Category: Victorian Age

What did Thomas Carlyle mean by “Close thy Byron; open thy Goethe” ?

A. Britain’s preeminence as a global power will depend on mastery of foreign languages.
B. Even a foreign author is better than a homegrown scoundrel.
C. Abandon the introspection of the Romantics and turn to the higher moral purpose found in Goethe.
D. In a carefully veiled critique of the monarchy, Byron and Goethe stand in symbolically for Queen Victoria and Charles Darwin respectively.

What did Victorian journalists mean by terming certain women surplusor redundant ?

A. They remained unmarried due to a population imbalance between the sexes.
B. Their willingness to work for low wages resulted in a surplus of textiles, causing them to drop in price.
C. They were women writers who wrote frequently about similar topics.
D. They prostituted themselves as a way to make money in a market economy that didn’t provide extensive job opportunities to women.

What did Thomas Carlyle mean by Close thy Byron; open thy Goethe ?

A. Britain’s preeminence as a global power will depend on mastery of foreign languages.
B. Even a foreign author is better than a homegrown scoundrel.
C. Abandon the introspection of the Romantics and turn to the higher moral purpose found in Goethe.
D. In a carefully veiled critique of the monarchy, Byron and Goethe stand in symbolically for Queen Victoria and Charles Darwin respectively.