Harriet Martineau, Deerbrook

Valerie Sanders (University of Hull)

The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.2.1.07: English Writing and Culture of the Victorian Period, 1837-1901.
Vol. editors: Gillian Fenwick (University of Toronto), Jessica Gossling (Goldsmiths College, University of London)

Dates

First circulation or publication 1839

Places

England (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Novel

Resources

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Recommended Reading

Harriet Martineau’s

Deerbrook

(1839) – described by the politician John Morley as “one of the books that give a rational person pleasure once, but which we hardly look forward to reading again” (Morley 1877, cited in Peterson 2007: 716) – is her only attempt at a three-volume Victorian domestic realistic novel. In her

Autobiography,

Martineau describes it as highly unusual for its time in focusing on middle-class life (

Autobiography

, 2007: 408-9). In this respect, it occupies an important transitional place between the novels of Jane Austen (which Martineau admired) and those of Charlotte Brontë, George Eliot, and Elizabeth Gaskell, all of whom are known to have read and enjoyed Martineau’s novel. Set in the fictitious village of Deerbrook, the novel concerns two…

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1406 words

Citation: Sanders, Valerie. "Deerbrook". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 28 January 2004; last revised 19 April 2024. [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=9841, accessed 20 April 2024.]

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