Octavia Hill, Dickens and the houses of the London poor

Abstract

This dissertation deals with the topic of housing during the Victorian Age, with a particular attention to the dwellings of the London poor. For this reason, great attention has been given to the figure of Octavia Hill who has been one of the most important philanthropists of Victorianism. A pioneering of English housing system, Octavia Hill developed a method to improve the housing service in London during the Victorian age, by giving a particular assistance to the London outcasts. Thus, the first part of this paper analyses the general historical background of nineteenth century by above all focusing the attention on the social and economical conditions of Victorian England. The figure of Octavia Hill represents the main topic of the second part of this work and details on her life, thoughts and ideas have been furnished in order to shed light on Octavia's important work among the Londoners. Finally, in the last part of this work the interest has been focused on houses as they appeared in several articles of Dickens' magazine Household Words. Moreover, in analyzing these articles, a particular consideration has been devoted to the descriptions of dwellings in order to find any connections between the work Octavia Hill did to enhance the dwellings of poor and the real conditions of houses during the Victorianism.