Anne Bronte Flashcards
Anne Bronte’s pseudonym
Acton Bell
When is Tenant of Wildfell Hall published?
1848
Tenant of Wildfell Hall: genre, structure, form
Epistolary–letters from Gilbert Markham to his friend and brother-in-law about the vents leading up to meeting his wife. Letters are long.
Tenant of Wildfell Hall: the hall itself
An Elizabethan mansion which has been empty for many years. A mysterious young widow arrives, who assumes the name Helen Graham.
Tenant of Wildfell Hall: Helen Graham
alias Helen Graham (Graham is her mother’s maiden name), the tenant of the title. Wildfell Hall is the place where she and her brother were born. After their mother’s death she goes to live with their aunt and uncle at Staningley Manor, while her brother, Frederick, remains with their father. In spite of their separation Helen has maintained an affectionate relationship with her brother and later he helps her to escape from her abusive and dissolute husband. The character of Helen Graham was probably inspired by Anna Isabella Milbanke, the wife of George Byron. Like Anna, Helen firstly believed that reforming her husband’s behaviour was her religious obligation. Despite disillusionment, both women retained their Universalist faith.
Tenant of Wildfell Hall: Master Arthur Huntingdon
five years old at the beginning of the book, the son of Arthur Huntingdon and Helen. He has a resemblance to his uncle, Frederick, which gives rise to gossip. He is grown up by the time of Gilbert’s letter to Jack Halford, and is residing at Grassdale Manor with his wife, Helen Hattersley (the daughter of Milicent Hargrave and Ralph Hattersley).
Tenant of Wildfell Hall: Mr Maxwell
Helen’s wealthy uncle, dies near the end of the novel and leaves Staningley to Helen.
Tenant of Wildfell Hall: Peggy Maxwell
Helen’s aunt, tries to warn her against marrying Huntingdon. She dies several years after Helen’s and Gilbert’s marriage.
Tenant of Wildfell Hall: Frederick Lawrence
Helen’s brother, helps her to escape from Huntingdon and lends her money. As he and Helen grew up apart and probably never visited each other before her first marriage, no one in Linden-Car village guessed that the secretive Mrs. Graham is actually Frederick’s sister. Eventually he marries Esther Hargrave. Being in mourning for her husband, Helen is forced to miss her brother’s wedding.
Tenant of Wildfell Hall: Arthur Huntingdon
Helen’s abusive and alcoholic husband, is a Byronic figure of great fascination but also of barely concealed moral failings. His abusive behaviour impels Helen to run away from him, but nevertheless when he becomes ill (after falling from his horse when drunk and injuring his leg badly), Helen returns to Grassdale to take care of him. Unwilling to stop drinking alcohol, Huntingdon deteriorates in health and eventually dies. He is widely thought to be loosely based on the author’s brother, Branwell, but some critics have argued that, apart from their masses of red hair, they have little in common. Along with Lord Lowborough, Huntingdon bears far stronger resemblance to two types of drunkards outlined in Robert Macnish’s The Anatomy of Drunkenness.
Tenant of Wildfell Hall: Branwell Bronte
Thought to be the basis of dissolute Arthur Huntingdon (they both have masses of red hair). Causes some offense w sisters
Tenant of Wildfell Hall: Annabella Wilmot
later Lady Lowborough, Arthur Huntingdon’s paramour, is flirtatious, bold and exquisitely beautiful. She has an affair with Arthur Huntingdon for several years. Helen ignores the affair, but when Annabella’s husband discovers it, he divorces her. Gilbert says he hears that after Annabella moves to the continent, she falls into poverty and dies destitute and alone, but stresses he cannot be sure if this is true or merely a rumour.
Tenant of Wildfell Hall: Lord Lowborough
friend of Huntingdon’s and Anabella’s husband, is apathetic but devoted. Melancholic, dour and gloomy, he is in complete contrast to Huntingdon. He used to gamble and drink too much alcohol and developed an addiction to opium, but after his financial ruin gradually reforms himself. Lowborough truly loves Annabella, and her infidelity brings him such suffering that only his Christian faith and strong will keep him from suicide. Later he divorces her and after some time marries a plain middle-aged woman, who makes a good wife to him and a stepmother to his children with Annabella — a son and a nominal daughter. Lord Lowborough also has some resemblances to Branwell, such as a life of debauchery, periods of remorse/religious torments, and opium, as well as moral weakness
Tenant of Wildfell Hall: Ralph Hattersley
a friend of Huntingdon’s, marries Milicent because he wants a quiet wife who will let him do what he likes with no word of reproach or complaint. He mistreats his wife. “I sometimes think she has no feeling at all; and then I go on until she cries – and that satisfies me,” he tells Helen. But after he reforms himself he becomes a loving husband and father.
Tenant of Wildfell Hall: Mr Grimsby
another of Arthur’s friends, is a misogynist. He helps Arthur to conceal his affair with Annabella.