Domestic Abuse as a System of Behavior in
Anne Bronte's The Tenant of Wildfell Hall

Naïve and young, a woman spurred by the eager, idealistic impulses of her heart marries unwisely, her husband’s true character soon revealed by gross acts of emotional and indirect physical violence against her. Desperate and heartbroken, she flees him, driven by the needs of self-preservation and of protection of her child’s direly threatened innocence.

The situation is probably as timeless as human vice, but it was not until compassion led Anne Bronte to lift her pen in an earnest attempt at warning and censure, that there existed any widely read Western literary work which detailed such a domestic nightmare. Yet The Tenant is not a source of absolute, clear-cut situations, in which certain characters may clearly fall into roles of unadulterated evil, or of unblemished victimhood. One of the book’s most intriguing facets is the depth and complexity of its perspective on the unhealthy interactions between women and their direct abusers, among women with one another, and between women and society. The role of women in perpetuating the phenomenon of their own abuse within the sphere of the novel and the unsettlingly cyclic pattern which their behavior and that of their abusers follows offers a fascinating subject of investigation.

The novel’s secondary marital relationships play an intriguing role in the development of its concepts. They illustrate different and relatively isolated situations, reactions, and characteristics, nearly all of which are integrated into the overall tableau of the two primary characters (i.e. Helen and Huntingdon) and the relationship they share. Early in the novel, one meets Helen’s guardians, her aunt and uncle, who are attempting to guide her in the hunt for a presentable mate. The first memorable impression of her aunt is her role as the voice of self-control and dispenser of wisdom in matters of love, marriage, and youthful impetuousness. However, as Helen’s sharp observation reveals, her aunt’s extreme gravity concerning marriage seems to bear the temper of painful experience (Bronte, 125).

With that thought implanted, even the title of the diary’s opening chapter, “The Warnings of Experience,” begins to take on a grim note. The aunt and uncle, one comes to realize, have a relationship which may most kindly be characterized as functional. She is found to be solemn, clearly acquainted with the consequences of error, and deeply concerned with the welfare and management of those in her care. A pervading sense of how easily they might fall to some awful fate seems to prevail, in this gravity and apprehension. Her mate, though, like Helen’s Huntingdon, is a dashing carefree older gentleman, who, “a sad wild fellow... when he was young” (Bronte, 128), now spends his time merrily hunting with his friends and carelessly teasing his niece about her various romantic prospects. He is ever laughing, content to let seriousness and weighty matters fall to his wife’s hands. His suffering of the gout (Bronte, 142) also informs us that he still quite enjoys the pleasures of the bottle today, and where his relative moderation inflicts this little reward upon him, Arthur’s likewise has its (correspondingly greater) cost. Helen’s aunt and uncle fall neatly into the roles of a Regency-era marriage, in which the husband plays the role of the carousing devil-may-care warrior, and the wife that of the pious, anxious, and serious wife. Her duty it is to atone for her husband’s vices and pick up the pieces whenever his excesses catch up with him (McMaster, 353). One may note also the lack of any signs of affection between the aunt and uncle, who deal in their separate spheres like cordial business partners. Similarly, although the relationship between Helen and Huntingdon is initially driven by an intense affection and (though subtly expressed) physical attraction, with (brief) time and loss of regard for one another, such fades into duty before being extinguished altogether. And finally, in the scene upon which the second diary chapter ends, a vitally serious conversation between Helen and her aunt is cut short by the uncle shouting angrily for his wife to come to bed, whereupon she must perforce abandon all and scurry off to comply (Bronte, 142). Helen likewise must place before all else the satisfaction of her husband’s whims, lest he fly into a temper and she lose what little influence she possessed with him. Thus the roles in this union are an excellent general foreshadowing of those which appear in Helen’s.

Another secondary relationship, however, is of vastly more interest. Though abusive in a quite different manner than Helen’s, Millicent and Hattersley’s marriage illustrates keenly the pressures upon Helen and the pitfalls which she manages to avoid. It is particularly relevant because unlike the stagnant coolness of Helen’s aunt and uncle, it is a model of the worst excesses into which the traditional Regency-era marriage (as Helen’s first was) stood in danger of falling.

