Our class exhibition designed on COVE focuses on the history of children’s literature through canonical texts. Students will select one work from a list of chronologically arranged books, choosing 4-5 images for a virtual display case to illuminate the chosen book’s importance to the history of children’s literature. Students will write an introduction, headers, and captions for their case, complete a reflection on their experiences mounting an online exhibition on COVE, and contribute to an assessment of the exhibit.
Assemblies, balls, and dancing are central to the plots and themes of many of Jane Austen’s novels. Similarly, these events were central to sociability during the Georgian and Regency Eras, as they provided a socially acceptable setting for men and women to meet and begin forming relationships. Knowledge of these aspects of society help readers to better understand Austen’s writing. This exhibit displays various aspects of balls and dancing during the Regency Era, including assembly rooms, music, dancing styles, dress code, and overall ballroom culture and etiquette to provide historical context for the works of Jane Austen.
To better understand the world of Jane Austen's works, we need to understand the society she is writing in. Even though she does not often describe what her characters are dressed in, when she does bring up fashion, it is often notable in terms of character personality, social status, or plot. Regency fashion is notable in its distinct rejection of the former era of fashion as it had neoclassical influence, simplicity, and natural beauty.
A gallery exhibit showcasing the military, their role, and their impact on the society and world of Jane Austen and her novels. As Jane Austen spent a majority of her life during wartime and had brothers in the military, she was very familiar with how her militia behaved off of the battlefield. Many of the images presented are drawings of genuine military artifacts used by the English Miliary during the Napoleonic, French, and American Revolution wars. Other images are satirical pieces depicted the lives of the English common people during wartime. Regardless, the knowledge and understanding gained from each image gives the reader context into Jane Austen’s life and why she depicted the military in her novels in certain fashions.
A gallery exhibit showcasing religion in Jane Austen's Society. A variety of images are displayed and shown, including religious clothing from the time in which Jane Austen was alive, an 1806 King James Bible, old Church documents playfully filled out by Austen and a marriage witness signature from her and her sister, stained glass windows, and church pews that discuss designated seating between rich and poor individuals. The Anglican customs and beliefs are displayed throughout each of these gallery exhibits, as well as the extensive history of the Church of England, how Anglicanism shaped Austen's life, and how her career was affected by religion.
The shift from Abstract Expressionism in the 1940s to Pop Art in the 1960s refelcted societal changes influenced by postwar consumerism, technological advancements, and the rise of mass media.
While Abstract Expressionism emphasized emotional intensity and individual expression, Pop Art used bold, familiar imagery and commercial aesthetics to critique violence and address pressing social issues, using irony to engage a wider audience in anti-war and nonviolence messages. Pop Art also functioned as a protest against the perceived elitism of Abstract Expressionism, which, with its detachment from reality, was seen as inaccessible to the general public. Pop Art grounded its imagery in the real world, allowing viewers to connect more directly with their contemporary experience.
In a 1908 interview that appeared in The Strand, illustrator Sidney H. Sime claims his work was deeply influenced by his own "omnivorous and indiscriminate reading" (notably including works by Poe and De Quincey), by illustrator Aubrey Beardsley, and by Japanese art. According to Sime, Beardsley's morbid temperament and "extraordinary" technique had undoubtedly influenced himself and nearly every one of his contemporary illustrators. He claimed that the same was also true of Japanese Art. An illustrator of things morbid, strange, fantastical, and occult, it is fitting that Sime would come to illustrate literary works of fantasy, occult, and the weird, including fantasy works by Lord Dunsany and the weird/horror tales of Arthur Machen, an author whose early works were also illustrated by Beardsley. In this exhibit, we explore how both Beardsley and Sime contributed to the difficult work of visualizing strange, unseen worlds and chilling, ineffable horrors that (as Machen...
This gallery includes images and information to supplement the 1851 narrative “An Account of Some Strange Disturbances in Aungier Street," by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu, in the collection Shades of Meaning: A Haunted Victorians Anthology.
This gallery includes images and information to supplement the 1852 narrative “The Old Nurse's Story," by Elizabeth Gaskell, in the collection Shades of Meaning: A Haunted Victorians Anthology.
This gallery includes images and information to supplement the 1882 narrative "The Open Door," by Charlotte Riddell, in the collection Shades of Meaning: A Haunted Victorians Anthology.
This gallery includes images and information to supplement the 1892 narrative “The Skeleton,” by Rabindranath Tagore, in the collection Shades of Meaning: A Haunted Victorians Anthology.
This gallery includes images and information to supplement the 1894 narrative “Herself,” by Mary Elizabeth Braddon, in the collection Shades of Meaning: A Haunted Victorians Anthology.
Immigration has profoundly shaped New Jersey's cultural identity, enriching its communities through diverse traditions, cuisines, and arts. Since 1960, waves of immigrants have revitalized neighborhoods, fueled economic growth, and introduced new perspectives that define the state’s vibrant and inclusive character. This exhibit explores the dynamic ways immigration has woven itself into the fabric of New Jersey, celebrating the stories, contributions, and cultural legacies that continue to inspire its future.
