In the late 1800s, domesticity was of such importance that handbooks such as Mrs Beeton 's Household Management were extremely popular throughout the nation. This was particularly due to a shift in class structure and the ease of transitioning from working class to middle class. Due to this, women who were born into working class families had to learn the etiquette required of a middle-class lady. Through Beeton 's book, as well as Ruskin 's, women of the late 19th Century learned the values of the home and their roles within it. Women also learned that they were the centre of the home and that, without their existence or presence, the house would surely fall apart (Ruskin, 68:32). In both Our Mutual Friend (Dickens) and The Diary of a Nobody
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This is possibly due to a sense of modernity in The Diary of a Nobody, which not is not only written less formally than other Victorian texts, but presents more modern issues to the reader. The Diary of a Nobody has been suggested to: “[celebrate] the lower-middle-class husband 's eager commitment to domesticity” (Hammerton, 291), which shows a drastic change to earlier Victorian ideologies concerning traditionalist domesticity: “Whilst men accumulated money to support home and family, women regulated [the] household” (Boardman, 150). Whilst Charles does have a job and thus supports his family and home: “my work in the city” (31), the domesticity is shared between the two, meaning that Charles 's role in the household is modernised, by which he is performing both male and female roles in his life. Charles acts as a sign of a 'modern man ', rejecting theories and beliefs practice and preached by Mrs Beeton and Sarah Ellis, that it is a woman 's job to be in charge of the house and to provide her husband with what he needs. Carrie, although she does act in a somewhat domestic role, doesn 't necessarily provide to the extent that Beeton and Ellis suggested a Victorian woman should. “I found Carrie buried in a book” (154) It is suggested in Mrs Beeton that a woman use her “employ her spare time in repairing and making up dresses” (2263), or that she spend her personal time doing things for the house or her family. The use of Carrie reading whilst her husband returns from work and sets about doing housework shows, again, the modernity
This is possibly due to a sense of modernity in The Diary of a Nobody, which not is not only written less formally than other Victorian texts, but presents more modern issues to the reader. The Diary of a Nobody has been suggested to: “[celebrate] the lower-middle-class husband 's eager commitment to domesticity” (Hammerton, 291), which shows a drastic change to earlier Victorian ideologies concerning traditionalist domesticity: “Whilst men accumulated money to support home and family, women regulated [the] household” (Boardman, 150). Whilst Charles does have a job and thus supports his family and home: “my work in the city” (31), the domesticity is shared between the two, meaning that Charles 's role in the household is modernised, by which he is performing both male and female roles in his life. Charles acts as a sign of a 'modern man ', rejecting theories and beliefs practice and preached by Mrs Beeton and Sarah Ellis, that it is a woman 's job to be in charge of the house and to provide her husband with what he needs. Carrie, although she does act in a somewhat domestic role, doesn 't necessarily provide to the extent that Beeton and Ellis suggested a Victorian woman should. “I found Carrie buried in a book” (154) It is suggested in Mrs Beeton that a woman use her “employ her spare time in repairing and making up dresses” (2263), or that she spend her personal time doing things for the house or her family. The use of Carrie reading whilst her husband returns from work and sets about doing housework shows, again, the modernity