Its very beginning is a reversed image of the near escape Helen has. Helen's aunt had at least been motivated by her vision of her niece's welfare in her forceful attempts to see her settled with a husband of the Victorian tradition, a quiet and reliable provider and protector, though he might fail in every other respect. Millicent Hargrave’s mother is of quite a different mind; she wishes merely to have her daughter taken off her hands -- “well married, that is, united to [a] rich partner” -- settled with a man of wealth and prestige. Hence Mrs. Hargrave essentially countermands her daughter’s refusal and manipulates the confused girl into marriage to a man whose rough ways fill the timid and gentle creature with fright and dread at the very thought of marrying him (Bronte, 210). Her objections and revulsion are dismissed as “childish nonsense.”

Unsurprisingly, the marriage which has been arranged is for a time much in a vein with its inauspicious beginning. Millicent’s attitudes and reactions are far more traditional and conventionally feminine than Helen’s. Where the latter is ever alert for a means of checking her husband’s faults, Millicent passively accepts every abuse Hattersley inflicts upon her. Her only answer to his treatment is to yield with the barest and feeblest of complaints (Chitester, 50). Being helpless by virtue of her social position, her marriage, and most importantly, because of her own submissive, quiet nature, she chooses nonresistant martyrdom as a kind of emotional self-defense, a system of behavior which will hold her together. Because for her, resistance or escape are impossible, she tells Helen, “Don’t say a word against Mr. Hattersley, for I want to think well of him… you must tell me, if you can, that [he] is better than he seems,” (Bronte, 211).

The marriage of Millicent and Hattersley is of tremendous interest to the reader in large part because it offers an alternate to the domestic situation of Helen and Huntingdon. Though equally abusive and painful at its outset, in nearly every other way it is a flipped version of the relationship between the primary couple, and offers the reader a second perspective on contemporary marriage and abuse. Much as Millicent is quiet and compliant where Helen is passionate and rational, Hattersley’s abusive treatment (which similar to Huntingdon’s, runs parallel to his reaction to alcohol) is characterized by a blundering, lumbering, and almost innocently simplistic physical cruelty, where Huntingdon’s is primarily psychological, typically consisting of adultery, mockery, and childish temper. For example, seeing Millicent weep at his alcohol-addled behavior one night, Hattersley seizes her, shaking her roughly while demanding to know the reason for her tears. When at length, sobbing, she is obliged to divulge the cause of her grief – himself – he flings her violently to the floor (Bronte, 267). And again: In the presence of his wife, Hattersley loudly utters outrageous statements of adoration for qualities in Lady Lowborough which Millicent distinctly does not possess. In the deeply moving scene which follows, rather than expressing anger or even offended coldness, the latter, when he remarks the sadness in her expression, expresses in tones of profound yet resigned sorrow that at least she is the one he chose as his wife, and if he doesn’t love her, it can’t be helped (Bronte, 276). Subsequently, in the very act of assuring his wife of his love for her, Hattersley takes up a handful of her curls and (apparently oblivious of her pain) twists them so hard that she must protest despite herself.

Yet in this, and again in the subsequent conversation between Helen and Hattersley, the ironic truth comes to light. Millicent’s gruff husband actually explains frankly (and with surprising eloquence) to her that “you bother me... but only by your exceeding goodness – when a boy has been cramming raisins and sugar-plums all day, he longs for a squeeze of sour orange by way of a change,” (Bronte, 276). Though admitting to Helen that the behavior of which he complains was indeed what he had sought in a wife, he now realizes it would have been better to have a mate who “would have the spirit to stand at bay now and then, and honestly tell me her mind at all times – such a one as yourself, for instance,” (Bronte, 279). For, “how can I help playing the deuce when I see it’s all one to her whether I behave like a Christian or like a scoundrel such as nature made me? –and how can I help teazing her when she’s so invitingly meek and mim... and never so much as squeaks to tell me that’s enough?” (Bronte, 278) Thus he sees his wife as an angelic creature whose very virtue makes her incapable of comprehending the help he needs to restrain his “natural” urge to be a rascal (Chitester, 50). This is the flip side of Huntingdon’s perspective of his wife as a saint tyrannically expecting utterly perfect behavior of him, and the way he psychologically needles her in a quest to expose any flaw in her immaculate character.

