Prefiguring The New Woman in Elizabeth Gaskell’s Mary Barton and Anne Brontë’s The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
Article Sidebar
Main Article Content
Abstract
The Victorian era was a period of prosperity and development for British female novelists. Many of them criticized Victorian morals and values in their writings. Women started to revolt against the status quo, and Victorian women’s writing began to develop as a means to challenge patriarchy. Subsequently, at the end of the 19th century, Sarah Grand coined the concept of the New Woman. Nevertheless, in this article, I argue that the representation of this concept is previously found in early Victorian literature. Thus, this article aims to analyse female characters in Mary Barton (1848) and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (1848) representing the New Woman, exploring how Elizabeth Gaskell and Anne Brontë create female characters who challenge Victorian social standards.
Downloads
Article Details
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
References
Astell, Mary & Springborg, Patricia (2002), A serious proposal to the ladies: parts I and II, Peterborough, Canadá, Broadview Press.
Bekler, Ecevit (2022), «A Foucauldian and Feminist Reading of The Tenant of Wildfell Wall», Gaziantep University Journal of Social Sciences, 21(2), pp. 728-738, <https://doi.org/10.21547/jss.98873>. DOI: https://doi.org/10.21547/jss.988733
Bonnell, Marilyn (1992), Sarah Grand: The New Woman and Feminist Aesthetics [PhD Dissertation], The Pennsylvania State University, <https://www.proquest.com/dissertations-theses/sarah-grand-new-woman-feminist-aesthetics/docview/303990638>.
Brontë, Anne (1998), The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, Oxford, Oxford UP.
Brown, Pearl (2000), «From Elizabeth Gaskell’s Mary Barton to Her North and South: Progress or Decline for Women?», Victorian Literature and Culture, 28(2), pp. 345-358, <https://www.jstor.org/stable/25058523>. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S1060150300282065
Clifton, Kelly Marie (2013), Saving Adam, Saving Eve: Construction of the Fallen Woman in Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century English Novels [MA Thesis], California State University.
Cochrane, Tom (2014), «Narrative and Character Formation», The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 72(3), pp. 303-315, <https://www.jstor.org/stable/43282347>. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/jaac.12087
Cunningham, A. R. (1973), «The ‘New Woman Fiction’ of the 1890s», Victorian Studies, 17(2), pp. 177-186, <https://www.jstor.org/stable/3826183>.
Diniejko, A. (n.d.) The New Woman Fiction. Victorian Web. Available at: <https://victorianweb.org/gender/diniejko1.html> (Accessed: 16 November 2025).
Fishelov, David (1990), «Types of Character, Characteristics of Types», Style, 24(3), pp. 422-439, <https://www.jstor.org/stable/42945871>.
Gaskell, Elizabeth (2008), Mary Barton, Oxford, Oxford UP. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/owc/9780199538355.001.0001
Grand, Sarah (1894), «The New Aspect of the Woman Question», The North American Review, 158(448), pp. 270-276, <https://www.jstor.org/stable/25103291>.
Heilmann, Ann (2000), New Woman Fiction: Women Writing First-Wave Feminism, London, Palgrave Macmillan. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230288355
Kucich, John (1990), «Transgression and Sexual Difference in Elizabeth Gaskell’s Novels», Texas Studies in Literature and Language, 32(2), pp. 187-213, <https://www.jstor.org/stable/40754928>.
Lindemann, Beatriz (2023), «The First Wave of Feminism: A Movement Created by and for Americans», Journal of Student Research, 12(4), pp. 1-5, <https://doi.org/10.47611/jsrhs.v12i4.5637>. DOI: https://doi.org/10.47611/jsrhs.v12i4.5637
Mohajan, Haradhan Kumar (2022), «Four Waves of Feminism: A Blessing for Global Humanity», Studies in Social Science & Humanities, 1(2), pp. 1-8, <https://doi.org/10.56397/SSSH.2022.09.01>. DOI: https://doi.org/10.56397/SSSH.2022.09.01
Patmore, Coventry (1863), The Angel in the House, London, Macmillan.
Phillips, Jennifer (2001), Anne Brontë’s New Women: Agnes Grey and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall as Precursors of New Woman Fiction [PhD Dissertation], University of North Texas.
Schwarz, Daniel (1989), «Character and Characterization: An Inquiry», The Journal of Narrative Technique, 19(1), pp. 85-105, <https://www.jstor.org/stable/30225237>.
Senf, Carol (1990), «The Tenant of Wildfell Hall: Narrative Silences and Questions of Gender», College English, 52(4), pp. 446-456, <https://doi.org/10.2307/377662>. DOI: https://doi.org/10.58680/ce19909654
Showalter, Elaine (1978), A Literature of Their Own: British Women Novelists from Brontë to Lessing, Princeton, Virago Press. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/9780691221960
Stoneman, Patsy (1987), Elizabeth Gaskell, Bloomington, Indiana University Press.
Swenson, Kristine (1993), «Protection or Restriction? Women’s Labour in Mary Barton», The Gaskell Society Journal, 7, pp. 50-66, <https://www.jstor.org/stable/45185557>.
Wollstonecraft, Mary (2008), A Vindication of the Rights of Woman and A Vindication of the Rights of Men, Oxford, Oxford UP.
Woolf, Virginia (1995), Killing the Angel in the House: Seven Essays, London, Penguin.