Summary and Analysis of “Appendix B: Religion and Factory Reform”, Elizabeth Barrett Browning Selected Poems

In this blog, I will be summarizing a text from Peter Bayne about religion in Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s poetry and two other texts from Frances Trollope and the Irish Unviversity Press Series of British Parliamentary Papers, both dealing with the employment of children in factories.

Religion

From Peter Bayne, Two Englishwomen: Mrs. Browning and Charlotte Brontë (London: James Clarke, 1881)

Summary

First, Bayne makes a comparison between Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s and the 17^th century poet John Milton’s works about religion and explains that Milton’s Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained are better works than Browning’s A Drama of Exile and The Seraphim. Then he makes a distinction between the two poet by explaining how their works deal with the death of Christ.

Analysis

Peter Bayne’s text is based upon a comparison between Elizabeth Barrett Browning and John Milton. At first he affirms that Milton’s literary skills were better than Browning’s: “As works of literary art, the performance of Mrs. Browning cannot enter into rivalry with those of Milton”. But then he explains that the two poets’ ways of dealing with the death of Christ differ. To Bayne, the best treatment of this topic is Browning’s: “On the other hand, Mrs. Browning is in some respect – and these important – more successful in the treatment of the subject than Milton”. According to him, Milton “has almost ignored the death of Christ” whereas Browning “seeks to penetrate into the spiritual meanings of the death of Christ, into the mystery of sorrow shared by Divinity, into love that, through death, conquers death and hell”. It seems obvious that to Bayne, Browning’s work deals more deeply with the subject of religion and particularly with the death of Christ.

 

Factory Reform

Summaries

From Frances Trollope, The Life and Adventures of Michael Armstrong, The Factory Boy (London: Henry Colburn, 1844; serial publication, 1840)

In this excerpt of his novel, Trollope first describes the factory in which children are working. He gives many details concerning the machinery and the atmosphere there. Then he describes the working children. He insists on their appearance, the way they have to do their work and their movements.

From On the Employment of Children and Young Persons in the Irons trades and another Manufactures… and on the actual State, Condition, and Treatment of such Children and Young Persons (1841)

This text is composed of five parts which describe the working conditions of five children and young persons. These excepts of reports give details about the work of these people and  their harsh working conditions. These are the five people presented in this text: Eliza Field, age going on 10; Mary Field age going on 11; Sarah Field, age going on 14; Edward Coleman (age unknown); Unknown, aged 19.

Analysis

These two texts clearly condemn the working conditions of children during the 19^th century. Trollope presents the factories as being like an hell thanks to his descriptions: “every sight, every sound, every scent that kind nature has fitted to the organs of children, so as to render the mere un fettered use of them a delight, are banished for ever and ever”; “the scents that reek around, from oil, tainted water, and human filth”. The emphasis on senses makes the reader realizes the unpleasant and awful atmosphere of the place.

Both texts presents the children as victims of the work in factories and manufactures. Trollope describes them as: “hundreds of helpless children, divested of every trace of health, of joyousness, and even of youth”; “lean and distorted limbs – sallow and sunken cheeks – dim hollow eyes, that speak unrest and most unnatural carefulness, give to each tiny, trembling, unelastic form, a look of hideous premature old age”. With these descriptions, children appears as weak, old, exhausted. It shows how they were exploited and reinforces the feeling of injustice we can feel. In the excerpts of the reports from the Irish University, children are presented with a more individual way, but the impact on the reader is the same. The children are perceived as low-paid victims with no possibility of education and no better future: “gets a shilling a week”; “never heard of another world, nor of heaven, nor of another life”; “she has worked over-hours”; “was taken away at 10 years of age to go to work; has never been able to go to school since; would be glad if she could”.

The dangerous aspect of working in the factories is also mentioned in these texts. Indeed, the working conditions of children were dreadful and children were often wounded or died because of the lack of safety, as we can read in the reports: “many children are burnt to death”; “only yesterday a boy was killed, another had both legs fractured, and several were injured”; “a boy […] was killed on the spot by the weight of the tips that fell upon him; another boy had both his thighs broken and one arm, another boy had his knee hurt, another his arm, and one hurt his back”. All these descriptions deliberately inform the readers to make them react against the work for children in such conditions.

I think that these texts make us be aware of this terrible aspect of the 19^th century society. It also make us understand why poets such as William Wordsworth and Elizabeth Barrett felt concern about it and wrote poems such as Wordsworth’s “The Chimney Sweeper” and Browning’s “The Cry of the Children”.