| England's first periodical, The Gentleman's Magazine, could be studied as a genre in itself, as a means to understanding the culture in eighteenth-century England, or as a transitional literary form preceding the novel. Through an examination of the perception and treatment of animals, this study provides insight into the culture of eighteenth-century England. Although humans have always been fascinated by animals, eighteenth-century scholarship has ignored both the importance of animals and TGM. Instead, canonical scholarship has concentrated on masters such as Alexander Pope, Samuel Johnson, and Jonathan Swift. Pope, Johnson, and Swift appear in TGM along with a host of anonymous contributors whose perception of animals results in major contributions to subsequent literature and to the rise of social movements. For instance, TGM concern for animal rights and what is today called "ecology" generates topics important to the literature of the period.;Specifically, this study focuses on contributors' contextual views of animals within their culture. It examines TGM discussions about animals from 1731-40 with selected articles dating to 1760. Since the periodical conceptualizes new ways of measuring the value of animals, this study reflects the human-animal relationship in the Great Chain of Being, the issue of pet keeping, the pastimes such as hunting and cock throwing, and the role of science and law as they were viewed at the time. It concentrates on discussions about whether animals possess souls, discussions about the human treatment of animals and the environment, discussions about the similarities and differences of human and animal traits, and discussions about how eighteenth century contributors perceive animals through a class consciousness of human beings. Periodical contributors examine topics ranging from vivisection, to superstition, to the role of the Church, and to socially unacceptable human behavior towards animals. According to TGM contributors, the perception of animals perhaps dictates the behavior of humans by changing the manner in which humans conceptualize animals. |
