A Necessary Luxury: Tea in Victorian England

The drinking of tea is intrinsically bound up in the English national identity. Fromer (English, Corning Community College, Corning, NY) studies how this cup of boiled leaves came to assume so much importance. She begins with the early tea trade and the ways in which non-fiction publications helped to defend the immoral practices of the British trading companies in procuring the tea from China. She then moves to the ways in which the rituals surrounding tea drinking were portrayed in novels throughout the nineteenth century. Authors use the ubiquitousness of tea-time to comment on the establishment of "middle class" values that actually were agreed upon in all levels of society. Her inclusion of the mad tea party from Alice in Wonderland emphasizes the underside of this pleasant lie. She also discusses the gender roles inherent in Mother pouring the tea and Father being at the table to share it. The tea party as a symbol of female entrapment in societal expectations is also addressed. In her conclusion, Fromer brings the tea mystic to the present, with the new gourmet teas and the popularity of Indian/southeast Asian chai. From a symbol of British domesticity, tea has once again become an exotic foreign beverage. Annotation c2009 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)