Victorian Vision

by John M. MacKenzie

One hundred years after the death of Queen Victoria, Western culture still bears the indelible imprint of her reign. The hallmarks of the modern world -- global commerce and communications, shopping and leisure, sports and entertainment -- first emerged during the Victorian era. This landmark book, published to accompany a major exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, immerses readers in a wealth of imagery and facts that bring to life this extraordinary period of human achievement.The Victorian Vision presents life in the latter part of the 19th century on both a grand and intimate scale, from the small innovations that began to transform domestic life to the huge societal shifts brought about by expanded rail and maritime travel to the new trends in art and design fueled by access to Africa and the East. With superb illustrations and expert texts that illuminate their subject without confining it within a 21st-century point of view, this book not only revisits a colorful period in history but also re-examines the origins of our own era.

Genres: History, Nonfiction

360 pages, Hardcover

First published March 30, 2001

About the author

John M. MacKenzie is Emeritus Professor of imperial history at Lancaster University and holds honorary professorships at the University of Aberdeen, St. Andrew and Edinburgh. He has published on many aspects of the cultural and environmental history of the British Empire. He edited the Manchester University Press Studies in Imperialism series for thirty years. He was Editor-in-Chief of the four volume Wiley-Blackwell Encyclopaedia of Empire and is Editor-in-Chief of the journal Britain in the World.

Reviews

[Rena Sherwood · Rating 3 out of 5]

Damn -- that was a big book.



Just Victorian your brains out here. You may now even get some of the in-jokes in Sherlock Holmes stories. This muscle-puller of a book is not all prose -- lots of images help break up the huge pages of small text. If I remember correctly, each chapter is written by a different writer, but the writing style is pretty uniform throughout. There's so much information you'll be soaking in it.

I see the subtitle is "Inventing New Britain." Wouldn't the Victorians be proud of the New Britain?

[Jbondandrews · Rating 3 out of 5]

The pictures in this book were beautifully presented and very colourful and expressive. It was a well written book and informative.

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

This a book revealing the creative and inventions of the victorian era which I found interesting.