Awards

• Winner of Outstanding Academic Title 2023

Overview

This book addresses the ways in which Charlotte, Emily, and Anne Brontë took advantage of the rapid change of their time unleashed by the Industrial Revolution in order to illustrate the inequalities women faced in the Victorian Age. It historically contextualizes all seven novels, Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights, Agnes Grey, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, Shirley, Villette, and The Professor, in order to investigate the themes of marriage, education, class, and work. Specifically, the author examines the ways the Brontë sisters decenter marriage, call for equality in education, expose the inherent dignity of humans despite class differences, and demonstrate the ways in which increased work opportunities empowered women. Ultimately, the author argues that the Brontë sisters’ call for female empowerment was symptomatic of the age, and one that is realized in the latter half of the Victorian Age and beyond.

Full Product Details

9781666904994

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Reviews

"The three Brontë sisters--Charlotte (1816-55), Emily (1818-48), Anne (1820-49)--between them wrote a total of seven novels. Whether the siblings discussed the effects of the industrial revolution one cannot know, but their fiction reveals a profound interest in the social changes it brought on. Their books ask how women can achieve agency. The answer is brought to the fore in complex novels that show protagonists who saw beyond love and marriage to the enriching possibilities of education and work. By 1855 the sisters were all dead, but their writings lived on and helped bring about social change. In 1904 Virginia Woolf visited the Brontë home on the moors: their knicknacks did not speak to her, but the novels still did. Over time scholarship has enriched understanding of the dark truths of Victorian change. This book is easy to read and well researched, and it includes useful chapter notes in addition to the customary scholarly apparatus. Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty.-- ""Choice Reviews"""

The three Bront� sisters--Charlotte (1816-55), Emily (1818-48), Anne (1820-49)--between them wrote a total of seven novels. Whether the siblings discussed the effects of the industrial revolution one cannot know, but their fiction reveals a profound interest in the social changes it brought on. Their books ask how women can achieve agency. The answer is brought to the fore in complex novels that show protagonists who saw beyond love and marriage to the enriching possibilities of education and work. By 1855 the sisters were all dead, but their writings lived on and helped bring about social change. In 1904 Virginia Woolf visited the Bront� home on the moors: their knicknacks did not speak to her, but the novels still did. Over time scholarship has enriched understanding of the dark truths of Victorian change. This book is easy to read and well researched, and it includes useful chapter notes in addition to the customary scholarly apparatus. Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty.

Author Information

Taten Shirley is director of interdisciplinary studies and associate professor of humanities at Faulkner University.

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