This great essay was completed by: Ben Brodhead, Kyle Topp, Lauryn Barnhart, Holly Bouchard, Madison Thiel, Katie Watson, Tierney Messmer, Morgan Folstad, and Emily Skogen

The United Kingdom’s empire had an enormous influence. In 1897, Britain was the world power. Its spanse reached from Canada to the Carribeans, and from Hong Kong to New Zealand. Britain’s flag flew over forty percent of the world’s land and its navy controlled the seas. During this time there were many poets, for example Alfred Lord Tennyson’s poem, “Ulysses”, is about a wandering hero of Homer’s Odyssey who makes it home and reclaims his kingdom. Throughout Ulysses’ many adventures, he pushes the boundaries and ends up in hell. This is written in Dante’s medieval epic, the Divine Comedy. In the Victorian era, the poets worked to visualize what the environment of time looked like through their literature. These works were examples of Britain’s hope to go beyond limits. They wished to expand in land, as well as in literature. They believed that to limit was a grave sin, and hoped to spread their literature throughout their land.
Victorian literature reflected the hope, wisdom, and belief of its era. As discussed in Sydney Smith’s essay “Progress in Personal Comfort”, life was improving for inhabitants of England, while the remainder of Europe was in shambles. Some of the topics of the poetry during this era were “spring of hope” and “season of light”, which directly reflected the good times that a