The Victorian Pastoral
After landscape painting, and portraits of farm animals, the tradition of ‘the Pastoral’
shows another use of farm imagery by Victorian artists. Referring to the lifestyle of
shepherds and cowherds, pastoralists use farming scenes and symbols, particularly
of sheep and shepherds, not to represent agricultural activity of the current time, but
as metaphors. Understanding these moral messages can tell us about Victorian
attitudes towards the world they lived in.
Illustrations to Robert Thornton’s Pastorals of Virgil, William Blake, 1821
 The Trustees of the British Museum
First published online in March 2009 by FACE and
supported by Arts Council England.
Text © Georgina Barney, Images as credited.
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‘The Pastoral’ has its origins in the Classical literature of the Greek and Romans
which instructed readers in the art of farming. ‘Romantic’ artists such as William
Blake and Samuel Palmer made illustrations of these poetic works. In particular,
they used etchings, woodcuts and ink drawings, rather than oils. In the wood
engravings of Blake shown above, powerful moons and mystical, wild-looking figures
are drawn with rough, intuitive lines. As I look at them, I feel that I am in a world far
away from that of either my own life, or that of Victorian Britain.
Although the Pastoral was originally a literary ‘genre’ it became a theme for art and
painting too. Victorian artists used it to look back to the Classical age. As Classical
poets had used agriculture as a theme to instruct their readers, so Victorian artists
used the pastoral to promote the values of traditional rural society as it was ordered
around farming.
The depiction of agricultural scenes from the Bible is also important to the Victorian
pastoral movement. In the ink painting Ruth returned from gleaning by Samuel
Palmer, the Old Testament character of Ruth is shown on her way back from
‘gleaning’. Gleaning was a practice by which farmers allowed the poor to take leftovers from the fields after the main part of the harvest had been gathered in. In
Palmer’s painting, Ruth looks strong and healthy, and appears to be prospering as a
result of this system. In Palmer’s world, however, the efficiency of modern farming
methods meant that the gathering of the harvest left no remainder for the poor. It
was a time of great unrest and rural poverty and this painting of Ruth makes a stark
contrast between Victorian Britain and a harmonious society depicted in the Bible.
The painting might be seen as a protest about the changes looked at in the previous
essay.
In the story of Ruth, the farmer who ends up ‘saving’ Ruth by marrying her, is seen in
the Christian tradition as a parallel figure to that of the Christ. The painting therefore
has a moral point, suggesting that the farmer is properly central to rural society and
embodies authority and responsibility in the rural world.
First published online in March 2009 by FACE and
supported by Arts Council England.
Text © Georgina Barney, Images as credited.
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Our English Coasts (Strayed Sheep), William Holman Hunt, 1852 (image, Wikipedia
Commons)
The painting Our English Coasts (Strayed Sheep) shows a gaggle of sheep at the
edge of a cliff. They are in disorder: perilously close to the edge and tangled
amongst brambles. Painted in oils, the scene is unlike those of Blake or Palmer. It is
so realistic that I have looked at it in the Tate in London and felt as though I could
reach out and touch the veins on the leaves of the brambles. There seems to be
nothing ‘romantic’ or imaginary about Our English Coasts. However, I think that it is
a pastoral painting in the way that it had meaning as it was originally produced and
received.
The coast depicted by Holman Hunt is specifically the south coast and the sheep are
perilously close to the edge of the cliff. This would have been significant to
Victorians who were terrified of the threat of foreign invasion from France. This, and
the patriotic, possessive original title of the painting ‘Our English Coasts’ served to
emphasise the identity of Britain as an ‘island’. Even though Britain is correctly more
than one island, it is a place which has its identity out of opposition to the (Catholic)
French and the European continent across the water.
First published online in March 2009 by FACE and
supported by Arts Council England.
Text © Georgina Barney, Images as credited.
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Sheep are understood in the Christian tradition to represent ‘followers’ of Christ. As
the Victorians saw the whole British nation as Christian and the scene is of an
English coast, the sheep in this painting can be said to embody the Victorian public.
Additionally, as they are ‘strayed’, the implication is that those responsible to act
pastorally over the Victorian public have neglected their duties. Consequently, we
can see this painting as a criticism of political and religious leadership, and a flawed
society.
In another painting by Palmer, Coming from Evening Church, villagers, in archaic
clothes, depart from a church in an orderly fashion. Trees frame the picture and
surround the human scene, with ominous mountains further off, and a full moon up
above. It is a dreamlike rural world. At the centre of the throng of people stands the
parson. Above him, the spire of the church points upwards, towards heaven.
Coming from Evening Church can be seen at:
http://www.tate.org.uk/servlet/ViewWork?workid=11045&tabview=image
The painting may not feature agricultural imagery but it is pervaded by pastoral
metaphor. The community are gathered around the religious head as his obedient
flock; the church behind them appears as the sheepfold, a place of protection in a
brooding landscape. Palmer’s painting, depending on the association in the Victorian
mind of Christ as the great Good Shepherd, charges clergymen and land-owners
with the responsibility and duty of dispensing with God’s authority. Coming from
Evening Church is a vision of a perfect society, in which sheep follow, and all is well.
In the pastoral paintings of Palmer and other Victorian artists, agricultural metaphors
convey political and religious messages and identify Victorian Britain as
conservative, English and Anglican. Reference to classical and Biblical ideas of
agriculture present the ‘ideal’ society as pre-industrial and rural, with agriculture at its
heart.
First published online in March 2009 by FACE and
supported by Arts Council England.
Text © Georgina Barney, Images as credited.
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