Michael Lewis writes about “the irrational hatred of the Victorian era” prevalent not long ago.

To understand how Sargent, one of the most brilliant painters in American history, was once derided as a mere facile courtier now requires an act of historical imagination. For it has been forgotten just how thoroughly Victorian painting had been once banished from the cultural conversation. And not merely painting, but architecture, sculpture, and the decorative arts; all of Victorian culture, in fact. This state of affairs lasted through the heyday of the modern movement, from the end of World War I into the 1960s, and it would not end until a rising generation became curious about Victorian art precisely because it was despised and forbidden…