debate whether the tales were published in their correct order. Despite its erratic qualities, The Canterbury Tales continues to be acknowledged for the beautiful rhythm of Chaucer’s language and his characteristic use of clever, satirical wit.

The legendary 14th century English poet Geoffrey Chaucer died October 25, 1400 in London, England. He died of unknown causes and was 60 years old at the time. Chaucer was buried in Westminster Abbey. His gravestone became the center of what was to be called Poet’s Corner, a spot where such famous British writers as Robert Browning and Charles Dickens were later honored and interred.

Governor

Articles 153 to 167 of the Constitution of India deal with state administrations. The state executives are made up of the governor, the prime minister, the Council of Ministers, and the state attorney general.

The governor is the chief executive officer of the state. But like the president, he is the nominal executive branch, and the governor also acts as a representative of the central government. Therefore, an office or governor has two roles. Normally, there is one governor per state, but the Seventh Amendment of 1956 made it easy to appoint the same person as the governors of two or more states.

The governor is neither directly elected by the public nor indirectly elected by a specially formed electoral college, as is the case with the president, who is a candidate for the central government. However, as the Supreme Court was held in 1979, the position of Governor is not the appointment of the central government. It is an independent constitutional office. The Governor’s Direct Elections Can’t Be Reconciled The parliamentary system is well established in the state, and the governor is only the head of the constitution, so he makes great efforts to arrange his elections and spend huge amounts of money. There is no meaning. The governor’s direct election at this point raises serious leadership issues in the state’s general elections.

Conditions for the Governor’s Office The Constitution of India stipulates the conditions for the Governor’s Office as follows. 1. He must not be a member of the Houses of Parliament or the Legislature

2. He has the right to use his official apartment without paying rent.

3. He is entitled to such rewards, benefits and privileges that Congress may decide.

4. During his tenure, his compensation and allowances cannot be reduced.

The governor shall serve a five-year term from the date of his inauguration. However, the five-year term is at the discretion of the President.

Governor Features

There are several governor features

1. All administrative acts of a state government are formally carried out on behalf of that state.

2. He can convene or postpone the legislature and dissolve the legislature.

3. He confirms that the annual account has been submitted to the Legislature.

4.He can grant pardons,reprives,respites and remissions of punishment of suspend,remit and commute the sentence of any person convicted of any offence against any law relating to a matter to which the executive power of the state extends.

Oliver Goldsmith

Oliver Goldsmith was an Anglo-Irish novelist, playwright, and poet. He was born in Pallas, a small village in County Longford, in Ireland, and he was the son of the poor but admirable curate of the village. His father, the village, and various local features are duly registered, and unduly idealized, in the poem The Deserted Village. In 1744, Goldsmith proceeded to Trinity College, Dublin; graduated, after some misadventures; and then tried various careers in turn law, medicine, and playing the flute at various places, including Dublin, Venice, Padua, and Leyden. During his years of wandering, he roved over Europe, playing the flute for a living; then in 1756, he returned to England, poor, unknown, but undaunted. During his later years, he was a member of Johnson’s famous club, where his artless ways his bickerings, witticisms. and infantile vanity was the mingled amusement, admiration, and contempt of his fellow members.

His Poetry

Though its poetical production is not large, it is notable. His first poem, The Traveller (1764), deals with his wandering through Europe. The poem, about four hundred lines in length, is written in the heroic couplet and is a series of descriptions and criticisms of the places and people which he had experienced. His only other poem of any length is The Deserted Village (1770). In this poem, as he deals with the memories of his youth, the pathetic note is more freely expressed. The peculiar humor and pathos of Goldsmith are hard to analyze. Both emotions arise from simple situations and are natural and free from any deep guile. Goldsmith’s miscellaneous poems are important, for they include some of his characteristic humorous and pathetic writing. The ballad called The Hermit is done in a sentimental fashion, the witty Elegy on the Death of a Mad Dog is suggestive of Swift without Swift’s savage barb, and the fine lines beginning “When lovely woman stoops to folly” are among the best he ever wrote.