Millicent’s non-confrontational stance is so complete that the eventual conversion of her husband is accomplished almost solely by the intervention of Helen and the latter’s eventually successful appeals to Hattersley’s naturally generous and fair-minded nature. Initially he attempts to dismiss Millicent’s misery (“If she were, she should tell me so: I don’t like that way of moping and fretting in silence, and saying nothing.”) and endeavors to defend his own vice by – rightly – pointing out the victim’s own culpability in the matter (“It’s not honest. How can she expect me to mend my ways at that rate?” –Bronte, 278). For a great while the thought of her complicity in the situation buoys him in his unconcern. But after a time, Helen approaches him once more. Faced by his prosecutor with the disgusting behavior of his companions, and furnished with letters proving his wife’s quietly heartbroken decline and grief over his debauchery and careless cruelty, the weak protests that “She likes me all the same, whatever I do,” die upon his lips. Faced with Helen’s brisk honesty and frank discussion of the situation, he resolves with success to mend his ways henceforth. Yet Millicent still fails to understand the situation, from her response to Helen’s mild reproach that “I had only done what she might – and ought to – have done herself.” Millicent, however, remains convinced that “Oh no! I couldn’t have influenced him, I’m sure, by anything that I could have said. I should only have bothered him by my clumsy efforts at persuasion, if I had made the attempt.” But in Hattersley’s terse reply, the truth lies: “You never tried me, Milly,” (Bronte, 365).

As has been seen, Mrs. Hargrave, similar to Gilbert’s mother, is a typical example of the materialistic matriarchs of the era who support and perpetuate the unhealthy situation between men and women. Their reprehensible callousness regarding their daughters’ welfare and dotage upon that of their sons does much to fuel the system which so often crushes their daughters’ happiness and produces more like themselves. Refusing to deny her son Walter anything, she drains her resources to the dregs, at the expense of her daughters and even herself, simply in order that “her cherished son shall be enabled to ‘hold up his head with the highest gentlemen in the land,’” (Bronte, 219). And from this extravagance for his sake stems the need to marry her daughters off to rich men with no regard for their well-being, for with their share of the family resources diverted to Walter’s support, they become burdens on her hands. Esther’s fate stands to mirror her elder sister Millicent’s, but for the fact that the younger Hargrave girl possesses Helen’s strong will and powerful romantic notions, refusing to be foisted off on wealthy and corrupt men old enough to be her father. Helen’s being a mentor of sorts for Esther enhances the similarity which may be observed between them, as the elder advises and strengthens the younger in their natural, wise inclinations, and encourages her in her resistance of Mrs. Hargrave’s tyrannical marital connivings, warning her of their consequences.

Mrs. Markham is more domestic in her ambitions, placing her sons' physical comfort at home at the apex of her and her daughters’ endeavors. All meals are to be prepared to their tastes, tea is kept waiting when Gilbert is delayed by conversing with friends, the house is cleaned for their arrival. Gilbert’s sister Rose, disgruntled at this, quotes her mother, “You know Rose, in all household matters, we have only two things to consider, first, what’s proper to be done, and secondly, what’s most agreeable to the gentlemen of the house – any thing will do for the ladies,” (Bronte, 53). Gilbert, the Victorian provider model, rationally points out that “I might sink into the grossest condition of self-indulgence and carelessness about the wants of others, from the mere habit of being constantly cared for myself, and having all my wants anticipated or immediately supplied, while left in total ignorance of what is done for me.” His mother simply avers that when he marries, “you must each fall into your proper place. You’ll do your business, and she, if she’s worthy of you, will do hers; but it’s your business to please yourself, and hers to please you,” (Bronte, 54). Obviously this is a behavior pattern bound to lead, in men whose Regency bent parallels hers (rather than Gilbert, whose Victorian morality is opposed to her urgings) to harsh and demanding husbands who, like Huntingdon and Hattersley prior to his reform, have little thought for their wives’ welfare or happiness.

This interchange is particularly significant because it is to similar maternal influence that Helen attributes Huntingdon’s faults, as “he had... from the beginning... a foolish mother who indulged him to the top of his bent... doing her utmost to encourage those germs of folly and vice it was her duty to suppress,” (Bronte, 166). The manner in which children are reared, with an eye to the development of their character, is an obsession from the beginning of the novel, with Helen castigated as a mother for employing a commonly recommended method of protecting children from alcoholism (Thormahlen, 833). Glimpses of conventional Regency-model motherhood are thus invaluable in understanding the psychologies of the adult males in the novel, as the book makes clear the belief that the manner in which a child is reared virtually sets his life’s course in stone. These Regency mothers are also particularly of in contrast with the manner in which Helen raises her son, who is to be a youth of the new, genteel Victorian mores which Bronte champions. Indeed, the childhood of little Arthur under his mother’s sober care seems as if it could have been a fitting start of the lives of either Gilbert of Frederick, both of whom the novel presents as images of the nearly-ideal Victorian man and husband, the successors to the clearly flawed Regency models. The emphasis on motherhood is, finally, of interest also in that it is in a very real sense another illustration of the vast degree to which women were found to create the very brutes who caused them such misery. Thus by such irresponsible and absurd behavior as mothers, the ill-treatment contemporary Regency era women as a whole suffer in their marriages may be traced clearly back to their own agency.

