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- The Dubious Character of the Gentleman
- CBaldini | Spring 2004
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- A gentleman was defined by his pedigree and family history=birth
- …or by whom he was known (that is, powerful alliances) = rank
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- Middle class influence the definition: Social mobility facilitated by
wealth.
- Imitated behaviors and customs of the Gentleman of Birth, and soon
became “the real thing.”
- Education: Wealth could send sons to Cambridge or Oxford, which prepared
younger sons for taking orders or going into civil service.
- Wentworth? Oh, ay—Mr. Wentworth, the curate of Monford. You misled me
by the term gentleman. I thought you were speaking of some man of
property: Mr. Wentworth was nobody, I remember; quite unconnected […]
- Sir Walter Elliot (Jane Austen, Persuasion)
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- Slide towards gentility as behaviorally defined characteristic. (cf.
Austen)
- Samuel Smiles, Self-help (1859) Definition of “a true gentleman”:
"a keen sense of honor – scrupulously avoiding mean actions. His
standard of probity in word and action is high. He does not shuffle or
prevaricate, dodge or skulk; but is honest, upright and straightforward“
- “If a man is obliged to take even the life of another, in the disharge
[sic] of his duty, he should do it with perfect kindness and
courtesy”
Thomas Low Nichols, How to Behave, 1873
- => Wholly based on individual conduct.
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- The Newman definition
- Concerned with the comfort of others
- Unobtrusive, “furniture-like”
- Amusing, delicate, gentle, accommodating –
- Doesn’t gossip, doesn’t bear malice, turns the other cheek, disciplined
intellect = morally superior. (Seems very similar to Arnold’s ideas of
the “cultured” individual)
- Distinctly Christian characteristics.
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- Education, preferably public school, and then Oxbridge.
- Prepared for holy orders, law, or civil service.
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- Pip: Conflict between material signs of gentility and innate integrity.
- Outward signs of gentility are deceptive (Estella’s origins, the source
of Pip’s “Expectations”)
- A gentleman remains always active. Leisure for its own sake is
characteristic of degeneracy.
- True gentility is not a matter of money or position (Joe Gargery)
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- Castronovo, David. The English Gentleman : Images and Ideals in
literature and society. New York, 1987.
- Young, Arlene. Culture, Class, and Gender in the Victorian Novel:
Gentlemen, Gents, and Working Women. New York, 1999
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