Author Description

"Novelist, poet, Anglican priest and controversialist, Charles Kingsley (1819-1875) epitomises the bustling Victorian man of faith and letters, a prolific polymath as ready to break a lance with John Henry Newman over Christian doctrine as he was to preach to schoolchildren on the virtues of manly, physical struggle. Kingsley's The Water-Babies and Westward Ho! were best-sellers which became classics of children's literature. Kingsley has come to epitomize the Victorian age. On closer inspection Kingsley is harder to categorise: a socialist who was also an imperialist, a Chartist revolutionary who was Queen Victoria's favourite novelist, a natural theologian who popularized Darwin, a priest who celebrated sex as sacrament, Kingsley only appears straightforward if you consider him one piece at a time. The debates he shaped remain with us today: faith and sexuality, economics and exploitation, race and identity. The aim of this book is to present the whole man: to consider the public crusades for public health alongside the most private sexual fantasies of sexual intercourse; to consider the ardent imperialist alongside the Darwinist. It will be of interest to all students of Victorian Studies, as well as of British/Imperial History, Church History and especially the History of Science"--