This clash of social mindsets is one of the novel’s central concepts, for the fundamental incompatibility which exists in the marriage between Helen and Huntingdon is this clash between obsolete Regency mores which he represents and Victorian concepts emergent in the new generation and epitomized in the person of Helen. Even Millicent and Hattersley were, despite their initial discord, at least of the same moral generation, and thus not so incompatible that they could not be contented with each other once understanding had been reached. The rift with the former couple runs deeper; from the beginning of their courtship one sees the pulse of Helen’s psychological energy, bent on a collision course with Huntingdon’s.

Quiet Millicent permitted the entire affair of courtship and marriage to be managed by her mother, but Helen the romantic is from the outset a woman actively steering her own course. Filled with youth and spirit, she firmly rejects the staid, geriatric provider-type suitors presented to her, dazzled by the easy physicality, irreverent wit, and the “joyous, playful spirit,” (Bronte, 153) which characterize the dashing Regency cavalier. Huntingdon appears before her cast as an “angel of light” rescuing her from the mentally and emotionally suffocating, if steady, men whom her aunt has been prodding her towards. After this psychological (and sometimes physical) confinement with such “purgatorial fiend[s],” the young man with the “noble nature” and the “graceful ease and freedom about all he said and did,” (Bronte, 128) seems like an avenue of escape. Further, in his “wildish” vibrance, Huntingdon offers “repose and expansion to the mind, after so much constraint and formality as I had been doomed to suffer,” (Berry, 7).

A powerful sexual attraction is also evident, as when after hearing Huntingdon’s first professions of devotion, Helen is reprimanded by her aunt. “Stay here a little till that shocking colour is somewhat abated, and your eyes have recovered somewhat of their natural expression,” (Bronte, 139). This is part of a theme of Helen’s involuntary physical manifestations of passion, when the powerful temper which helps sustain her momentarily escapes her control and becomes visible, suggestive of a feminine passion and sexuality which cannot be entirely repressed. Huntingdon and others thus are often able to read her desire against her will, such as after their first quarrel, in the midst of her offense and outrage at his arrogant recount of his conquest of Lady F___. He informs her that “Though you stand there with your white face and flashing eyes, looking at me like a very tigress, I know the heart within you, perhaps a trifle better than you know it yourself,” (Bronte, 199).

But this intensity of sexual/romantic desire must be validated and covered by the existence of purely virtuous, culturally validated motives of the Victorian tradition (O’Toole, 1) in which the woman “serves as a kind of angel in the home,” by whose “virtue and wisdom... men are redeemed from weakness and vice,” (Chitester, 31). This is a perfect expression of the frame of mind with which Helen approaches her marriage, and how she deals with her husband’s character flaws and transgressions. Her confidences to her journal reveal her physical, emotional, and psychological attractions to Huntingdon, but “When pressed by her aunt for an explanation of Arthur’s appeal, Helen does not counter with a profession of love but only with a statement of her intent: ‘I think I might have influence sufficient to save him from some errors, and I should think my life well spent in the effort to preserve so noble a nature from destruction,’” (Chitester, 32). Helen’s single great error of the novel is, as McMaster puts it, that she is too much of a mold of the Victorian angel-wife; it is her own special hubris to believe herself virtuous enough for two. Indeed, once one has progressed beyond the very initial stages of the courtship, and she becomes as much or more aware of his vices as of his virtues, his primary appeal becomes this potential to be the instrument of his salvation. She becomes obsessed. “Whatever skill or knowledge I acquire is some day to be turned to his advantage... There is essential goodness in him; and what delight to unfold it! ... Oh! If I could but believe that Heaven has destined me for this!” (Bronte, 143). It goes so far that when she fears he is succumbing to the charms of another, her primary grief is “the wreck of my fond hopes for his advantage,” as “She will neither deplore his faults nor attempt their amendment, but rather aggravate them.” (Bronte, 154).

