Female Social Roles In Victorian Literature

Fe staminate Social Roles In straitlaced LiteratureDuring the utter roughly between Victorian and current progress, womanly societal roles encounter changed signifi nookietly however, they fluent work re importanted some convention inherited from its previous generation. To examine women and parliamentary law of their sequence, Charlotte Bront in nineteenth century and Virginia Woolf in twentieth century could provide the reflection in a clear and realistic way. However, in that respect ar similarities and differences in female person social roles in their ages. The aim of this study was to compare and contrast Bront and Woolfs portrayal of women and their contemporaries in terms of professions, marriage, and cognizance. It is concluded that even though the Victorians pioneered to break in the emancipation of women, they were hardly abandon the interior(prenominal) marriage in Bronts fiction. On the other hand, Woolf had claimed women rights should be developed by ec onomic independence, but she did non deny matrimony. This may be interest feminists, socialists and literature readers, especially who want to know more ab appear women modern times.ContentsAbstractIntroduction1. on the job(p) Women in the Literature of Charlotte Bront and Virginia Woolf1.1 Similarities1.2 Differences2. Wives and Mothers in the Literature of Charlotte Bront and Virginia Woolf2.1 Similarities2.2 Differences3. The Awareness of Women in the Literature of Charlotte Bront and Virginia Woolf3.1 Similarities3.2 DifferencesConclusionReferencesIntroductionFemale social roles have changed dramatically from Victorian age (1837-1901) to modern age (from twentieth century to the present), and literature would reflect in a vivid way the parity between women and their eras. Writers such as Charlotte Bront and Virginia Woolf are particularly influential on the literature and the contemporaries in Victorian and modern age. As the female writers, which are non valued in their g enerations, Charlotte Bront and Virginia Woolf have more closeness and concern to the women in their society.Before and at the beginning of nineteenth century, a model of femininity was the perfect lady, which was inherited as a Victorian ideal of women. Family and morality were the base of Victorian society, and girls were all taught to submit to the authority and matrimony (Vicinus 1972). The concept of The Angel in the House, which was referred to the embodiment of Victorian women, was govern in the Victorian society. As a result, women in Victorian Age were regarded as incompatible and excluded in many professions. Showalter(1999) points out that the first professional activities of Victorian women are either in the home or in womanhood. From the nineteenth century, however, the prevalence of education attributed to the gradual rising incidence of working women. Besides, by the struggles of individuals and feminists, the obstacles to the first appearance into professions for w omen, whose exclusion and incompatibility in work had been debated, were removed in the beginning of twentieth century. (Swindells 1985) Meawhile, the concept of morality and family was strongly suspected by the critics and feminists, who argue that t here(predicate) is no The Angel in the House. Within a century, not only female social roles but also female awareness had been emancipated from restraint, though some conventional notions had sleek over remained.The purpose of this paper is to compare female social roles in Charlotte Bronts Victorian fiction and Virginia Woolfs modern literature in terms of three aspects working women, wives and mothers, and awareness of women. Women and professions in Bront and Woolfs literature will be compared and contrasted firstly. Then the similarities and difference of married women their work will also be examined. Finally, how female consciousness is visualized in their work and its development from Victorian to modern age will be discusse d.1. Working Women in the Literature of Charlotte Bront and Virginia Woolf1.1 Similarities ordinal century is a crucial period for modern age because of the gender attitude and practices and professional structure which hatful inherited were formed. Besides, despite of the situation that the approach of Victorian women with professions had not happened in signifi drive outt numbers (Swindells 1985), the idea of professionalism in Victorian age also stimulates the inspiration of the contemporary novelist, Charlotte Bront and the modern writer, Virginia Woolf. Due to the fact that women have gained more access to education since the middle nineteenth century , both Charlotte Bront and Virginia Woolf have positive stance on women professions because women feel just as men feel they need exercise for their faculties and a field for their efforts as much as their brothers do. (Bront 1985141)Women and professions are presented in Charlotte Bronts novels. The most prevailing patronage for young girls in the middle-classes in Victorian Age is governess, as Charlotte Bronts Jane, the well-educated heroine, in Jane Eyre. To quote from Franoise (1974155), she is completely free in her work, that her relations with her educatee Adele are well behaved, she deplores Adele French coquetry and frivolity. Mr. Rochester has enough books in his library for her teaching methods. In Jane Eyre, Charlotte Bront depicts the background of a governess deportment in her employers family.In Virginia Woolfs viewpoint, it was workable that women are kept away from academies and institutes, but women cannot be forbidden from using the pen, paper and physical composition desk. Katharine Hilbery in Virginia Woolfs Night and Day is the implication of her approval