Developments and Expansion

The Anglophone historical novel was significantly and globally popular throughout the nineteenth century. The impact of the generic innovation of the early part of the century can be seen in the various waves of historical fiction through the 1800s, from the new work of the 1820s, a peak of popularity in 1830–60, and another wave in the 1880s. This chapter looks at some of the ways that history was conceived in these moments. Arranged broadly chronologically, the chapter shows how quickly the historical novel became theorised and reconfigured, responding to changes in the ways that history itself was undertaken but also driving how the past was imagined and engaged with. The historical novel became a mode for reimagining the national past, for rethinking agency, for challenging and supporting imperialism, and for expressing racist, colonial, white supremacist ideologies. There are specific, in-depth sections on Mary Shelley, Charlotte Brontë, William Wells Brown, George Eliot, Frances E. W. Harper, the historical novel and race in America (including work on Nathaniel Hawthorne and Catharine Maria Sedgwick), Leo Tolstoy, and Mark Twain.