Arthur himself is at first gratified by the attention, and “knows how to control his women by nicely calculated shows of reformation. ‘He always listens attentively now, when I speak seriously to him... and sometimes he says that if he had me always by his side he should never do or say a wicked thing...’” (McMaster, 355). However, over time “Helen’s sanctimonious behavior and religious zeal begin to resemble torture,” (Berry, 8). Some signs of it emerge early on, when she and Huntingdon walk home from Sunday service. With comically exaggerated gravity, he claims offense on the grounds that she loves God too much; she treats his preposterous comment as being absolutely in earnest, responding fiercely, “What are you, sir, that you should set yourself up as a god, and presume to dispute possession of my heart with Him to whom I owe all I have and all I am, every blessing I ever did or ever can enjoy – and yourself among the rest – if you are a blessing, which I am half inclined to doubt.” She accompanies this with a physical demonstration which elicits the protest, “Don’t be so hard upon me Helen; and don’t pinch my arm so, you’re squeezing your fingers into the bone,” (Bronte, 193). At this point she herself agrees that he has been “very good these last few weeks,” but sets herself up as a sort of thought police, saying “I would have your thoughts changed; I would have you... not to call evil good, and good, evil,” (Bronte, 196). She admits herself that “in the actual truth, I am... so intensely anxious to excuse his errors, that I am continually dwelling upon them,” (Bronte, 251). Berry argues that towards the novel’s close, “Helen virtually proselytizes him to death,” and that as Huntingdon begins to deteriorate, Helen preys upon his weakness and “presides somewhat gleefully over this process.” She informs him she has come to “benefit your soul as well as your body, and awaken some sense of contrition,” and accordingly proceeds to remind him that although the doctor assured him of recovery, that “neither the doctor nor I can speak with certainty in such a case: there is internal injury, and it is difficult to know to what extent,” and again that “There’s always a chance of death; and it is always well to live with such a chance in view,” (Bronte, 413). As Chitester remarks, “Modern psychology would descrive Helen... as ‘codependent... a person who has let someone else’s behavior affect him or her, and is obsessed with controlling other people’s behavior,’” (48).

But as the male partner in the relationship, Huntingdon is not helpless to harm her in return, being the one able to exercise the most decisive power, and applying it in violating ways from the very outset of the relationship. The physical aspect of this is that which first becomes the most glaring to the reader. During their courtship, permitted the intimacy of viewing Helen’s drawings, he proceeds not only to deliberately scrutinize the clearly private sketch of himself, found on the back of one of her pieces, but to call attention to this embarrassing discovery. When Helen, in agony, abandons dignity in attempts to reclaim it, he physically denies it to her and buttons it into his coat, laughing, before moving to take possession of her collection of work and examine each for similar covert drawings. The violation even suggests a kind of emotional or psychological rape. When he confronts her later that night and finds her restrained by fragile yet cold self-control, he dares to physically block her escape, and “seized my hand, and held it much against my will,” despite Helen’s “desperate effort to free my hand from his grasp.” Now that she behaves such that he knows her affection is at risk, he conveniently finds his affections turning warmer, and ere he releases the outraged girl, he ventures so far as to clasp and kiss her (Bronte, 148). Their first physical fight over Helen’s artwork is not the last, as soon afterwards they are in a literal tug-of-war over her entire portfolio. He gains its contents, and upon discovering another drawing of himself, again physically takes possession of it and laughs at her attempts to repossess it when again she is in a position of lost dignity and desperation (Bronte, 152). After nearly breaking Helen’s heart by his shallow advances towards Annabelle Wilmot, he presents himself to apologize when he knows he has sure power over her, his first move being to “forcibly [possess] himself of my hand.” When he wrests from her a confession of her love, an action which gives him power, he takes the liberty of “[catching] me in his arms and [smothering] me with kisses,” (Bronte, 159). This tendency towards physically restricting her continues; when he realizes her anger at his behavior towards Lord Lowborough, it is a moment of risk again, and in a great display of desperation at losing her regard, he “held me by both hands, asserting that he would not let me go till I had forgiven him,” (Bronte, 187). During their honeymoon, he also restricts her physically because he feels threatened by her eager attention to things other than himself: He forces disappointing speed upon her in their “flying transit through part of France and part of Italy,” from which “I came back nearly as ignorant as I went... [for] when I had expressed a particular interest in anything that I saw or desired to see, it had been displeasing to him in as much as it proved I could take delight in anything disconnected with himself,” (Bronte, 192). When they are settled back in Grassdale, this direct physical confinement is transformed into confinement in the home, where she must languish alone when he departs on his long pleasure trips off to London. These periods leave her desperate to see him again, such that she is at an emotional disadvantage when he returns. As their marriage turns sour, she can only remain in the house and hope that he will not often be present there; when his friends join him for sodden orgies, she has no escape but the library and her chambers, times when her helpless anger is an excellent source of entertainment for him. When it is clear their marriage is unsalvageable, though, he more consistently reacts with stern harshness, as well as exercises of male power, to both her bursts of emotion and her cold anger. Huntingdon repeatedly and insultingly refuses her chill request to let her leave in peace, lest he “be made the talk of the country, for your fastidious caprices,” (Bronte, 294). Her lowest ebb is when he discovers her plans of escape and temporarily dispossesses her of “The keys of your cabinet, desk, drawers, and whatever else you possess,” taking fiendish delight in his supremacy over her hopes, her plans, and her powerless anger and grief, as she becomes “a slave, a prisoner.” (Bronte, 352).

