Periodical
Essay: Addison and Steele
Q.What
does light ‘the periodical essay’ through on the social life of the 18th
century England with special reference to Addison and Steele.
Or:
Considers
‘the spectator papers’ as a record of English social life in the 18th
century.
Ans:
The 18th
century is remarkable as period in which the periodical essay that was a delicate
and sensitive synthesis of literature and journalism. Reigned supreme Addison
and Steele were the voices of a new and civilized life which sprang after the
fireworks of the Restoration. When they began writing then society was divided
into two camps of extremists. On the one side were the Puritans, insisting on
an impossible strictness of morals. On the other hand was the court, not yet
completely free from the dissolute license of the Restoration. The Puritans,
during their supremacy had imposed their own severity on others and was
avenging by indulging in extreme licentiousness.
The task of
Addison and Steele was to reconcile with this aim they brought philosophy out
of closets and libraries, schools and colleges, to dwell at clubs and
assemblies at tea-tables and in coffee-houses. Addison was employing wit on the
side of morality to raise the tone of the age. Steele had also the intuition of
the synthesis and worked to rallies it, though he sought it chiefly by way of
sensibility. In the Tatler, he
discovered the charm of tender sentiments, of family affection, of homely
manners. But it was Addison who enthusiastically coloured the Restoration
license with morality. In the periodical essays of Addison and Steele, the early
eighteen century life is conjured in such fullness that we seem to live there
and know and love the people whose commonplace lives float along the stream of
time, tide by bonds of family and passion.
It is Steel’s
Tatler that began the deluge of the periodical essays and the first issue of
the Tatler appeared on 12th
April, 1709, the Tatler appeared thrice a week. The general aim of the Tatler
is to expose the false arts of life to pull of the disguises of cunning vanity
affection and recommend a general simplicity in dress, discoursed and generosity.
The chief importance of the papers lies in its social and moral criticism. Suddenly,
Steele wound up the Tatler the second
January 1711, but two months later the
Spectator began which appeared daily except
Sunday. The Spectator became popular among English men and women belonging
to all wards of life. The best of all Periodical Essays, it is an important
human document concerning the morals and manners, thought and ideas of the
English society of the age of the Queen
Anne. An important aspect of Spectator was its envisagement of a club consisting of representative from diverse
words of life.
The Spectator
drew a large female readership as many of the papers were for and about women. Though
both Addison and Steele Whigs at in the Spectator, they crept up a fairly
natural political poise and in fact did their best to expose the error of the
political fanaticism of both the Tories
and Whigs (party).
About fashions
in dress and manners, we get plenty of information from ‘the Spectator’.
Foppish man alike will Honeycomb dedicated their lives to the worship of
fashion. Men like Sir Roger who
never dressed again, after his disappointment in love, were laughs at. About
the fashions of women, Addison wrote, “The toilet is their great
scene of business and the right adjusting of their hair the principal
employment of their lives. The setting of a suit of riband is reckoned a very morning’s
work.”
Addison portrayed
of the society of his age was not complete in all respects. He rigorously avoided
the Seamy Side- “rents, rags and uncleanness”- which was exposed by men like Defoe. Addison saw only the public life
of women and did not plunge into their psyche. Finally, we can say that both
Addison and Steele reflect the social life of 18th century England
with their periodical essays.
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