The Victorians: In Their Own Words

Punch was a famous British weekly magazine which was very influential during the Victorian era and even well into the 20th century. We'll be reading some excerpts from it for you in this final episode of The Victorians: In Their Own Words along with some famous Victorian poems.

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Kipling was a Nobel-prize winning writer, but while many of his poems and short stories are still treasured today, he has also become quite a controversial figure. Let's hear from the man in his own words.

Charles Darwin is credited with the theory of evolution which he famously laid out in his book, On The Origin of Species, however, long before that volume was published, Darwin became famous for an account of his journey on the HMS Beagle, which includes details of his trip to the Galapagos Islands and the beginnings of an idea he would later term "natural selection".

Ada Lovelace is largely considered to be the world's first computer programmer. And she was a Victorian! The daughter of Lord Byron, she wasn't just famous because of her parentage, but also in her own right. Her and her collaborator Charles Babbage were instrumental in laying the groundwork for what would one day lead to the invention of modern computers.

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Florence Nightingale is the mother of modern nursing—and—she was a Victorian! Hear directly from Florence herself and all about her legacy in this episode of Their Own Words.

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In this week's episode, we read from Queen Victoria's diary and find out what it was like to be the monarch after which this fascinating period in history was named.

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Maria Cust was just 23 years old when she began penning her diary as the bride of an East India Company executive. The picture she left us is one of domestic bliss, though there were certainly trials when Robert was called away to India right after they had their first child together. In this episode of Their Own Words, get an idea of what it might have been like to be a middle-class mother in Victorian Britain.

Most of us are familiar with at least some of Charles Dickens's work. This Victorian author was a literary giant and left us stories like A Christmas Carol and Great Expectations. In this episode of Their Own Words Danny and Ava take a look at Charles's personal correspondence to get a measure of the man behind some of the greatest pieces of literature to come out of the Victorian age. Plus, hear brief excerpts from the Pickwick Papers and Charles's own travel memoir detailing a trip he took to America.

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"Please sir, can I have some more?"

What was Easter like in Victorian Britain? Actually, rather similar to today. Join Ava and Danny for this bonus Easter episode of Their Own Words where they talk a bit about Easter traditions and read from a book with which many Victorians would have been familiar: the Book of Common Prayer.