The Deserted Village, Oliver Goldsmith

His Drama

Goldsmith wrote two prose comedies, both of which rank high among their class. The first, called The Good-Natur’d Man (1768), is not so good as the second, She Stoops to Conquer (1773). Each, but especially the latter, is endowed with an ingenious and lively plot, a cast of excellent characters, and a vivacious and delightful style. Based on the Restoration comedy, they lack the Restoration grossness. The second play had immense popularity, and even yet it is sometimes staged.

His Prose

The prose is of astonishing range and volume. Among his works of fiction, we find The Citizen of the World (1759), a series of imaginary letters from a Chinaman, whose comments on English society are both simple and shrewd. This series was contributed to The Public Ledger, a popular magazine. He wrote many other essays in the manner of Addison, almost as well done as those of Addison. His other important work of fiction is his novel The Vicar of Wakefield (1766), which is in the first rank of eighteenth-century novels. In addition, Goldsmith produced a great mass of hackwork, most of which is worthless as historical and scientific fact, but all of which is enlightened with the grace of his style and personality. Some of these works are An Inquiry into the Present State of Polite Learning in Europe (1759), his first published book; The History of England (1771); and An History of Earth and Animal Nature, a kind of text-book on natural history, which was published posthumously.

Goldsmith died after a brief illness in 1774, at the age of just 43, and is buried in London’s Temple Church. Johnson would remember him as a man ‘who left scarcely any kind of writing untouched and who touched nothing that he did not adorn’.

Chief Minister

The Chief minister is the actual executive branch. In other words, the Governor is the Head of State and the Chief Minister is the Head of Government. Therefore, the position of the Chief minister at the state level is similar to the position of the prime minister at the center.

The Constitution does not include specific procedures for the appointment of the Chief Minister, and Article 164 of the Constitution states that the Chief Minister is appointed by the Governor. However, this does not mean that the Governor is free to appoint the Chief Minister. Following the practice of parliamentary government, the governor must appoint the leader of the majority of the state’s legislative assembly as Chief minister. However, if neither party has a clear majority in parliament, the governor can exercise his personal discretion in the appointment and selection of the chief minister. Therefore, in such situations, the governor usually appoints the leader of the coalition or the largest party in parliament as Chief minister and demands a vote of trust in the House of Representatives within a month. If the incumbent Chief Minister died suddenly, no successor was found as the new Chief Minister, and the Governor had to appoint the Chief Minister, the Governor may need to make individual decisions in the appointment and appointment of the Chief Minister.

Chief Minister’s Oath- Before the Chief minister takes office, the Governor will take an oath of office and maintain confidentiality. In his oath of office, the Chief Minister swears as follows.

1. With true faith and loyalty to the Constitution of India

2. Perform the duties of his office faithfully and honestly

3. To support India’s sovereignty and integrity

4. To give justice to all kinds of people in accordance with the Constitution and the law, without fear, favor, affection or evil.

In a secret vow, the Chief Minister vows not to directly or indirectly communicate or disclose the issue under consideration to anyone.

The term of the Chief Minister is not fixed and he holds office during the pleasure of the governor.However this does not mean that the Governor can dismiss him at any time,but if he loses the confidence of the assembly he must resign or the Governor can dismiss him. The salary and Allowances of the Chief minister are determined by the state legislature.

Richard Steele

His Life

Sir Richard Steele was an Irish writer, playwright, and politician. He was born in Dublin, Ireland, in March 1672. The exact date of his birth is not known, but he was baptized on March 12. Steele’s father, an attorney, died in 1676, and his mother died the next year. He was placed under the guardianship of his maternal uncle, Henry Gascoigne, who was secretary and confidential agent to the Duke of Ormonde. In 1684 he began attending Charterhouse School, London, where he met Joseph Addison. Both Steele and Addison went to Oxford, Steele entering Christ Church in 1689 and transferring to Merton College in 1691. In 1695 Lord Cutts, to whom Steele had dedicated a poem on the funeral of Queen Mary, became Steele’s patron. Steele first served him as private secretary and then became an officer in Cutts’s regiment in 1697. Two years later Steele received a captaincy in a foot regiment.

