Queen Vicky - Television Tropes & Idioms

alt title(s): Queen Victoria

"We are not interested in the possibilities of defeat; they do not exist."

I will be good.

Victoria at 11, on being told that she would be queen someday

Queen Victoria (1819-1901) reigned over the largest empire the world has ever seen. She was a hugely important figure, causing sweeping changes in the history of many parts of the world, and inspiring her people. She was not simply an old woman with no sense of humour, and in fact probably never said, "We are not amused".

Her reign was equally momentous, occupying nearly the entire period of the Industrial Revolution, from 1837 to 1901, and being the longest in British history to date.

Many, many books have been written about her and her era. These tend to be set when they were written, either in Victorian London or in the colonies. Also the default timeframe for Steam Punk works.

Her Majesty Victoria and her reign involve examples of the following tropes:

Beam Me Up Scotty: The "We are not amused" story is most likely apocryphal. In fact, she wrote constantly in her journal about how much things amused her, and in fact laughed uproariously at most of the operas of Gilbert And Sullivan.
- Lampshaded humorously in the Tooth and Claw episode of Doctor Who, where a running gag was Rose to get Her Majesty to say it to win a bet with the Doctor.
British Accents: Victoria's was supposedly very heavily German-accented, considering that she was descended from Prussians and preferred to speak that one when she was alone or with her equally German husband.
Crystal Spires And Togas: This is somewhat what the Crystal Palace was supposed to suggest, though that wasn't its original design (see Dumbass Has A Point).
Determinator: See the above caption, spoken during the Second Boer War in 1899. For the record, they won, though she didn't live to see it.
Dumbass Has A Point: At first the Queen and Prince couldn't decide on the design for the Great Exhibition Building; brick or stone would be too heavy and costly, and would never get done in time, and wood would still take too long and add fire danger. A public contest was held, and the winning answer (a giant greenhouse, which was easy to assemble quickly, let in sunlight and could be built around the trees in the park) came from a lower-class gardener, who was supposedly quite dull. Later, they wondered how to get the sparrows in the trees from defecating on everyone, and his second ingenious answer got him knighted:
"How about sparrowhawks?"
Embarrassing First Name: Not for her, but her first name was "Alexandrina", which was chosen specifically to upset her uncle (who hated the Russian Tsar Alexander I).
Enemy Mine: Historical rivals England and France teamed up, along with the otherwise-hated Ottoman Empire and the came-out-of-nowhere Kingdom of Sardinia (turns out it was a Xanatos Gambit on poor French Emperor Napoleon III by Sardinia's Magnificent Bastard Prime Minister Cavour, but that's another story), to beat up the expansionistic Russians and their Bulgarian allies in the Crimean War.
Evil Matriarch + Education Mama: Not evil exactly, but her mother was morally dissolute and almost entirely self-centered; she once ordered ships in the harbor to salute to her and not the then-King. The only thing she cared about other than herself was making sure Victoria got to the throne to carry on the legacy.
- She did hope that Victoria came to the throne before her majority, though, so that a regency could be formed, with her as the regent of course. Some say that she even tried to get a regency established after Victoria turned eighteen.
The Federation: The British Empire under Victoria is one of the Trope Codifiers. Towards the end of her reign, there was talk of establishing a literal Federation (well, "Imperial Federation") with a central Parliament to set Empire-wide policy; Canada, Australia, South Africa, New Zealand, Newfoundland (at the time separate from Canada), and of course the United Kingdom would be its initial members. The idea eventually morphed into the Commonwealth of Nations.
God Save Us From The Queen: Averted; even those who don't like the country's practices have to admit that she did a good job ruling her own country.
Grande Dame: Though she was not actually lacking humour, she is generally portrayed this way in fiction — not entirely without justification.
Honest Johns Dealership: On hearing that Prince Albert was deathly ill, a certain London businessman bought up all the black crepe in the city. When it came time to go into mourning with the queen, he made, as it were, a killing.
I Was Quite A Looker: Oh, she most certainly was◊. Much of the justification for The Young Victoria.
Kuudere: Just read her journal entries on Albert.
Kissing Cousins: Victoria and her husband Albert were first cousins; Albert's father and Victoria's mother were brother and sister.
Loads And Loads Of Characters: Rather, loads and loads of kids. Victoria had nine children herself, and considering the intermarriage that took place among European royalty, almost every royal family in Europe is or was somehow related to her.
- In a pre-effective birth control age, more than three kids was not uncommon, but nine was a lot even back then.
- Victoria was also a carrier of the haemophilia gene, which ended up manifesting itself in one of the children of Tsar Nicholas II, resulting in the influence Rasputin had over the family.
Lord Error Prone: Lord Raglan, who was an overenthusiastic, overpromoted warmonger, and the nearly-senile Duke of Cardigan (who invented the clothing, by the way) in the Crimean War. Together with a few others, and with Raglan's vague communication—to signal a charge, he waved his hand in the general direction, causing the Charge of the Light Brigade. Cardigan repeatedly referred to his enemies as "The French" in a flashback to the Napoleonic Wars, even though the French were now on his side.
The Man Behind The Man: Even though Victoria was the iconic ruler of the British Empire, the real power was in the hands of her prime ministers, most notably William Gladstone and Benjamin Disraeli.
Mighty Whitey: How people tended to see the average British traveller.
One Steve Limit: Subverted and played straight. Victoria's mother was also named Victoria. So was her eldest daughter, but was called Vicky for most of her childhood. Victoria and Albert's eldest son was also named Albert, but the British people wouldn't accept such a German name for their future monarch and was always referred to as his middle name, Edward, in the press (which was the name he eventually adopted when he ascended to the throne). Within the family, though, he was always called Bertie.
Science Marches On: Many of the "futuristic" ideas of some British authors at the time seem ludicrous and dated now. HG Wells got some things correct, though.
The Mourning After: She never really did recover from the death of Albert.
- Alternate Character Interpretation: She found Second Love with John Brown.
  - Then possibly again with Abdul Karim after Brown's death.
Trope Maker: Without Prince Albert, we would not have Christmas Tropes, at least in English; when Victoria came to the throne, it was just a minor holiday in England. Albert introduced the concept of the Christmas tree, Christmas cards, Christmas caroling, Christmas lights and the traditional turkey dinner from Germany.
- Ditto for most Wedding And Engagement Tropes. The huge white dress, huger cake with figurines on top, and other frills we commonly associate with weddings were inspired by Victoria's (and at least one by her eldest daughter's).
Team Mom: To the whole Empire.
Unrequited Love Switcheroo: Victoria, Albert, his brother and another girl as teenagers...eventually it worked out.
Victorian London: Obviously.
Widow Woman: After the death of Prince Albert, Victoria always wore mourning clothes, though she did eventually brighten up personally.