Wars of words : A historical and rhetorical analysis of political and literary texts in the English 1830's and 1840's

Abstract

This article focuses on two major political events ofthe first half of the 19th centyry, namely: The Poor Law Amendment Act of 1834 and the Chartist Movement (starting 1838). The aim of this research is to examine the hidden or less obvious messages that can be traced through these apparently self-explanatory texts. Thus, the first part of the article concentrares on the analysis of three texts, each reflecting a different stage in the elaboration of the final Poor Law Act of 1834. From the study of these extracts the "vested interests "of the classes in power at the time become more apparent.In the second half of the article, the same type of analysis is applied to Chartist Poetry, with the subsequent discovery of underlying polítical messages of hope and fu tu re victory directed to the working class readers.