Essay on Helen as Angel and Rebel in The Tenant of Wildfell Hall

The author uses clear diction when she depicts the unique metaphors of the Angel in the House. By telling the story of the Angel of the House, she showed extreme disgust for the woman who were ever in her situation in which she was “bothered” and “tormented” to ignore her calling. Although the Angel was ultimately “pure” Woolf killed her. Woolf symbolically kills the Angel in the House and tells her audience that all women must take responsibility for killing her too. “Had I not killed her she would have killed me. She would have plucked the heart out of my writing.” Saying this empowers her audience, and Woolf achieves one of her foremost goals of the speech in informing women that they have the power to extricate themselves from patriarchy. Men are not going to consider women as human beings until women are willing to fearlessly assert themselves.

A Doll’s House and The Importance of Being Earnest were both written in the late nineteenth century at a period in time when gender roles in society were not only significant to the structure of society but were restrictive and oppressive to individuals. This was particularly true in the case of women who were seen as the upholders of morals in polite society and were expected to behave accordingly. A Doll’s House and The Importance of Being Earnest challenge society and its inclination to categorise and expect certain behaviour of individuals based on their gender.

For every Attachment, when indulg'd, will engross too much of a female Mind, and leave too little Room for domestick cares: It becomes improper, when best placed, if it breaks out in tiresome Solicitudes and ill tim'd Fondness. I would likewise prohibit all vain Attempts at being foremost in the best of Qualities: For I declare, that in a Woman of Common Sense, can be neither the finest, the best dress'd, the politest, the wisest, the wittiest, or the most religious Woman; She can only be the best Sort of Woman. (8-1) Women had to have a certain degree of standard in order for them to be

The next requirement for being a “true woman” was submissiveness. According to society men were superior to women by “God’s appointment.” If they acted otherwise they “tampered with the order of the Universe” (Welter 105). A “true woman” would not question this idea because she already understands her place. Grace Greenwood explained to the women of the Nineteenth Century, “True feminine genius is ever timid, doubtful, and clingingly dependant; a perpetual childhood.” Even in the case of an abusive husband, women were sometimes told to stay quiet

The narrator is portraying a woman who is looked down upon because of her mental illness, but women at the time were often seen as childish or too emotional. “Then he took me in his arms called me a blessed little goose,” (Gilman 5). The narrator’s husband, John, treats her almost like a father would treat a daughter. The narrator is belittled because of her inability to act like women at the time were expected to. “Victorian values stressed that women were to behave demurely and remain with in the domestic sphere,” (Wilson 6). During the 19th century, women were expected to simply care for the children and clean the house. Most of the time, women who aspired to do more than that were not considered respectable wives. “Because the narrator is completely dependent on her husband and is allowed no other role than to be a wife and a mother, she represents the secondary status of women during the 19th century,” (Wilson 5).

The place of a woman was believed to be within the home taking care of her husband, the home and raising the children on a full time basis. In this sense, Mary Rowlandson fulfills her family’s and society’s expectations of her as a female.

In the early nineteenth century, women were expected to be, “‘angels in the house,’ loving, self-sacrificing, and chaste wives, mothers and daughters or they are… ultimately doomed” (King et al. 23). Women of this time were supposed to be domestic creatures and not tap so far into their intellectual abilities (King et al.). The role of women in the nineteenth century is described:

Their engagement and marriage has numerous red flags that a modern reader can pick up on. NCADV, or the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, has laid out certain guidelines to recognize abuse and while The Tenant of Wildfell Hall was written in 1848, the modern guidelines can still apply. At one point, Helen did love Huntingdon. Helen believed that she can change Arthur and make him a better person. This is a common theme for people who marry abusers. They believe that they can fix their partners and that is simply not the case. Helen truly cared about Huntingdon and was hurt when he made her jealous with another woman, Annabelle. When Huntingdon hears of how Helen was hurt, he compliments Helen, claiming that she is the woman he loves. He then proposes to Helen and effectively traps her “nearly squeezing [her] to death in his arms” (page 143, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall). Helen asks him to leave and talk to her aunt and uncle about marriage, Huntingdon says that he will not leave until she admits that she loves him. He then smothered her with kisses, a term that can be endearing however, in this case it takes on a more sinister

Social standing, and moral values were vital elements in Victorian society, and the fundamental doctrine of establishing this ideology, began at home. The home provided a refuge from the rigour, uncertainty, anxiety, and potential violence of the outside world. (P, 341) A woman’s role was to provide a safe, stable, and well-organised environment for their husbands and families. However, change was on the horizon with an underlying movement of business and domestic changes both home and abroad, with industrialization, and the suffragist movement. Women were beginning to gain autonomy and began to grasp their opportunities, thus significantly curtailing male supremacy and the definable acceptable ‘role’ of the woman.

