Direct Speech and the Eclipse of the Hero in Some Nineteenth Century Novels

This thesis argues that the active, masculine, dominant, or substantial hero is virtually non-existent in the major English novel of the nineteenth century. Moreover, it contends that certain factors outwith the novel were responsible for changes in the perception of the hero in the nineteenth century. A major factor was the concept of Realism which modified the craft of the writer and the expectations of the novel reader. Another significant change was that middle-class ideology influenced the speech style of the hero in the nineteenth century English novel