Our class gallery on COVE will focus on the Great Exhibition of 1851—Prince Albert’s brainchild and, to the Victorians, the greatest sight in the history of the world. The Great Exhibition, which ran from May 1 to October 15, 1851, celebrated the global prominence of British industry and the manifold achievements of the “civilized” world. Approximately 6 million people—a third of the British population of that time—visited the Crystal Palace, a cast-iron and glass building erected in Hyde Park to house the exhibitions on display. Over 40 times, Queen Victoria visited the...
The major premise of EN 230: The BIble As Literature is that the Bible is not only a seminal text of Western culture as the foundational texts for Judaism...
This gallery collects examples of the ‘afterlives’ of the Victorian Gothic – the ways in which it has persisted into the 20th/21st centuries in literature and in all kinds of popular culture forms – movies, TV, podcasts and other online narratives, manga, anime, comic books , photographs and images – almost any form you can think of. Students in the class are collecting these and contributing them to the gallery from which we draw examples we’ll look at at the end of each class.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning's original manuscript of "The African" was completed in the early 1820s when EBB was in her early teens. One source of inspiration for the narrative poem came from her cousin, Richard Barrett, who owned sugar plantations in Jamaica. EBB kept Barrett's written account of an escaped slave, originally named Copperbottom, but altered the tone of the story significantly in her version.
Richard Barrett (1789-1839) was a cousin of Elizabeth Barrett Browning's father, Edward Barrett Moulton Barrett. Richard Barrett was a prominent political figure for much of his life, speaking in Britain's Parliament on behalf of the Jamaican legislature on matters concerning slavery and emancipation. Though he defended the interests of the slaveholders at the time of the Slavery Abolition Act of 1833 and was himself the owner of two sugar plantations in St. James, he had a reputation for nonviolence towards the enslaved people who worked on the family's land and called for more humane practices by the masters. This reputation may have contributed to the sparing of at least two of the Barrett family's plantation houses, his own Greenwood Great House and ...
In a November 26, 1869, letter to E. W. Stoughton, Hiram Powers recounts the history behind his inspiration for the Greek Slave. He describes the emotional distress caused by Turkish atrocities—namely, genocide and enslavement—enacted during the Greek War of Independence (1821-1829) and configures the Greek Slave as a representation of the innocence, exploitation, and moral strength of the Christian victims of such brutality. The core of this depiction lies in Powers's personal understanding of the ultimate purpose of art: "as there should be a moral in every work of art, I have given to the expression of the Greek Slave what trust there could still be in a Divine Providence for a future state of existence with utter despair for the present mingled with somewhat of scorn for all around her. She is too deeply concerned to be aware of her nakedness. It is not her person, but her spirit that stands exposed, and she bears it all as only Christians can" (26 Nov. 1869,...
While Victorian literature frequently employs the concept of “narrative prosthesis” to manage representations of disability, often through mechanisms resembling material or technological extensions aimed at restoring a sense of bodily "wholeness" (Hingston 370), a close examination of Dinah Maria Mulock Craik's work, The Little Lame Prince and His Travelling Cloak, reveals a more complex engagement.
Through this, it is clear that these “prostheses,” including magical gifts that function as artificial replacements or enhancements (Mitchell and Snyder 48), simultaneously function to normalize disability within the plot structure (Hingston 371) while narrative perspective subverts such normalization by emphasizing the social dimensions and pervasive nature of difference (Mitchell and Snyder 48), ultimately reflecting the complicated and ever-changing role of the body in Victorian thought (Hingston 370)...
This edition of The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám was published around 1933 by the Illustrated Editions Company, NY. Originally attributed to Persian poet, mathematician, and astronomer Omar Khayyám, the translation was copleted by Edward FitzGerald, a Victorian poet and writer. This particular edition features illustrations from British illustrator Edmund J Sullivan. This gift book features FitzGerald's preface, which precedes a printing of the first version of his translation, each stanza with its own page, facing one of Sullivan's illustrations, with a copy of the fifth version of his translation following the illustrated version.
This gift book upholds the Victorian tradition and value of gift books as it spread to America in the late nineteenth and into the early twentieth centuries. The Rubáiyát was especially popular during this time period, due to its plain language that granted moral depth to the poetry without becoming inaccessible. FitzGerald first...
An exploration of the "Heath Robinson Edition" of Omar Khayyám's Rubáiyát, translated by Edward FitzGerald and published in 1907 by Ernest Nister of London and E.P. Dutton & Co. of New York.
At Oregon State University, the Special Collections and Archives Research Center (SCARC) houses an extensive collection of different gift book editions of the Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyam translated by Edward Fitzgerald. This collection, known as the Dr. Sigurd H. Peterson Memorial Collection, was given to the university under strange circumstances. Little is known about Dr. Peterson, except that he was a former professor at the university. Dr. Walter Henry Ott endowed the university with this collection. It is still unknown why or how the Rubáiyát was important to either Dr. Peterson or Dr. Ott.
The Rubáiyát of a Scotch Terrier by Sewell Collins is one of the gift book editions in this collection. More specifically, this edition is a parody of Edward Fitzgerald's Rubáiyát. In this exhibit, this edition will analyze the basic features of the editions and what makes it special compared to others. It will also delve into the details of how the edition was created and its role...
