The Influence of Darwin's Origin of the Species on English Literature
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Author
Boyle, Rockwell S., Sr.
Subject
English literature
Influence (Literary, artistic, etc.) -- Sources
On the origin of species (Darwin, Charles)
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The title page of this thesis indicates that it was submitted to the Department of English "in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts." In the study of five important writers of prose as well as verse in the Victorian Age, we can see how the impact of Evolution was reflected in literature. The work of Da rwin, especially with its connotations on man (we have seen that the public was drawing these inferences even before Darwin stated them) gave a very novel and very stirring view point on the interpretation of man and his place in the Universe. The vihole of nature was reduced to biological growth, and the man was reduced, more than he had ever been, to a natural being. Alarming consequences must come, and we showed how they did, in religion and ethics. If there was a new interpretation of man, there was a new basis needed for man's code of living, or maybe he was even to lose his code of behavior. . . . The most striking things about the contribution of Darwin's The Origin of The Species are that it demanded an immediate adjustment in philosophy, it brought an immediate response from the public and from conscious literary artists and most of all it laid down a law: those writers of the post-Darwin age who wished to attain perpetuation in literature met the problem; those who continued to evade the question have proved unsatisfactory in their interpretation of life. [From Introduction]