Harkins, S.

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blo gs.lse.ac.uk http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/lsereviewofbooks/2013/05/20/book-review-dickens-and-race/by Blog Admin May 20, 2013Book Review: Dickens and RaceDickens and Race offers a unique contextualisation of Dickens’s fictional engagements with race in relation tohis lesser-known journalism, with wider nineteenth-century debates about differences between humans, withissues of empire, and with the race shows of London. A potentially invaluable resource for students interestedin Charles Dickens, Victorian studies, racial difference and empire, and childhood, writes Steven Harkins.Dickens and Race. Laura Peters. Manchester University Press.January 2013.Find this book: Did the social crit ic, ‘champion of  the oppressed’, and celebrated Victoriannovelist Charles Dickens advocate genocide on behalf  of  the Brit ishEmpire? This is one of  the questions tackled by Laura Peters in her newbook Dickens and Race, published to coincide with the bicentenary of  oneof  the best known literary f igures f rom the Victorian era.Peters is a specialist in nineteenth-century literature and this bookexamines literature, journalism, and letters written by Charles Dickens inorder to produce a thoroughgoing, sharp, and surprising examination ofhis of ten controversial views on the subject of  racial dif f erence. The bookexamines how Dickens’ early views on the subject of  race are shaped byhis voyages in the ‘paper boats’ of  boyhood Af rican adventure stories,alongside other narratives f rom his childhood like the Tales of the ArabianNights and Robinson Crusoe. As an adult, Dickens was to become‘attracted to the increasingly inf luential narrative of  science’ in order to gain a betterunderstanding of  racial dif f erence. Although Dickens’ views on race were to change over t ime,Peters argues that his thoughts were consistently shaped by the two inf luential ideas of  the ‘exotic off ancy’ and the ‘scientif ic narrative of  racial thinking’.In chapter 3, Peters examines Dickens’ 1853 essay on The Noble Savage, arguing that it represents ‘part ofa continuum of  thinking about race that spans over 12 years’. This runs contrary to the view of  GraceMoore, a f ellow scholar of  Dickens, who argues that the piece is at odds with the author ’s wider body ofwork. Peters does an excellent job of  contextualising The Noble Savage by examining the practice ofholding exhibit ions of  dif f erent races; she also highlights the ongoing debates about slavery and Dickens’own visit to America in 1842. Dickens sees a dichotomous relationship between civilisation and savagery towhich race is central. He rejects the concept of  nobility in other races because he understands them to be‘biologically inf erior ’. One of  Dickens’ most controversial quotations f rom The Noble Savage comes whenhe asserts; ‘I call a savage something highly desirable to be civilised of f  the f ace of  the earth’. Scholars likeBernth Lindf ors have argued that Dickens was calling f or ‘cultural, not literal genocide’. However, in thef ollowing chapter, Peters is able to cast doubt over this view.Chapter 4 f ocuses on Dickens’ response to the ‘Indian Mutiny’ of  1857, an event described in India as their‘First War of  Independence’. News coverage of  the incident at the time f ocused on f alse allegations ofenf orced cannibalism which ‘served to mobilise the society around a discourse of  extermination’. In a letterwritten in October of  the same year Dickens argues that:‘I wish I were Commander in Chief  in India. The f irst thing I would do to strike that Oriental race…should beto proclaim to them, in their language,…that I should do my utmost to exterminate the Race upon whom thestain of  the late cruelt ies rested;…to blot it out of  mankind and raze it of f  the f ace of  the Earth.Peters describes the letter as advocating ‘genocide as a response to the Indian mutiny’; her closeexamination of  the literature of  this period concludes that ‘this extermination rhetoric continues throughoutthe 1850s and beyond, becoming more ominous until it  arrives at the deadly eugenic rhetoric at the turn ofthe century’. The Indian uprising of  1857 also inf luenced one of  Dickens’ most f amous works, A Tale of TwoCities. The novel is set in the build up to and during the French Revolution and was published in 1859, justtwo  years af ter the Indian rebellion. Dickens emphasises the racial dif f erence of  the French revolutionarieswho are portrayed as ‘dusky’, and just as he had described the uprising in India this narrative portrays theFrench revolutionaries as ‘savages, murderous mobs and cannibals’ while the heroic characters are‘primarily Brit ish’. This description of  France sees the continuation of  the colonial idea of  civilisation inBritain juxtaposed with savagery overseas. By invoking concepts like cannibalism Dickens is still viewing theworld through ‘the lens of  the exotic’; although this type of  thinking was to f ace a sustained challenge f romthe scientif ic discourses of  the 1860s.In chapter 5 Peters examines how Dickens’ views were challenged by the publication of  On the Origin ofSpecies by Charles Darwin in 1859. This book ‘altered permanently’ the way that society was to think aboutrace. These advancing scientif ic discourses led Dickens to experience a crisis in his lif elong engagementwith f ancy which had ‘lost some of  its transf ormative power, replaced by rational knowledge.’ HerbertSpencer ’s inf luence is notably absent f rom this f inal chapter, which provides an account of  Dickens’ writ ingthroughout the 1860s. Spencer coined the term ‘survival of  the f ittest’ in his 1864 book Principles of Biologyand his arguments are very similar to those expressed by Dickens in his f inal years. The latter part ofDickens’ lif e saw him f ocus on ‘the clear linkage between neglected children, degeneration and savagery’.This is a period when Dickens writes about savagery in London, amongst the street-children of  CoventGarden in his last completed novel, Our Mutual Friend. Peters’ research also highlights an unconventionalway of  understanding Dickens’ writ ing on the subject of  poverty. She argues that Dickens understands theEast End of  London as ‘a site of  a degenerating race of  urban poor ’. This type of  thinking, linkingevolutionary concepts to social issues, was propagated by Herbert Spencer and would later be understoodas ‘Social Darwinism’.This enlightening book of f ers an unconventional perspective on Charles Dickens’ thinking on race and howit was inf luenced by debates, discoveries and historical events. These events have been expertly placedwithin a social, polit ical and historical context. This makes the book a potentially invaluable resource f orstudents in a variety of  disciplines. One of  the most striking f indings when reading this the book is that ithighlights how litt le popular discourses on race and poverty have advanced since the era of  CharlesDickens.—————————————————-Steven Harkins is an ESRC f unded PhD candidate based in the in the Journalism Studies Department atthe University of  Shef f ield. He is also a tutor and occasional lecturer in the same department. His PhDresearch f ocuses on reporting poverty and inequality in the UK press with a particular emphasis on therelationship between journalists and their sources. He holds a BA (Hons) in Journalism and Polit ics f rom theUniversity of  Stirling and an MSc with distinction in Media and Communication research f rom the Universityof  Strathclyde. Read more reviews by Steven.

Book Review: Dickens and Race by Laura Peters

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Book Review: Dickens and Race by Laura Peters

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