Nineteenth-century literature often reflects the evolving social dynamics and aspirations of the era and in works with female protagonists and/or by women authors, themes of women’s struggles are often prevalent, albeit sometimes more covertly. This essay examines the themes of empowerment, disempowerment and agency in Anne Brontë’s The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (1848) and Mary Elizabeth Braddon’s Lady Audley’s Secret (1862). Through the exploration of their respective protagonists, Helen Graham and Lucy Audley, these works illuminate the multifaceted dimensions of agency, from subtle acts of defiance to bold assertions of independence. To illuminate the discussion, the two novels are read and discussed alongside a variety of nineteenth-, twentieth- and twenty-first-century critical works. The thesis is divided into three parts, with the first part focussing on the social context in which real-life and fictional Victorian women lived. The second and third parts discuss disempowerment and empowerment, respectively, and discuss and highlight how social norms and inequalities for women in nineteenth-century Britain impacted the female characters in these novels. It also shows how they navigate these constraints to assert their agency or succumb to societal pressures.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:kau-100638 |
| Date | January 2024 |
| Creators | Stark, Anna Ulrika |
| Publisher | Karlstads universitet, Institutionen för språk, litteratur och interkultur (from 2013) |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
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