Sir Richard Steele, self-portrait

His Drama

Steele wrote some prose comedies, the best of which are The Funeral (1701), The Lying Lover (1703), The Tender Husband (1705), and The Conscious Lovers (1722). They follow in the general scheme the Restoration comedies but are without the grossness and impudence of their models. Indeed, Steele’s one importance as a dramatist rests on his foundation of the sentimental comedy, avowedly moral and pious in aim and tone. In places, his plays are lively and reflect much of Steele’s amiability of temper.

His Essays

It is as a miscellaneous essayist that Steele finds his place in literature. He started The Tatler in 1709, The Spectator in 1711, and several other short-lived periodicals, such as The Guardian (1713), The Englishmen (1713), The Reader (1714), and The Plebeian (1719). The Plebeian is Steele’s most famous political journal, which involved him in a dispute with Addison, whose death in 1719 frustrated Steele’s attempt at reconciliation. Steele’s working alliance with Addison was so close and so constant that the comparison between them is almost inevitable. Of the two writers, some critics assert that Steele is the worthier. In versatility and originality, he is at least Addison’s equal. His humour is a border and less restrained than Addison’s, with a naive, pathetic touch about it that is reminiscent of Goldsmith. His pathos is more attractive and more humane. The aim of Steele’s essays was frankly didactic; he desired to bring about a reformation of contemporary society manners and is notable for his consistent advocacy of womanly virtue and the ideal of the gentleman of courtesy, chivalry, and good taste. His essays on children are charming, and he is full of human sympathy.

Joshep Addison and Richard Steele

His Politics

Steele served as the chief Whig propagandist; as the principal journalist of the Whigs in opposition, he was the antagonist of Jonathan Swift, who held the corresponding job for the Tories. Steele’s writings frequently made his political career perilous. Appointed commissioner of stamps in 1710, he was forced to resign from this office in 1713. That same year he was elected to Parliament from Stockbridge, but he was expelled in 1714 on a charge of sedition. After the accession of George I to the English throne in 1714, Steele obtained several political favors. In 1715 he was knighted and was re-elected to Parliament. Steele’s intemperance gradually undermined his health, and he suffered from gout for many years. In 1722 he wrote his last and most successful comedy, The Conscious Lovers. In 1724, still notoriously improvident, impulsive, ostentatious, and generous-Steele was forced to retire from London because of his mounting debts and his worsening health. He went to live on his wife’s estate of Llangunnor in Wales, and in 1726 he suffered a paralytic stroke. His health was broken, Steele died at Carmarthen, Wales, on Sept 1, 1729.

Realism

Realism emphasizes relation among nations as they have been and as they are.It is not concerned with the ideal world.It is the International interpretation of human behavior.

Realism or political realism as an approach of international relations has evolved over the centuries. Prominent among its earlier advocates were Indian scholar Kautilya, Chinese strategies Sun Tzu, and Greek scholar Thucydides, English philosopher Thomas hobbes also contributed to the evaluation of Realism. Their ideas may be called classical realism,though Morgenthau is now considered the principal classical realist. Morgenthau was the most systematic advocate of realism. However, British professor EH Carr writes: The “Twenty Years of Crisis” prepared the basis for Morgenthau’s development of the theory of realism. Realism is a school of thought that explains international affairs from the perspective of exercising power. The exercise of mutual power by the states is often referred to as realpolitik or simply power politics.

Hans J. Morgenthau:

Morgenthau from Germany could not tolerate the arbitrary domination and brutality of Hitler’s Nazi regime. He taught Americans national interests and established the “School of Realism in International Relations”. And for that he called it Political Struggle Power.Many Americans, obsessed with legalism and moralism, hated Morgenthau’s emphasis on national interests. However, it was only Morgenthau’s national interest that made sense in international affairs. He believed that “understanding national interests makes it easy to predict foreign policy movements.” He argued that “God is on that side,” that is, there is no universal morality. All government actions should be based on prudence and practicality.

