''Sybil, or The Two Nations'' is an 1845 novel by

Benjamin Disraeli Benjamin Disraeli, 1st Earl of Beaconsfield (21 December 1804 – 19 April 1881) was a British statesman, Conservative Party (UK), Conservative politician and writer who twice served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. He played a ...

. Published in the same year as

Friedrich Engels Friedrich Engels ( ;"Engels"
''Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary''.The Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844 ''The Condition of the Working Class in England'' () is an 1845 book by the German philosopher Friedrich Engels, a study of the industrial working class in Victorian England. Engels' first book, it was originally written in German; an English ...

'', ''Sybil'' traces the plight of the

working class The working class is a subset of employees who are compensated with wage or salary-based contracts, whose exact membership varies from definition to definition. Members of the working class rely primarily upon earnings from wage labour. Most c ...

es of England. Disraeli was interested in dealing with the horrific conditions in which the majority of England's working classes lived — or, what is generally called the Condition of England question.

Political context

The book is a roman à thèse, or a novel with a thesis — which was meant to create a furor over the squalor that was plaguing England's working class cities. Disraeli's interest in this subject stemmed from his interest in the Chartist movement, a working-class political reformist movement that sought universal male suffrage and other parliamentary reforms. (

Thomas Carlyle Thomas Carlyle (4 December 17955 February 1881) was a Scottish essayist, historian, and philosopher. Known as the "Sage writing, sage of Chelsea, London, Chelsea", his writings strongly influenced the intellectual and artistic culture of the V ...

sums up the movement in his 1839 book ''Chartism''.) Chartism failed as a parliamentary movement (three petitions to Parliament were rejected); however, five of the "Six Points" of Chartism would become a reality within a century of the group's formation. Chartism demanded: #

Universal suffrage Universal suffrage or universal franchise ensures the right to vote for as many people bound by a government's laws as possible, as supported by the " one person, one vote" principle. For many, the term universal suffrage assumes the exclusion ...

for men #

Secret ballot The secret ballot, also known as the Australian ballot, is a voting method in which a voter's identity in an election or a referendum is anonymous. This forestalls attempts to influence the voter by intimidation, blackmailing, and potential vote ...

# Removal of property requirements for Parliament # Salaries for Members of Parliament (MPs) # Equal electoral districts # Annually elected

Parliament In modern politics and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: Representation (politics), representing the Election#Suffrage, electorate, making laws, and overseeing ...

Disraeli was particularly inspired by the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Children's Employment, which published a report interviewing working children in 1842. ''Sybil'' examines the moral corruption inherent in forcing children to work under such unpleasant conditions. The characters of the sixteen-year-old Dandy Mick and Devilsdust, who is abandoned by his mother and left to fend for himself, are particularly emblematic of this.

Characters

*Sybil Gerard *Charles Egremont *Lord Marney *Lord Henry Sydney *Lord de Mowbray *Rigby *Taper *Tadpole *Lady St. Julians *Marchioness of Deloraine *Baptist Hatton *Aubrey St. Lys *Sidonia *Devilsdust *Dandy Mick *Walter Gerard (Sybil's father) *Stephen Morley *Mr. Mountchesney

Adaptations

Disraeli's novel was made into a silent film called '' Sybil'' in 1921, starring

Evelyn Brent Evelyn Brent (born Mary Elizabeth Riggs; October 20, 1895 – June 4, 1975) was an American film and stage actress. Early life Brent was born in Tampa, Florida and known as "Betty." When she was 10 years old, her mother Eleanor ( Warner) die ...

and Cowley Wright. '' The Difference Engine'', a 1990

steampunk Steampunk is a subgenre of science fiction that incorporates retrofuturistic technology and Applied arts, aesthetics inspired by, but not limited to, 19th-century Industrial Revolution, industrial steam engine, steam-powered machinery. Steampun ...

novel written by

William Gibson William Ford Gibson (born March 17, 1948) is an American-Canadian speculative fiction writer and essayist widely credited with pioneering the science fiction subgenre known as cyberpunk. Beginning his writing career in the late 1970s, his ear ...

and

Bruce Sterling Michael Bruce Sterling (born April 14, 1954) is an American science fiction author known for his novels and short fiction and editorship of the ''Mirrorshades'' anthology. In particular, he is linked to the cyberpunk subgenre. Sterling's first ...

, contains alternate versions of several characters from ''Sybil'', including Sybil Gerard, Walter Gerard, Charles Egremont and Dandy Mick. It also features Disraeli himself as a character.

Bibliography

Editions

There is no critical edition of Disraeli's novels. Most editions use the text of Longmans Collected Edition (1870–71). *Disraeli, Benjamin ''Sybil''. (Harmondsworth:

Penguin Penguins are a group of aquatic flightless birds from the family Spheniscidae () of the order Sphenisciformes (). They live almost exclusively in the Southern Hemisphere. Only one species, the Galápagos penguin, is equatorial, with a sm ...

, 1987) . Edited with an introduction by

Rab Butler Richard Austen Butler, Baron Butler of Saffron Walden (9 December 1902 – 8 March 1982), also known as R. A. Butler and familiarly known from his initials as Rab, was a prominent British Conservative Party (UK), Conservative Party politici ...

and notes by Thom Braun. *Disraeli, Benjamin ''Sybil''. (Oxford:

Oxford University Press Oxford University Press (OUP) is the publishing house of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world. Its first book was printed in Oxford in 1478, with the Press officially granted the legal right to print books ...

, 1998) . Edited with an introduction and notes by Sheila Smith.

Works of criticism

*Braun, Thom ''Disraeli The Novelist''. (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1981) .

References

External links

* * archive.org: *
Vol I
(1845) *
Vol II
(1845) *
Vol III
(1845) * * British social novels 1845 British novels One-nation conservatism British novels adapted into films Novels by Benjamin Disraeli British political novels Victorian novels Social novels {{poli-novel-stub