A Comparative Study of Social Satire in British Victorian Novels and Drama from a Comedic Perspective

DOI

10.2991/978-2-38476-511-9_34How to use a DOI?

Keywords

Victorian literature; social satire; comedy; novel; drama; Charles Dickens; Oscar Wilde; satirical art

Abstract

The paper performs a comparative reading of the art of social satire in British Victorian literature focusing on the distinct modes used in the novel and drama. From a Comic Studies point of view, this paper argues that the different formal structures of the genre create inherently different satiric strategies. The expansive, narrative-oriented, novel-size canvas was contrasted with the more contained, performance-oriented, stage-sized drama, which dictated fundamentally different satirical strategies and leads to distinct audience effects. The study looks mainly at canon works, which mostly come from Charles Dickens and William Makepeace Thackeray’s novels and works by Oscar Wilde and George Bernard Shaw. Specifically, it examines how these novelists used devices such as an omniscient narrator, detailed descriptions, and comedic characterization to critique the flaws of societal institutions and dominant moral norms. Conversely it looks at how playwrights take advantage of the immediacy of the stage, using clever dialogue, pithy language, and ironic commentary to launch a quick, pointed attack on the conventions and absurdity of upper-class life. After systematically making comparisons of their techniques, characterization, and target themes in the few example’s tables in this paper, it concludes that while both forms use comedy as a medium for making a social statement, they tailored their respective forms to work better in that medium. The satirizing in the novel has a breadth and immersive depth; satirical theatre is defined by its precision, intellectual acuity and immediate, communal impact. In this comparative study, it shows the flexibility of the comedic satire and how important comedic satire was in interrogating the complex social web of the Victorian era.

Copyright

© 2025 The Author(s)

Open Access

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

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TY  - CONF
AU  - Kai Wang
PY  - 2025
DA  - 2025/12/31
TI  - A Comparative Study of Social Satire in British Victorian Novels and Drama from a Comedic Perspective
BT  - Proceedings of the 7th International Conference on Literature, Art and Human Development (ICLAHD 2025)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 298
EP  - 305
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-2-38476-511-9_34
DO  - 10.2991/978-2-38476-511-9_34
ID  - Wang2025
ER  -