backdrop

[Mad-ox]

hi,

What is the meaning of the word "backdrop"? I met this word in the following context: "The novel is set in Early Victorian England against a backdrop of great social change."

Could you give me a synonym for this word?

Macmillan dictionary:
backdrop=everything that you can see behind the main thing you are looking at

Madox

 

[Horsa]

It comes from the theatre and refers to a kind of curtain or screen at the back of the stage on which scenery is painted. In your example it is being used idiomatically to refer to the conditions or events happening at the time the story/novel occurred - the background to the story.

 

[vil]

Hi Mad-ox,

backdrop=scenery hung at back of stage
synonyms : backcloth
background

backdrop = 1. an painted cloth hung at the back of a stage set also called
backcloth
2. the setting,as of a historical events; the background

backdrop = on the theater stage, a large, taut, flat canvas, usually hung from the grid at the rear of the stage to mask the backstage area.

Regards.

V.

 

[Mad-ox]

Many thanks for Horsa and Vil!!!!!!!


Madox