Huntingdon’s emotional attacks upon her are much more sadistic, however, and constitute his primary weapon against her. They are woven into the physical incidents, interspersed among them, and many of them are counters to the ways in which Helen responds to his offenses against her. As with the physical trespasses, they commence as early as the courtship. Helen is forever careening about, from bliss, to offense, to heartbreak, to temporary delight again, at the mercy of his fickle conduct. He particularly manipulates her throughout the novel by his flagrant conduct towards Annabella. Early on, Helen makes a firm stand against his mistreatment of her, tearing in two the portrait of himself which he had discovered against her wishes and attempted to take from her. He responds swiftly to her outrage by transferring his overt affections to the other woman, having “cheerful smiles and words for all but me,” and “addressed himself entirely to Annabella,” (Bronte, 152). It is only when Helen’s own behavior alters, when her spirit has broken and he finds her weeping, that he is quick to take advantage of her weakness to wrest admissions of her feelings for him, and work deception upon her by claiming fervent contrition.

After their marriage, and ever plagued by boredom, his audacity grows by leaps and bounds. “His favorite amusement is to sit or loll beside me on the sofa and tell me stories of his former amours, always turning upon the ruin of some confiding girl or the cozening of some unsuspecting husband.” His response to his new bride’s natural reactions of uncontrolled pain and anger is callous mirth, for when “I used to fly into passions or melt into tears at first... his delight increased in proportion to my anger and agitation.” Manipulating her emotions for the sheer joy of it, “when he has sufficiently diverted himself with that, or fears my displeasure will become too serious for his comfort,” (Bronte, 197) he makes overtures of appeasement.

Their first serious fight occurs when Helen is overcome by revulsion at his dastardly treatment of his friend, Lord Lowborough. A revelation to her ensues, of some of the scope of the true ugliness of Huntingdon’s character. Helen’s reaction pattern is different here; she behaves coldly, with the withdrawn courtesy of offended dignity. Huntingdon, baffled and most certainly not entertained, can only respond with childish surliness and condescending yet pathetic attempts at drawing her back (“Are you cross still, Helen?” –Bronte, 199). All war ends when he feigns deep sadness; Helen’s merciful and warm heart can no longer, at that point, remain aloof, and forgives all in transports of joy at his outward, though subtly facetious contrition. At such times, he is in control again. But as his behavior becomes more and more reproachable, particularly with respect to Annabella, and when Helen cannot help but rebuke him seriously and more often, Huntingdon begins to insult her openly, and bears increasing resemblance in word and deed to a sulky, spoiled brat. At times when he is cornered in logic (as when she maneuvers him into admitting that he would blow out the brains of any man who behaved towards her as he does towards Annabella), he begins to panic, responding with completely flagrant illogic (“You are breaking your marriage vows yourself,” –Bronte, 224). Yet for a long while he retains the surety of her forgiveness with the effective exercise such sweet words as, “You are an angel of Heaven; only be not too austere in your divinity, and remember that I am a poor, fallible mortal. Come now, Helen; won’t you forgive me?” (Bronte, 225)

