Reading Order
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall Reading Order
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (1848) by Anne Brontë is the most radical of the three Brontë sisters' novels — a direct, unflinching investigation of the dissolution of a marriage through alcoholism and vice, organized as a double narrative: Gilbert Markham's account of his encounter with the mysterious woman at Wildfell Hall (Helen Graham), and the diary that Helen gives him which tells the story of her marriage to the charming, irresponsible Arthur Huntingdon. Helen married Arthur believing his dissolute companions were a youthful phase he would outgrow; she discovers instead that his character is fixed, that his friends corrupt her household and ultimately her son, and that she must leave him to save herself and her child. The novel was considered scandalous at its publication — Charlotte Brontë suppressed it after Anne's death, perhaps because its directness about alcoholism and marital dissolution was too uncomfortable — but modern readers recognize it as the most psychologically acute and socially radical of the Brontë novels. Helen's decision to leave her husband (illegal in 1848), to support herself by painting, and to refuse to return when Huntingdon falls ill are the acts of a woman who has decided that her integrity and her son's welfare outweigh the social law that makes her his property.
Where to start
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (1848) — the complete novel, in a good modern edition (Oxford World's Classics or Penguin Classics). Best Anne Brontë reading order: Agnes Grey → The Tenant of Wildfell Hall.
Complete The Tenant of Wildfell Hall Book List
- 1Buy
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
Anne Brontë·1848·The complete novel — Helen Graham, Gilbert Markham, and Arthur Huntingdon. Anne Brontë's most radical novel; the Oxford World's Classics edition with Herbert Rosengarten's introduction is the standard scholarly edition - 2Buy
Agnes Grey
Anne Brontë·1847·The companion predecessor — Agnes Grey as governess. The companion as Anne's autobiographical first novel: where The Tenant of Wildfell Hall investigates the dissolution of marriage, Agnes Grey investigates the psychological and social humiliations of the governess position — both organized around the same quiet, precise, direct social observation - 3Buy
Jane Eyre
Charlotte Brontë·1847·The companion — Jane Eyre and Mr. Rochester. The companion as the most famous investigation of the same questions (the woman who refuses to be defined by the social expectations placed on her, the man whose previous marriage is a secret) but organized through the romance mode rather than the realistic critique: Charlotte's Jane ultimately finds happiness in a way that Anne's Helen is more ambivalent about - 4Buy
Wuthering Heights
Emily Brontë·1847·The companion — Heathcliff and Cathy. The companion as the most extreme and visionary investigation of the same themes: where The Tenant of Wildfell Hall investigates the destruction of marriage through realistic domestic detail, Wuthering Heights investigates the same destruction through the romantic-gothic mode of absolute passion - 5Buy
Middlemarch
George Eliot·1871·Eliot's companion — Dorothea's marriage to Casaubon. The companion as the most complex Victorian investigation of the same theme: the marriage that destroys a woman of exceptional quality, and the social world that permits this destruction while offering no adequate remedy - 6Buy
A Doll's House
Henrik Ibsen·1879·Ibsen's companion — Nora's departure. The companion as the dramatic version of the same investigation: Nora Helmer's decision to leave her husband and children is the Norwegian theatrical equivalent of Helen Huntingdon's decision to leave Wildfell Hall — both women choose integrity and selfhood over the legal and social structure of marriage - 7Buy
Tess of the D'Urbervilles
Thomas Hardy·1891·Hardy's companion — Tess's tragedy. The companion as the late Victorian investigation of the same theme: the woman whose sexuality and character make her vulnerable to the social system's merciless judgment, and whose destruction exposes the injustice of that system - 8Buy
The Story of an African Farm
Olive Schreiner·1883·Schreiner's companion investigation of the same feminist themes in colonial South Africa — Lyndall's life and death. The companion as the Southern African version of the same investigation: Lyndall's fierce rejection of the marriage contract and her refusal to live by the social expectations placed on women is the colonial equivalent of Helen Huntingdon's escape from Wildfell Hall
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall — Frequently Asked Questions
What is The Tenant of Wildfell Hall about?
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall is about Helen Graham, a mysterious woman who arrives at the abandoned Wildfell Hall in 1827 with her young son and a male servant, and who turns out to be an artist supporting herself by painting. The local farmer Gilbert Markham is fascinated and eventually falls in love with her; when rumor and gossip threaten to destroy her reputation, she gives him her diary to read. The diary tells the story of her marriage to the charming, irresponsible Arthur Huntingdon, whose dissolute companions gradually corrupt her household and ultimately threaten her son's character. Helen makes the radical decision to leave her husband (which was illegal in 1848), to live by her own work, and to protect her son from his father's influence. She returns when Huntingdon is dying — not out of love, but out of duty — and after his death she is free. The novel then resolves the framing story: whether Gilbert and Helen will come together.
Why did Charlotte Brontë suppress The Tenant of Wildfell Hall?
Charlotte Brontë suppressed The Tenant of Wildfell Hall after Anne's death in 1849, refusing to authorize a new edition. In a letter to her publisher, she claimed that the book's subject (alcoholism and marital dissolution) was chosen in ignorance of what it would involve — that Anne didn't understand how unpleasant these subjects were. Most modern readers and scholars find this explanation inadequate and somewhat condescending: Anne Brontë was thirty-one years old, not naïve, and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall is clearly the product of deliberate choice and careful thought. The more likely explanation is that Charlotte found the book's directness and its implicit critique of the social system uncomfortable in the same way that the Victorian critical establishment did — or that she was trying to protect Anne's reputation by keeping her most controversial work out of circulation. Whatever the motivation, Charlotte's suppression meant that The Tenant of Wildfell Hall was largely forgotten until the twentieth century, when it began to be recognized as perhaps the most radical and certainly the most socially acute of the three Brontë novels.
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