ABSTRACT
Through its focus on what Douglas Hesse calls “the essay of ideas”, Victorianism is rather poor in thing-essays. Nevertheless, in Thackeray’s “De Juventute” (1860), the contemplation of the countenance of George IV on a coin triggers a stream of memories from Mr. Roundabout’s youth. This nostalgic immersion in the associative mode harks back to a time that precedes the mechanised, accelerated Victorian society. Robert Louis Stevenson’s meta-reflective “Philosophy of Umbrellas” (1871) is more concerned with contemporary issues and humorously criticises the status symbols in a British class society whose interest in things has to a high degree become an interest in commodities. Its description of the umbrella’s sign value through Biblical references suggests that capitalism is replacing a Christian church in decline.