Morgenthau equates what he calls “realism.” He believes that the flaws in the world are “the result of the forces inherent in human nature.” According to this approach to improving the WORLD, one must cooperate with these forces rather than oppose them. Like EH Carr, Morgenthau began his approach by defining a position against what he was seeing, if not the rule of the liberal utopian principle. Morgenthau listed six principle of political realism, which when taken together summarises his theoretical approach to the study of international relations. In the first chapter of his famous book “Politics among Nations”( 1948), Morgenthau states that his theory is called realism because it is concerned “with human nature as it actually is and with the historical process as they actually take place”.

Morgenthaus’s six principle of Realism- There are six principle’s of Realism

1.Politics is governed by objective laws which have their root in human nature. These laws do not change over time and are impervious to human preference. A rational theory of politics and international relations can based on these laws: infact any such theory should reflect these objective laws.

2. The key to understanding international politics is the concept of interest, defined from the perspective of power. By referring to this concept, politics can be regarded as an autonomous space of action. It imposes intellectual discipline on the viewer and gives a rational order to the political subject.

3. The form and nature of government authorities varies by time, place and situation, but the concept of interest is consistent. The political, cultural, and strategic environment greatly influences the form of power a state chooses to exercise, just as the types of power that appear in relationships change over time.

4.Universal ‘moral principles’ do not guide state behaviour,though state behaviour with certainly have moral and ethical implications. Individuals are influenced by moral codes but states are not moral agents.

5.There is no ‘universally agreed set of moral principles’ though States from time to time will endeavour to cloth their behaviour in ethical terms.

6.Intellectually, the political sphere is ‘autonomous’ from every other sphere of human concern,whether legal ,moral or economic. This enables us to see the international domain as analytically distinct from other fields of intellectual enquiry.

The Victorian Age

In the history of the United Kingdom, the Victorian era was the period of Queen Victoria’s reign, from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. Many events occurred during her reign in England and in the rest of the world. Many places in the British colonies were named after her. Even the nineteenth century has been referred to as the Victorian Era or Victorian England or the Victorian Age. Victoria also changed the way the monarchy in Britain worked. During her reign, Britain was the most prosperous nation in the world. England had gone from a rural society to an urban one. Britain did not lose a war during her reign. She also inspired authors to do writings on human rights and saving the poor. Victoria affected the rest of Europe because she was the “Grandmother of Europe”. She put on the Great Exhibition of 1851, the Golden Jubilee, and the Diamond Jubilee, to show how great the British Empire was. The British created a new renaissance.

The Victorian Age was a period of remarkable progress in physical as well as medical science. Henry Bessemer’s process which made possible the mass production of steel and Michael Faraday’s discoveries of electrical power added much to the material prosperity of the period. The use of chloroform in medical practice by Simpson in 1847 and the anti-septic surgery developed by Joseph Lister came as a great relief to the suffering humanity. In 1859 Charles Darwin, the great scientist of the day published “The Origin of Species”. It brought forth a rather shocking theory that man and all other species of life had evolved from a common source.

In no other period of English history was there such an output of literature as in the Victorian Age, Poetry, Prose, novel, history, and painting and writing on painting-all these were produced in large quantities. Alfred Tennyson who became the poet Laureate in 1850 was the greatest poet of the day. Robert Browning, famous for his dramatic monologues, was his nearest rival. Other poets of the period, but lower caliber, were Matthew Arnold, Swinburne, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, his sister Christina Rossetti, Fitzgerald, Coventry Patmore, and many others. Great among the prose were Carlyle, Macaulay, Ruskin, Newman, and many others. However, the most outstanding literary contribution of the period was the novel. As far as the novel was concerned it was an age of giants. Charles Dickens, George Eliot, Anthony Trollope, and many others. In the mid-Victorian period, there was a distinguished school of artists known as the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, who wanted to revive the art forms which existed in European art before the time of Raphael.

The latter half of Queen Victoria’s reign was noted for many reforms in the field of both politics and education. The Reforms Act of 1867 and 1884 extended the right to vote to larger and larger sections of society. This in turn necessitated reforms in the educational systems of the country. The educational reforms effected by Gladstone eradicated some of the anomalies which had become a stumbling block in the path of progress of the nation. The only problem which Gladstone failed to solve, because of the lack of co-operation from the House of Lords, was Home Rule for Ireland. At any rate, speaking, on the whole, the Victorian Age was a period of peace and prosperity.