Introduction
The Anglo-European perception of hearth and home, which is the traditionally-accepted view in west-dominated literature, revolves around a vivid and romanticized view of the physical space and place (Shelley 2004). In it, the home being described as an ancestral house, a castle of one’s own, a place where memories, traditions, and family are intertwined (Shelley 2004). This tradition persevered the test of time, to the point that even today, many contemporaries share a version of that view when asked about what home means to them.
Nevertheless, the Victorian perception of what constitutes the concept had undergone severe changes in the 19th century, when the heart of the British Empire saw a significant wave of migration into the metropolis from its colonies in the form of Indians, Africans, and Chinamen (Hall 2002). Prolonged engagement with other countries slowly dismantled the inherently nationalist and traditionalist perceptions of what constitutes home, creating a dissonance of behavior in individuals that had to travel outside of the British Isles, being reflected in. This paper will examine how the middle-class notions of social propriety and social mores are challenged in Conan Doyle’s The Sign of the Four and Stevenson’s The Beach of Falesa.
The Evolution of the Concept of Home in Victorian Literature as Shown by Doyle and Stevenson
The concept of home in the Victorian era emerged during the 17th century, which was the start of the British imperial expansionism into the Americas as well as West India (Shelley 2004). The perceptions of home, thus, were first separated from the mundane day-to-day living for those who had to travel long distances away from the Isles, in order to either secure these colonies, do trade, or engage in maritime employment.
These included soldiers, merchants, sailors, and colonists, among many others. Examples of such could be seen in both The Sign of the Four as well as The Beach of Falesa. In Sherlock Holmes’ adventurers, one of the protagonists (Doctor Watson) is a veteran from the Afghan wars (Doyle 2016). The story itself is also full of individuals that were connected to India.
All of the individuals that constituted “the sign of the four” were from that, as well as the deceased Captain Morstan, Colonel Sholto, and his son, Thaddeus Sholto (Doyle 2016). It is through the former two that we start seeing the classic romanticized perception of home – it is where the family and their people are, a place where cultural roots are strong.
Morstan’s letters back home are filled with love and nostalgia, as were those of Colonel Sholto (Doyle 2016). Both, at the same time, were involved in the British subjugation and control of India, which was known for its brutality (Herbert 2008). These men did not see India as their home, despite having lived and served there for many years. The colonies were perceived as places full of savages, foreign culture, and potential plunder. Thaddeus Sholto’s house was full of rarities and expensive items brought from India, as well as a multitude of servants/slaves (Doyle 2016).
At the same time, this shows the slow integration of foreigners into the British Empire. With the rise of migration, foreign quarters start to seep even into the idealized concept of home. Doyle’s (2016) descriptions of these places are hardly flattering, usually painted as unsafe, dark, poor, and downtrodden. While true that foreign quarters were often poorer and neglected compared to those of the middle class, they were not any different than other poor parts of the city, showing how the locals refused to accept these areas as parts of their home.
Thus, from The Sign of the Four, it is possible to see the struggle with incorporating migration and the dissolution of the perceived British national character through interaction with other cultures. They are described as decadently opulent at best, and as inferior and subservient at worst (Brantlinger 1988).
However, at the same time, the ideas of other people and cultures being equal to that of the Empire, and the ephemeral nature of the space also intrudes into the Victorian literature, as shown in The Beach of Falesa. The plot of the story is relatively familiar to the modern audience – a white man falling in love with the native and choosing to integrate into their society (Stevenson 2008). The same idea, in one way or another, can be found in many other contemporary stories, such as Pocahontas or The Last of the Mohicans (Shelley 2004). It shows how cultures clash and coexist with one another.
The main hero of the story, John Wiltshire, falls in love with a woman named Uma, a person he initially was talked into marrying as a means of improving relations for trade (Stevenson 2008). This marriage would hold no worth or value in the eyes of the culture back home, which made him agree to the plan. Over the course of the story, John ended up genuinely caring for his new wife, her people, and the place in general, enough to fight and kill a man for them, in order to save them from their superstitions being exploited (Stevenson 2008).
This shows not only a shift from the typical perceptions of natives as savages and their lands – as riches to be plundered (Herbert 2008). Although it certainly started off that way, John ended up shedding such preconceptions. He still felt the white man’s burden of protecting and guiding these people, and did view their beliefs, traditions, and superstitions as inferior, he did seem to care about Uma, their child, and the people (Stevenson 2008). He found a home there, in a physical sense.
The story ends with him worrying about the fate of his wife and children back home, which, instead of being an idealized picture, suddenly was presented with flaws and restrictions to be concerned about (Stevenson 2008). As such, the concept of home in the story became more developed, incorporating more cultural nuances and departed from the stereotypical picture of a brick house and white family with two or more children, which was the traditional perception of hearth and home during the beginning of the British expansion (Shelley 2004).
Conclusions
The concepts of home in the Victorian era evolved from the static, nationalist, and white-exclusive cultural paradigms of the 17th century to a more cosmopolitan view in the late 19th. Although many elements of the colonial and imperialist thinking persevered, as demonstrated in The Sign of the Four and The Beach of Falesa, the cultural backlash appears to mellow a little, when it comes to the second tale, putting forth a novel idea that home can transcend the physical limitations of space and place, and incorporate a cultural and metaphysical dimension.
The idea of home being where the heart is, was demonstrated in Sherlock Holmes’ stories, whereas The Beach of Falesa showed that a man could be happy with an indigenous wife and a child, far away from the place of his birth, hinting to a nascence of a more cosmopolitan view of home.
Reference List
Brantlinger, P 1988, Rule of darkness: British literature and imperialism 1830-1914, Cornell University Press, Ithaca.
Doyle, CA 2016, The sign of the four, CreateSpace, Scott’s Valley.
Hall, C 2002, Civilising subjects: metropole and colony in the English imagination, 1830-1869, Polity Press, Cambridge.
Herbert, C 2008, War of no pity: the Indian mutiny and the Victorian trauma, Princeton University Press, Princeton.
Shelley, M 2004, ‘Understanding home: a critical review of the literature, Sociological Review, vol. 50, no. 1, pp. 62-89.
Stevenson, RL 2008, South sea tales, Oxford University Press, Oxford.