His descent into alcoholism, however, indulging his corrupt Regency character to its fullest, deprives him of the ability to carry out such delicate manipulation of his Victorian wife’s emotions. He descends into crude insults (“You must have been letting [cook] get into slovenly habits then, while I was away,” –Bronte, 242), and when she reveals her grief at his condition and earnestly implores him to exercise self-control, pettishly brushes her off (“Come, come, Helen, don’t begin that nonesense now, I can’t bear it,” (Bronte, 243). And when she dissolves into tears now, formerly the cue for him to charm her heart into falling at his feet, his response is “What are you crying for, Helen? What the deuce is the matter now?” (Bronte, 245). He goes on to hold the previously mentioned drunken orgies at Grassdale, despite Helen’s obvious anguish at witnessing such spectacles, and permits his inebriated friend Hattersley to physically and emotionally terrorize Helen’s best friend without a word on her behalf – or words at all, besides laughing until he must be “wiping his swimming eyes,” (Bronte, 267).

His affair with Annabella, though not initially deliberately calculated to wound Helen, soon becomes a weapon to be taken up at leisure against the cool self-control she has won so dearly. Not only does he refuse her request of a separation, but when she informs him that they shall be henceforth married in name only, his response is the outrageously supercilious “We shall see who will tire first, my lady,” (Bronte, 295). He and his paramour soon are exchanging passionate words and tender embraces before the very eyes of the injured wife, grossly inappropriate behavior which reaches a peak when Huntingdon actually bades Helen read one of Annabella’s love letters to himself, in order that she may “take a lesson by it!” Here some of his old amusement at her irrepressible discomfiture reappears, as “He gave a slight titter on seeing me change colour.” (Bronte, 311).

Under the simultaneous pressures the emotional torture her husband inflicts upon her and that which her overexcited conscience creates, Helen stands to lose all sense of mirth and joy in life even while the reader sees Huntingdon transformed more and more into a figure of inane, mindless laughter. More importantly, she is at risk of losing her ability to trust and love any man besides her child, as things reach such a pass that she fears that “instead of being humbled and purified by my afflictions, I feel that they are turning my nature into gall.” (Bronte, 303) But it is around this time that her brother, Frederick, hitherto a nearly invisible character (at least from within the diary), steps onstage, becoming a dear and supportive friend who can and will give her the help she desperately needs. Utterly Victorian, he is critical to her development at this point, as the solitary male figure who, ever gentle and loyal, can be utterly trusted, and her only true protector. An “air of tender sadness” is said to pervade his letters to her at this point, for his sensitivity has given him the ability to discern more of her actual situation than she has told him prior to asking his help. Unlike any other men who have appeared in the novel, even Gilbert, Frederick also has the tactful respect for her pain and her dignity by “the fact of his so seldom mentioning my husband... but he has never openly expressed any disapprobation of him or sympathy for me; he has never asked any questions,” (Bronte, 356). Despite his misgivings about her “wild and impracticable” (Bronte, 357) project of leaving her husband, Frederick, outraged at her treatment, is still willing to go to great lengths to help. Working rapidly and painstakingly, he makes Wildfell Hall, though naturally still somewhat sparsely furnished, a fairly comfortable and friendly home for her (Bronte, 374). Frederick never abandons her, coming often to share his sister’s company, ever careful to prevent anyone’s having any knowledge of his visits, to preserve the obscure safety of Helen’s hiding place. And when even Helen’s uncle is taken in by the “many lies and... such unblushing coolness” of Huntingdon in the latter’s attempts to trace Helen, she may at least still have unshakeable faith in her brother’s ability to firmly repulse all of her husband’s slanders and demands, no matter who else may be deceived. He it is who keeps her faith in mankind alive, without which she could never have been able to open her heart to trust and love Gilbert.