During the Victorian Era in 1837 the period that was ruled by Queen Victoria I, women endured many social disadvantages by living in a world entirely dominated by men. Around that time most women had to be innocent, virtuous, dutiful and be ignorant of intellectual opinion. It was also a time associated with prudishness and repression. Their sole window on the world would, of course, be her husband. During this important era, the idea of the “Angel in the House” was developed by Coventry Patmore and used to describe the ideal women who men longed. Throughout this period, women were treated inferior to men and were destined to be the husbands “Angel in the House”.

In Anne Brontë’s The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, Arthur Huntington, Helen’s husband and Arthur’s father, is presented as an alcoholic, disgraceful, narcissistic “gentleman” (Brontë 311). Despite Helen’s efforts to shelter their son, Arthur, from the corrupted masculinity embodied by Huntington and his friends, Huntington encourages Arthur’s “manly accomplishments” that mirror his own character, such as excessive drinking, swearing, and selfishness (297). For fear of Arthur becoming “a curse to others and himself”, like his father, Helen has acquitted herself to prepare for an escape; however, Huntington seizes her journal which reveal her plans (203). In this passage Mr. Huntington is not only devaluing aspect of his corrupted masculinity,

Jane Eyre is a novel written by Charlotte Brontë. It is distinctly a female Bildungsroman, as it follows the progress and growth of Jane’s character on her quest for selfhood and independence in a society that tries its best to impress upon her the roles and expectations of women in the Victorian era (which is neatly packaged in the figure of the ‘Angel-in-the-house’.) This is something with which this essay seeks to engage by looking at female figures which feature prominently in Jane’s life, how those who embrace the figure of ‘Angel-in-the-house’ are treated and viewed, versus those who do not. Furthermore, important male figures will also be looked at in order to understand Jane’s own feelings to the ‘Angel-in-the-house’ figure and how she approaches it, as well as how the Byronic hero might relate – if it even does.

In Graham’s Magazine, another anonymous reviewer suggested that Rochester’s character was dangerous and immoral, saying, “No woman who had ever truly loved could have mistaken so completely the Rochester type, or could have made her heroine love a man of proud, selfish, ungovernable appetites, which no sophistry can lift out of lust.” Thus, he intimated that any author who would contrive to have her heroine fall in love with such a total rake would be immoral herself and unknowing of what true love is. He went one step further to say, “We accordingly think that if the innocent young ladies of our land lay a premium on profligacy, by marrying dissolute rakes for the honor of reforming them, à la Jane Eyre, their benevolence will be of questionable utility to the world.” In this, he suggested that the depiction of Jane and Rochester’s relationship would cause young women of the time to emulate Jane’s “romantic wickedness.”

Bella Casey represents female literary archetypes of both The Angel in the House and The Fallen Woman. Virginia Woolf describes The Angel as, “…intensely sympathetic. She was immensely charming. She was utterly unselfish…She sacrificed herself

Furthermore, the stereotypical Victorian feminine ideal was the wife and mother who was selflessly devoted to her children and submissive to her husband. The poet Coventry Patmore put this into words in his 1854 poem ‘The Angel in the house, which was portentous to his perception of the ideal woman, who in his view, had to be a devoted docile wife and mother, a paragon of domesticity, virtue and humility, and similar to Patmore’s own meek and pious wife. () On the other hand, the sensual, passionate, rebellious female, were considered insane, or uncontrollable monsters namely, ‘The Madwoman in the Attic, (Gilbert & Gumar).Who needed to be incarcerated and kept out of sight. Hence the symbolic metaphoric meaning of the Jane’s fear when she is locked in the Red room in that Jane is more scared of not having the opportunity to explore her own independence, find a meaningful existence, and demonstrate that women can go beyond the oppressive limitations