The Victorian Web cites Charlotte Brontë’s 1849 novel Shirley as a New Woman novel, as well as Charlotte herself as part of the New Woman movement. Anne Brontë’s The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, published a year earlier, upholds the same characteristics in a defining way. The article writes that “many New Woman novels strongly opposed the idea that home is the woman’s only proper sphere. The female authors revealed the traps of conventional Victorian marriage, including the condition of marriage which tolerated marital rape, compulsory or enforced motherhood, and the double standard of sexual morality.” The article outlines the paradox of the New Woman: alternately oversexed and undersexed, hyperfeminine or hypermasculine, “manhating and/or man-eating or self-appointed savior of benighted masculinity.” Wildfell Hall exemplifies the duality of the New Woman almost half a century before the New Woman phenomenon made the socially significant changes talked about in the Victorian Web article.
The protagonist of the novel, alternately Helen Huntingdon and Helen Graham, does what the article defines as characteristic to New Woman novels: it “expressed dissatisfaction with the contemporary position of women in marriage and society … New Woman novels represented female heroines who fought against the traditional Victorian male perception of woman as ‘angel in the house’ and challenged the old colds of conducts and morality.” Helen Huntingdon, the wife to Arthur Huntingdon, represents one side of the New Woman attempting to reform the degeneracy of her husband, while Helen Graham, the fugitive single mother hiding from her abusive marriage, represents another. When Helen first marries Mr. Huntingdon, it’s the definition of an “I can fix him relationship” even before she is exposed to the depths of Huntingdon’s depravity. Throughout the novel, Huntingdon operates as a corrupting force on other characters, encouraging alcoholism, addiction, and adultery; he attempts to “make a man” out of his very young son in his image, giving him alcohol and teaching him to swear. At first, Helen tries to encourage reformation, though she is met with resistance at every turn.
Helen spends the entirety of her marriage with Huntingdon trying to reform him. She tries to curb his drinking and his partying, to manage his debts, and even turns a brief blind eye to his adultery. He resists her at every turn, gaslighting and manipulating her, flaunting his cheating and trying to corrupt her. He calls her his “household deity” and confines her to the property, refusing to allow her to accompany him when he leaves for months to “do business” (read: party) in London or even to attend her father’s funeral. Their marriage falls apart. Helen, in an act of defiance, bands Huntingdon from her bedroom and so denies him access to her body. Huntingdon refuses to allow her to divorce him, or even to live separately from him. When Helen at last runs away from Grassdale Manor with her son, and assumes the name Helen Graham, she is resisting the institution of marriage that has become so confining for her. This is only a brief overview of the ways in which the New Woman ideology can be read through Anne Brontë’s The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, and it is possible to go much more in depth about it. I felt that Anne deserved her name among the New Women movement along with her sister.
Ladybug, I love this interpretation, and I love the Brontë sisters! Do you think that Jane Eyre also fits the mold of a New Woman novel? I would argue that it does. Jane, an industrious, independent young woman, refuses to be tamed by Mr. Rochester. If anything, she is the one who tames him by the novel’s end; he eventually submits to her guidance, both literally and figuratively. As a wife, she takes the leading role in the marriage, demonstrating a reconceptualization and renegotiation of gender roles. Jane also embodies other aspects of the New Woman. When she asks Rochester for her paycheck, she illustrates the importance of women’s financial independence, a common preoccupation of New Woman activists. She also rebukes Rochester for his infidelity, refusing to accept hypocritical sexual standards.
If Jane stands in for the New Woman, perhaps Blanche Ingram represents the more demure woman of yesteryear. She has no real talents, is preoccupied with appearances, and views marriage as her ultimate purpose in life. Jane often compares herself to Blanche, wishing she could live as carefree as the vapid socialite. However, like St. Vincent in “The Yellow Drawing-Room,” Rochester is not attracted to feminine submission; he wants the rebellious and alluring New Woman. Jane is rewarded with the man for her dedication to New Woman ideologies. Now, is that a particularly New Woman ending? Let’s not think about that too much.
P.S. Why leave Emily out of the conversation? Wuthering Heights is definitely a New Woman novel in many ways, too. Perhaps you could expand on this idea in a future blog post!