of female professionals. During the daytime, Katharine helps her mother write the biography of her grandfather Richard Alardyce, who is a well-known poet, and she develops her interest at night. In addition, Katharine Hilbery is expected to be a writer to inherit the endowment fund of her family estate. Virginia Woolf uses Katharine as her idea of a feminist marriage is not the only destination for women.As the incidence of working women has increased, writers as Charlotte Bront and Virginia Woolf create their own heroines concerning the relation between female and professions. Though they belong to the two generations that female capabilities are often denied, Charlotte Bront and Virginia Woolf administer the same point that women can do as good as men in vocations. However, there are some different development of their novels which represent Victorian and modern ideologies of women who have jobs, and they would be discussed in the interest section.1.2 DifferencesIn the late Victorian age, the conventional social roles of women, who start to demand their own welfare and seek for more constructive roles in society, met great challenges (Vicinus 1972). Therefore, there has been a rise of the number of women who have professions since Victorian age. In the literary work of Charlotte Bront and Virginia Woolf, there are different implications and stances of working womens final outcome.Women in Charlotte Bronts fiction are affected by the ideology that marriage is the ultimate conclusion for women in Victorian age. Franoise points out that Jane in Jane Eyre, ends up by marrying afterwards macrocosm independent and free for a time, and that she gives up the task of a tutor and enjoys the moral satisfaction. Jane also indicates that Victorian married women in working-class were still minority. Another heroine in Charlotte Bronts Shirley, Shirley Keeldar, who longs for pursuing an occupation, would never stray from the domestic model eventuallyCaroline, demanded fell Keeldar abruptly, dont you wish you had a profession a monger?I wish it fifty times a day. As it is, I often wonder what I came into the world for. I long to have something entrancing and compulsory to fill my head and hands, and to occupy my thoughts.Can labour alone make a human being happy?No but it can give varieties of pain, and prevent us from breaking our hearts with a single tyrant master-torture. Besides, successful labour has its recompense a vacant, weary, lonely hopeless life has none. (Bront 1977235)This passage represents the confrontation of shaft and professions in Victorian age. Though Caroline wants to have a richer life by working, professions for her still cannot be prior to love and marriage. The function of work is to prevent us from breaking our hearts with a single tyrant master-torture. As Vicnus (1972xi) pointed out, many young women suffered the pangs of unrequited or ill-considered love, as described by Caroline.On the other hand, Virginia Woolf claims that women must be economically independent to develop their professions. In A Room of ones Own, Virginia Woolf particularly points out the difficulties that women as vocational writers have met. The imaginary heroi ne, the talented Shakespeares sis, is neglected and rejected by the society. If she has the room of her own, her creativity would be valued.In Professions for Women, Virginia Woolf states her opinions after the beginning of womens liberation from work in early twentieth centuryThe whole position, as I see ithere in this hall surrounded by women practicing for the first time in history I know not how many different professions-is one of extraordinary interest and importance. You have won room of your own in the house hitherto exclusively owned by men. You are able, though not without great labour and effort, to pay the rent. Your are earning your five hundred pounds a year. But this freedom is only a beginning the room is your own, but it is still bare. It has to be furnished it has to be decorated it has to be shared. How are you red ink to furnish it, how are you going to decorate it? With whom are you going to share it, and upon what terms? (Woolf 1942153)In the process of mak ing the entry into the work, women had won their own rooms and five hundred pounds a year, which Virginia Woolf regarded as necessary. She considered professions for women as extraordinary interest and importance. The room, professional work, was no longer possessed only by men. Finally, women had the decision to furnish, decorate, and share the room. In sum, women in the beginning of modern age had strived for their rights to get the access to the professions, the innovation and great progress in female history.2. Wives and Mothers in the Literature of Charlotte Bront and Virginia Woolf2.1 SimilaritiesSince most of the literature of Charlotte Bront and Virginia Woolf explore the relation between female and their contemporary era, marriage hardly cuckolds to be neglected. Calder(197659) states, marriage in Victorian agewas the core of social life and social aspiration. In the early twentieth century, modern society still remains the domesticity and morality inherited from Victorian age. Thus, female roles in the fiction of both Charlotte Bront and Virginia Woolf needs follow the conventions of the idea of marriage.Marriage is a social success in Victorian age, and being unmarried is considered the failure of womens lives. In Jane Eyre, Janes marriage with Rochester is domestic, with her total fealty to her husband. Jane is in the social doctrine that a Victorian woman should be all devoted to her husband and children, and that her duty is to provide a comfortable and domestic life for her mate On the hand, Caroline in Charlotte Bronts