The majority of The Go-Between is set during the summer of 1900, near the end of the Victorian era and on the threshold of what later became known as the Edwardian age. For many people in 20th-century Britain, this period came to symbolize a lost “golden age” of stability, elegance, and social confidence.

British society at the turn of the century was strongly hierarchical. At the top stood the aristocracy and landed gentry, whose wealth and influence often rested on inherited estates. Below them were professional and business classes, followed by skilled workers, laborers, and domestic servants. These divisions shaped nearly every aspect of life. Education, housing, employment, marriage, and political influence were all connected to class position. Although individuals could sometimes improve their circumstances, social mobility remained limited compared to later periods.

In his Introduction, Hartley explains he chose this setting to place his “little private tragedy against a general background of security and happiness” (10). This apparent security was founded on a rigid class system that strictly governed interactions between the aristocracy, the rising middle class, and the working class. Country estates like Brandham Hall functioned as the epicenter of this world. The resident family owned the land on which many local people lived, and for working-class local people, these places were an important source of employment, making escape from the class system difficult. Tenant farmers, for example, paid to lease the land via their agricultural labor. For wealthy people, the estates were places to socialize through rituals like cricket matches and formal dinners.

For example, the “Marlborough House set” surrounding the future King Edward VII epitomized high society’s blend of leisure and stringent etiquette; while affairs were common, they were tolerated only as long as they remained discreetly within the upper crust. The central conflict in The Go-Between derives its explosive power from violating this code. The affair between Marian, a daughter of the gentry, and Ted Burgess, a tenant farmer, is a dangerous transgression precisely because it crosses class lines, and because Ted’s position depends on the goodwill of the landowners. Leo’s role as a middle-class outsider heightens this tension, making the novel a critique of the era’s repressive morality and the fragile illusion of its golden age.

Marriage was one of the institutions through which class distinctions were maintained. Families often expected children to marry within their own social circle. Such expectations were particularly strong among the upper classes, where marriage could influence property, status, and family reputation. Romantic relationships that crossed class boundaries were frequently discouraged. Hartley uses this reality to drive the central conflict of the novel.

The setting of 1900 also contributes to the idea of a pre-war “golden age.” Many later observers remembered the years before the First World War as a period of peace and certainty during which Britain possessed a vast empire, economic power, and global influence. Country houses, formal social rituals, and stable hierarchies became symbols of a seemingly harmonious national past. The Go-Between was published after the devastation of two world wars when this earlier era acquired a nostalgic appeal.

The apparent stability of Edwardian society, however, concealed significant problems. Economic inequality remained widespread. Large numbers of people lived in poverty, particularly in industrial cities. Political conflicts over labor rights, Irish self-government, and women’s suffrage were intensifying, though such subject matters rarely intrude into the isolated world of Brandham Hall. It is nevertheless touched by changing economic realities: The landowning Winloves are renting their estate to the wealthy Maudsleys, reflecting the fact that global market competition was reducing the profitability of British farming, and the landed gentry were beginning to struggle with upkeep costs. International rivalries were also increasing, contributing to the conditions that eventually led to the First World War. The novel’s retrospective structure reinforces this nostalgic perspective. The older Leo, a conduit for the contemporary reader, remembers 1900 from the vantage point of a later age, knowing that the world he describes will soon be transformed by war and social change.