William Morris’s Dream of John Ball and the Victorian Vision of Medieval History
William Morris’s Dream of John Ball and the Victorian Vision of Medieval History

Summary/Abstract: The paper analyses the representation of the fourteenth century Peasant Revolt in William Morris’s Dream of John Ball. Like many Victorian social and religious polemics Morris sets the idealised vision of the Middle Ages in contrast to the overall degeneration of the nineteenth century world. His idealisation of the medieval world is, however, very selective and he calls for more radical changes than suggested by Victorian social reformers. Morris extolls the superiority of medieval craftwork, which for him constitutes a proof that feudalism was a less tyrannical system than capitalism and, yet, exposes the oppressive character of the medieval social system. Looking at the rebellion of 1381 from a historical distance, he exposes its limitations and does not rewrite its achievement into a story of success but rather chooses to praise the very effort which the medieval non-ruling community exhibited in standing up against the powerful establishment, as well as the rebels’ heroic determination and a sense of fellowship. Morris’s visionary account of the major uprising of the medieval third estate brings into focus the issue of social oppression and exposes these aspects of class struggle which Morris considers desirable. Morris places, thus, the medieval events of 1381 in a larger perspective of mankind’s struggle for freedom and presents the Peasant Revolt as a forerunner of the social revolution, which he considers as a necessary answer to capitalist practices of his own times.

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