Shirley drives that an unmarried woman is doomed to be the victim of society, as shown by Miss Mann and Miss Ainsley. Single women are in the sacrificed social status, just like the homeless and unemployed people. (Franoise 1974)Similarly, Virginia Woolfs women are cast in a highly traditional act and still confined to a female sphere(Stubbs1979233). Mrs. Ramsay in To the Lighthouse leads an well-ordered life and creates the harmony not only be giving birth to children but also by giving a peaceful life for them. In fact, the stability of the family is based on the nature endowing with life, the mother. In Mrs. Dalloway, Clarissa is the hostess arranging the troupe in her house, and she is also the symbol of the natural bond to the convention and society despite of the fact that her husband and her are an unequal couple. (Marder 1968)In sum, the ideas of marriage in the ages that belong to Charlotte Bront and Virginia Woolf are similar that is to say, wives and maternity are the basis of stability and the core of domesticity. Nevertheless, Poovey (1988) has indicated that the Victorian subordination of one to another is always unstable, and the inequality can explain the emergence of the opposite, the various movement of feminists. The change of the structure and the ideology of family has implied in Virginia Woolfs later novel, threesome Guineas.2.2 DifferencesMarriage in Charlotte Bronts literature differs from Virginia Woolfs in terms of the womens subordination. In Victorian age, men control over women in relationship and matrimony, both of which are suggested in Charlotte Bronts Jane Eyre. However, this situation has changed in modern age, when masculine power has gradually eroded. Instead of staying in the masculine domination, people start to be suspicious of the value of marriage in modern age. Virginia Woolfs Three Guineas has indicated the decadence of family.In Jane Eyre, the theme of mastery of male power could often be seen. In Janes childhood, she is demanded to call John Reed my master. When she develops the relationship with St. John and Rochester, she insists on her personal will and freedom. However, she expresses her struggle and inability to avoid the domination of St. John By degrees, he acquired a certain influence over me that took away my self-sufficiency of mind his praise and notice were more restraining than his indifference (Bront 1977423). As for R ochester, he completely masters Jane, not only as an employer but also a man. Jane says, for a moment I am beyond my own mastery (Bront 1977272). She cannot resist the attraction of male domination from Rochester, even when she tries to escape from him. In the end, the refractory and ambitious Jane submits to her master, Rochester, and finally becomes absolutely bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh. (Calder1976)In Virginia Woolfs opinion, unlike Charlotte Bront, marriage to women is a way to show subordination in masculine society. Once women are married, they lose their independence, self-identity and the bond with society. In Mrs. Dalloway, it suggests that its likely that women are the prisoners in marriage nonetheless, Clarissa, the protagonist, still can feel at ease and find a way out in matrimony by arranging a party at home. May (1981134) claims, Mrs. Dalloway is about degrees and kinds of relatedness and human beings to one another, change from lonely madness to self-c ompromising sociability. Virginia Woolfs Three Guineas is based on her observation of the society. In the beginning, the Victorian family (the Pargiters) seems stable but gradually falls into decadence. Eventually the members of the three family have been separated, and many of them remained unmarried or even isolated. At the end if the story, the children and grandchildren gather in a party, which indicates that time has brought the revolution and breakdown to traditional Victorian society.From the literary work of Charlotte Bront and Virginia Woolf, we can discover the development of the idea of marriage from Victorian to modern age. Virginia Woolf, as a female writer, examines and criticizes womens role in marriage, which is an ultimate goal for Victorian women.3. The Awareness of Women in the Literature of Charlotte Bront and Virginia Woolf3.1 SimilaritiesMore work opportunities provided for women were the implication of females awareness of the importance of economic independen ce. Therefore, independent heroines could be seen in Charlotte Bronts literary work in Victorian age (Vicinus 1972). Besides, they became the foreshadow of Virginia Woolfs modern literature. Independent heroines are often portrayed in their fiction.In Charlotte Bronts novels, Shirley and Jane Eyre, the outspoken main female protagonists are the models of women independence. Shirley Keeldar, who describes herself as a woman, and something more, is an economically independent woman in Shirley. In addition, Shirley also suggests that the dependent relation is always unstable and leads to misery. resembling the workers to their owners, wives are maltreated and ignored. In Jane Eyre, Jane will not succumb to the reality, and it could be seen from her rebellion in childhood to her pursuit for knowledge and love in womanhood. Jane is not satisfied with the feeling of confinement Then I longed for a power of vision which might overpass that limit which might reach the busy world, towns, re gions salutary of life I desired more of practical experience more of intercourse with my kind(Bront 1977140).Franoise(1974) also points out that Jane does not deny her love for Rochester and that she confesses and attentively listens to his depiction of his story, as a result of her refusal to the traditional female roles reliance, modesty