Published to accompany an exhibition held at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, in 2001.

During the nineteenth century, Britain became the first gaslit society, with electric lighting arriving in 1878. At the same time, the British government significantly expanded its power to observe and monitor its subjects. How did such enormous changes in the way people saw and were seen affect Victorian culture? To answer that question, Chris Otter mounts an ambitious history of illumination and vision in Britain, drawing on extensive research into everything from the science of perception and lighting technologies to urban design and government administration. He explores how light facilitated such practices as safe transportation and private reading, as well as institutional efforts to collect knowledge. And he contends that, contrary to presumptions that illumination helped create a society controlled by intrusive surveillance, the new radiance often led to greater personal freedom and was integral to the development of modern liberal society. The Victorian Eye’s innovative interdisciplinary approach—and generous illustrations—will captivate a range of readers interested in the history of modern Britain, visual culture, technology, and urbanization.

US scholars of literature explore how illustrated books became a cultural form of great importance in England and Scotland from the 1830s and 1840s to the end of the century. Some of them consider particular authors or editions, but others look at general themes such as illustrations of time, maps and metaphors, literal illustration, and city scenes. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

A study of British and American Utopian writing of the 1800s in the context of developments in real architectural, political, and cultural life. The book studies utopian visions published in the UK and the USA in the 1800s by writers such Robert Owen, James Silk Buckingham, Edward Bellamy, and William Morris.

Work by contemporary artists from the U.S. and the U.K. that evokes a Victorian sensibility. The essays look at parallels between the two periods: turn-of-the-century anxiety, intellectual curiosity, consumerism, a preoccupation with sex and morality, an infatuation with new technology.

A study of how artists and photographers shaped imperial visions of war and peace in the Victorian period In an era that saw the birth of photography (c. 1839) and the rise of the illustrated press (c. 1842), the British experience of their empire became increasingly defined by the processes and products of image-making. Examining moments of military and diplomatic crisis, this book considers how artists and photographers operating "in the field" helped to define British visions of war and peace. The Victorians increasingly turned to visual spectacle to help them compose imperial sovereignty. The British Empire was thus rendered into a spectacle of "peace," from world's fairs to staged diplomatic rituals. Yet this occurred against a backdrop of incessant colonial war--campaigns which, far from being ignored, were in fact unprecedentedly visible within the cultural forms of Victorian society. Visual media thus shaped the contours of imperial statecraft and established many of the aesthetic and ethical frames within which the colonial violence was confronted.