From the Young Student to the Old Caxtonian: Edward Bulwer-Lytton’s Lifetime Reflections on Victorian Ageing

Marta Miquel-Baldellou

University of Lleida, Spain

Edward Bulwer-Lytton, baronet, politician and highly-regarded novelist, has often been considered a representative Victorian man of letters. However, in addition to being a novelist, he was also a renowned essayist. Well-aware of his ancient heritage, his position in society, and his concern about posterity, tradition and progress became commonly-discussed themes in both his novels and essays. The way to interpret the past and the way to persist in time in the age to come became literary motifs that reflected his personal interpretations about ageing.

This paper is aimed at outlining Bulwer-Lytton’s main views as regards youth and old age, how these reflections evolved from his early life to his period of maturity, and in which ways Bulwer-Lytton’s thoughts on ageing may be termed as representative of the Victorian era. To that effect, two of his compilations of essays will be taken into consideration—The Student (1835), and Caxtoniana: A series of essays on life, literature, and manners (1862). The former, published when he was in his twenties, presents a series of papers Bulwer-Lytton wrote during his youth, while the latter brings together a series of essays Bulwer-Lytton published toward his early old age. The different thematic fields that he discusses in these two works, together with significant biographical details, are presented in an attempt to detect the evolution of his thoughts about ageing during these two different stages of his life.