The Sense of Superiority of Victorian English Travel Writers: A Reflective Reading of George Borrow’s Wild Wales

Abstract

This essay will highlight the relationship between the English and the Welsh people. Although these people share so much in common yet, there are palpable differences between them. Welsh as a language is markedly different from the English language. There are also clear differences in culture. The English believe that they are superior to the Welsh who they view as inferior in race and social class. During the Victorian age, this sense of superiority of the English over the Welsh tended to be particularly apparent and heightened. The Victorian age offered English travellers a critical opportunity to visit different parts of the world. They had the rare privilege of relating and observing the cultures, traditions and political set-up of diverse people across the world. In all these places they visited the English travellers tend to exhibit a high sense of superiority and a reinforced sophistication of the British over the local people. They indeed, look down on these cultures. This snobbish attitude was not limited to only those people from other countries but also to British people who are not English specifically, the Welsh. As a result of this unpalatable attitude of the English towards the Welsh there arose during the Victorian age a situation of mutual fear, hatred, and distrust between these two people. These issues were exacerbated by Victorian English writers who usually wrote unpalatable things concerning people who were not English. This study examines George Barrow’s book Wild Wales depicting the superiority complex and mistrust between the English and Wales people from culture, religion and scientific advancement.