and shyness. According to Showalter (1999), Janes running away from Rochester is her self-preservation. In Jane Eyre, as cited by Showalter (1999), Jane tells herself, I alimony for myself. The more solitary, the more friendless, the more unsustained I am, the more I will respect myself (Bront 1977344). For her, action is always the way to independence. Franoise (1974) claimed that Charlotte Bronts heroines represented the female disobedience to conventional rules and the liberty of the Angel in the House.In modern age, Virginia Woolf also claimed the importance of being economic independent and having a room for ones own for women. As Virgini a Woolf (1945112) stated in A Room of Ones Own, the habit of freedom and the courage to write exactly what we think,then the opportunity will come and the dead poet who was Shakespeares sister will put on the body which she has so often laid down. If the room of ones own is a place for the feminine conference, which contains the authority, politics, and aggression in male world, it will be a grave, as Clarissas attic bedroom in Mrs. Dalloway. However, if it is a center combined with female tradition and culture if people here make efforts to women independence, then Shakespeares sister, the future Virginia Woolf, may appear eventually. That female shares the equality with male is not a fantasy (Showalter 1999). In Virginia Woolfs To the Lighthouse, Lily, a female painter, thirstily wants to prove her ability to Charles Tansley, who claims that women cannot paint and write. She represents the women of independence and females desire of overtaking the gender boundary.Charlotte Bront and Virginia Woolf have indicated the female awareness and independence of their contemporary ages however, it seems that Victorian women still fail to be separated from domestic marriage. The differences of Charlotte Bront and Virginia Woolfs heroines in terms of female awareness will be examined in the following section.3.2 DifferencesThough both Charlotte Bront and Virginia Woolf have portrayed and declared their stances toward women awareness, they have endowed them with different characteristics and destinies suggesting the conventional notions in Victorian and modern age. In Bronts novels, however, female roles ultimately cannot avoid the bond of marriage, which is considered as the destination of Victorian women. On the contrary, Woolfs women would not always follow this pattern. Furthermore, she has pointed out the flaw of Bronts fiction.In spite of the fact that most of the heroines in Bronts novels are passionate, restless, and often contradictory in their inner world, the y are often tied to matrimony at the end of the story. Both Bronts Jane Eyre and Shirley provide the indicate of convention that Virginia Woolf attacks. Love and marriage are significant ingredients in the literature in nineteenth century.In Jane Eyre, Jane is ambitiously desired to pursue the vastness of knowledge. Meanwhile, like Shirley Keeldar in Shirley, she can only contemplate marrying a man who can be her master (Calder 1976). Similarly, the two heroines in Shirley, Caroline and Shirley, hunt for independence however, both of them gather up for ideal mates as well. The pattern of Jane Eyre and Shirley is similar to some extent those female protagonists have no choice but being dominated by men at last.In twentieth century, Woolfs Night and Day shows that womens consciousness has challenged the social notion concerning female roles and that marriage to women is not the only solution. Though being in the dilemma of the fact that if she should break the convention and disobey the expectation from her family, Katharine Hilbery can decide her own future. Besides, in Virginia Woolfs A Room of Ones Own, she argues that Charlotte Bronts writing inherits masculine style, It was a sentence that was unsuited for a womans use. Charlotte Bront, with all her splendid gift for prose, stumbled and fell with that clumsy weapon in her hands (Woolf 200077). Virginia Woolf regards that literature has been authorised by men since ancient time thus, masculine sentences are inevitable even in womens literary work. Showalter (1999) has expressed a similar view that female writers had been deprived of the language of their own style and the awareness of ambition, and their deprivation had extended from Victorias reign to the twentieth century. The delicacy and fastidiousness of Woolfs language is an expansion of this feminized style.ConclusionCharlotte Bront and Virginia Woolfs portrayal of female characters had reflected the female social roles in Victorian and modern age. In the transition between nineteenth and twentieth century, the womens ideology and the social norms had changed, while some of them still had been inherited. They were presented in Bront and Woolfs literature in a various and fascinating way.To compare and contrast women in the literary work of Bront and Woolf, the female roles in professions and marriage and their awareness were chosen. More and more women had had their vocations, which meant that they had the economic independence however, Victorian women still could abandon it for marriage. Besides, it was discovered that while domesticity had been valued in both Victorian and modern age, people gradually had found the flaw of the subordination of wives. As for womens inner world, self-discovery and thirst for independence were both considered in Bront and Woolfs literature. Unlike Bront, Woolf had emphasized the significance of womens own income and feminine language. It is concluded that female had gained more freedom in moder n age and that Virginia Woolf strongly supported the idea of gender equality and was optimistic toward the future women status.