"The Missing Generation"
"Another way to assess that decade is less thematic than generic. One of the most interesting phenomena of the 1830's is the blurring of conventional generic distinctions: Tennyson's inward-turning lyrics which chart new journeys of the mind, Browning's disruption of the conventions of historical narrative in Sordello, Dickens's imposition of a reformist vision on the eighteenth-century picaresque novel, or Carlyle's Sartor Resartus (1834) by turns autobigraphical fragment, philosophical treatise, novel and editorial doodling -- possibly the biggest put-on in English literature since Tristram Shandy" (Tucker 11).
from Herbert Tucker's Companion to Victorian Literature and Culture, chapter by Lawrence Poston.
Finally, I have a legit reason to dislike/dismiss Carlyle (again).
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