Gilbert, for his part, although possessing characteristics of the Regency male at the outset, is reformed and sensitized by his love for Helen, while his pleasant company and earnest, steady devotion thaw and continue to revive her heart. His development is marked in part by the change of his feelings for Eliza, whose initial simpering sweetness masks startlingly vindictive malice manifested particularly towards Helen when she (Eliza) becomes the novel’s most visible presenter of the village’s aggressive gossip regarding the lady hermit. The transition of the relationship between the naïve earlier Gilbert and the lively, charming, utterly frivolous Eliza is in fact an inverted parallel of the relationship of Huntingdon and Helen. While Eliza’s character progressively degenerates, Gilbert’s love of Helen saves him from the former’s influence and causes him to see her as she is (McMaster, 364). A critical element in his character is his ability to combine the passion of the early Huntingdon with the steady provider-model responsibility of the rejected suitors, forming a quite presentable Victorian country man. Though possessing a healthy, confident ego, he is nonetheless willing to observe his flaws and change them for the better, when he realizes and is stung by Helen’s probable observation of him as “an impudent puppy,” (Bronte, 15). He is willing to listen with an open heart, despite his anger, when Helen entrusts him with her diary, and approaches her with respect and devotion both before and after. Particularly telling is the detail in which his excellent relationship with Helen’s child is described. Even at the outset, Gilbert fills the role of a protector of little Arthur (and by extension, of Helen), catching the toddler falling from a wall (Bronte, 21). And from then on, he is always the child’s trusted playmate, and through his tenderness in this relationship, shows himself worthy of the trust and love of the mother. Unlike Huntingdon, his intention is never to use little Arthur for his amusement, and unlike Hargrave, whose melodramatic behavior suggests he probably was deliberate in using displays of affection for the boy to attempt to warm the mother’s heart (Bronte, 238), Gilbert’s fondness is unfeigned. He acknowledges the convenience of Arthur’s affection, but at the same time, obviously returns it, from his warm and patient, fatherly behavior towards him, and from his speech: “Dear Arthur! What did I not owe to you for this and every other happy meeting?... In love affairs there is no mediator like a merry, simple-hearted child,” (Bronte, 84).

As for Helen, whereas her smile, early in her friendship with Gilbert, is a forced, strained expression, it soon comes more naturally. The tension slipping out of her spirit can be clearly sensed as one reads the opening narrative of the novel, all the more if one has already read the diary portion. It comes as a subtle breakthrough when Helen is at last moved even to laughter in Gilbert’s undemanding, devoted company (Bronte, 50). “It is both a sign of conscious love and a manifestation of reawakening gladness in a life in which laughter had become horrible,” (McMaster, 366). From this point her smiles become more frequent and her guarded, tight manner gradually relaxes, until she begins to look upon Gilbert with smiles that are angelic (Bronte, 70) prior to Huntingdon’s death, and “of ineffable tenderness,” (Bronte, ) afterwards, now that under the influence of Gilbert, “the bitter resistance to smiles and laughter that her first marriage had induced has been dispelled,” (McMaster, 366). The “cross mama” who was “too grave to minister to his amusements and enter into [her child’s] infantile sports as a nurse or a mother ought to do” (Bronte, 311) and who might have been about to “freeze all the sunshine out of his heart, and make him as gloomy an ascetic as myself” (Bronte, 366) has for the man who is worthy of her love, “a countenance radiant with smiles,” (Bronte, 83). Forced for so long to jealously guard all her emotional vulnerabilities, she is able to choose to relinquish her armour, even to the point of confessing her love to Gilbert, at a point when she fears that he could be growing doubtful in his for her (Bronte, 465). The very novel itself, consisting in bulk of the diary which Helen is willing to place in Gilbert’s hands, unguarded and unqualified, is a testament to her ability to trust again. And therein lies Helen’s greatest triumph over the abuse she has suffered.

Her victory is symbolically that of two groups: firstly, that of women over a society which forbade them to be rulers of their own destiny, and secondly, of the Victorian moral code over that of the Regency. The Regency’s harmless rascal, embodied in different senses by such characters as Helen’s uncle, Hattersley, and Huntingdon, is shown to be, in reality, quite harmful. The passive, pious Regency woman, in Millicent, is revealed to be deeply complicit in her own abuse, by the extreme acceptance of it which she displays. She is even demonstrated to be not even what her husband truly desires, let alone what he needs. The Victorian woman, in Helen is not painted entirely in positive tones, as the defects of her extremeties of “missionary” bent and its effects on both herself and her husband are clearly observable. Yet her strength, spirit and sensibility shine through with glory, and the warmth and courage of her heart, with the help of Victorian men, lead her to a happy marriage in the end. Men of the Victorian social mores are shown to be more than worthy successors to the failed Regency model, by gentle Frederick’s gallant and sensitive behavior towards his sister, and by Gilbert’s youthful and passionate, yet responsible and gentle, behavior towards Helen and her son. The conferrence of respect and trust upon him by these abuse-scarred individuals comes as a kind of imprimatur upon the values which he represents.

Through these conclusions, and by the passage towards them, Bronte persuasively attempts her goal. And one may curiously wonder how many times it may have been achieved, convincing young women of her day to perceive and avoid the many traps of naivete, social pressures, and emotion unrestrained which might lead them into situations nearly as painful as Anne Bronte’s heroines.