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korrick 's review for:
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
by Anne Brontë
4.9/5
I'm currently pulling this and [b:Jane Eyre|10210|Jane Eyre|Charlotte Brontë|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1327867269s/10210.jpg|2977639] apart for an essay on the Coming of Age of the Abject Woman. Naturally, Victorian lit of the het cis sane (main character only, which means no Bertha Mason) and white variety is rather slim pickings for such a topic, but I may as well start in a place that will be useful for grad school and, for all my commitments to works beyond the pale, still manages to impress. There's also the matter that with these works, unlike [b:Beloved|6149|Beloved|Toni Morrison|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1347984578s/6149.jpg|736076] and [b:Almanac of the Dead|52385|Almanac of the Dead|Leslie Marmon Silko|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1386924233s/52385.jpg|316915], I'm not out of my league in terms of consorting of the academic type. In any case, I'm in the last leg of my undergrad career (amazingly enough), and I might as well make the most of it, serious writing wise.
The plot for this, and in many ways the narrative construction, are ridiculous. So are the ones for Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights, for that matter, and casting back I remember more strongly pronounced disbelief in reaction to other specimens of this era's lit, a smidge when it came to [b:North and South|156538|North and South|Elizabeth Gaskell|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1349633381s/156538.jpg|1016482] and utter hilarity in the case of [b:Great Expectations|2623|Great Expectations|Charles Dickens|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1327920219s/2623.jpg|2612809]. Reason and rationality, then, are not what classrooms all over this postcolonial dynamic of a world of ours come back to these for again, and again, and again. Narratologicaly speaking, one would have an easy time of characterizing this as poorly constructed trash, (which has most assuredly been done time and time again from the moment it was published and at an even more accelerated pace when it was discovered that a woman held the pen) so what is it? What made it so that, almost exactly a year after I finished work this under my own power, I was assigned it as a part and parcel of the culminating class of my degree, not as mere excerpt or memorized recitation but member of trifecta?
I'd give anything for this work to age badly, I really would. The microaggressions it contains are factors neither of racism nor ableism, and the classism is more internalized than anything else, but boil them down to a fundamental level and this is fear in a handful of dust. You're merchandise, so don't complain about never having it all. You're vulnerable, so god forbid you're ever given a choice. That lack of thing between your legs dictates all from a plethora of targeted slurs to the socioeconomics of your legal right to being human, so if you want justice for rape or humanization of rape: prove it. The alienation by social mechanisms of the breaking of faith and the subversion of civilized conduct is subtle and systemic enough to merit a paper, which is exactly what I'm going to do. This, however, is not only for the centerpiece of Helen Graham's diary, but for the flanked outposts of male narrator/male narrator, a voice that develops without word during the midst of hers that, proof upon proof, outlet upon outlet, paints this boy a picture of exactly what he has committed and how he could yet turn out. So long as monsters continue to think themselves the everyman and the everyman insures the status quo, there will always be a need for the writing kith and kin of Anne Brontë.
Theoretical academic constructs allow for amused and gratified reflection of the final stages of this work in comparison to [b:Pride and Prejudice|1885|Pride and Prejudice|Jane Austen|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1320399351s/1885.jpg|3060926]'s Pemberley scene, as well as surprisingly vast class discussions on matters of nipples, children as social construct, and how in the US once a man starts stalking you he, for all practical legal matters, owns you until death do you part. I'm a tad under the weather, so if I've wandered off any more than usual through the duration of this, blame it on that. In any case, you've my previous year's effort as an example of a more focused endeavor.
4/18/15 Review
4.9/5
I'm currently pulling this and [b:Jane Eyre|10210|Jane Eyre|Charlotte Brontë|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1327867269s/10210.jpg|2977639] apart for an essay on the Coming of Age of the Abject Woman. Naturally, Victorian lit of the het cis sane (main character only, which means no Bertha Mason) and white variety is rather slim pickings for such a topic, but I may as well start in a place that will be useful for grad school and, for all my commitments to works beyond the pale, still manages to impress. There's also the matter that with these works, unlike [b:Beloved|6149|Beloved|Toni Morrison|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1347984578s/6149.jpg|736076] and [b:Almanac of the Dead|52385|Almanac of the Dead|Leslie Marmon Silko|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1386924233s/52385.jpg|316915], I'm not out of my league in terms of consorting of the academic type. In any case, I'm in the last leg of my undergrad career (amazingly enough), and I might as well make the most of it, serious writing wise.
The plot for this, and in many ways the narrative construction, are ridiculous. So are the ones for Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights, for that matter, and casting back I remember more strongly pronounced disbelief in reaction to other specimens of this era's lit, a smidge when it came to [b:North and South|156538|North and South|Elizabeth Gaskell|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1349633381s/156538.jpg|1016482] and utter hilarity in the case of [b:Great Expectations|2623|Great Expectations|Charles Dickens|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1327920219s/2623.jpg|2612809]. Reason and rationality, then, are not what classrooms all over this postcolonial dynamic of a world of ours come back to these for again, and again, and again. Narratologicaly speaking, one would have an easy time of characterizing this as poorly constructed trash, (which has most assuredly been done time and time again from the moment it was published and at an even more accelerated pace when it was discovered that a woman held the pen) so what is it? What made it so that, almost exactly a year after I finished work this under my own power, I was assigned it as a part and parcel of the culminating class of my degree, not as mere excerpt or memorized recitation but member of trifecta?
I'd give anything for this work to age badly, I really would. The microaggressions it contains are factors neither of racism nor ableism, and the classism is more internalized than anything else, but boil them down to a fundamental level and this is fear in a handful of dust. You're merchandise, so don't complain about never having it all. You're vulnerable, so god forbid you're ever given a choice. That lack of thing between your legs dictates all from a plethora of targeted slurs to the socioeconomics of your legal right to being human, so if you want justice for rape or humanization of rape: prove it. The alienation by social mechanisms of the breaking of faith and the subversion of civilized conduct is subtle and systemic enough to merit a paper, which is exactly what I'm going to do. This, however, is not only for the centerpiece of Helen Graham's diary, but for the flanked outposts of male narrator/male narrator, a voice that develops without word during the midst of hers that, proof upon proof, outlet upon outlet, paints this boy a picture of exactly what he has committed and how he could yet turn out. So long as monsters continue to think themselves the everyman and the everyman insures the status quo, there will always be a need for the writing kith and kin of Anne Brontë.
Theoretical academic constructs allow for amused and gratified reflection of the final stages of this work in comparison to [b:Pride and Prejudice|1885|Pride and Prejudice|Jane Austen|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1320399351s/1885.jpg|3060926]'s Pemberley scene, as well as surprisingly vast class discussions on matters of nipples, children as social construct, and how in the US once a man starts stalking you he, for all practical legal matters, owns you until death do you part. I'm a tad under the weather, so if I've wandered off any more than usual through the duration of this, blame it on that. In any case, you've my previous year's effort as an example of a more focused endeavor.
If you had no higher motive than the approval of your fellow mortal, it would do you little good.---
4/18/15 Review
4.9/5
I would not send a poor girl into the world unarmed against her foes, and ignorant of the snares that beset her path; nor would I watch and guard her, till, deprived of self-respect and self-reliance, she lost the power, or the will, to watch and guard herself; —and as for my son — if I thought he would grow up to be what you call a man of the world — one that has “seen life,” and glories in his experience, even though he should so far profit by it, as to sober down, at length, into a useful and respected member of society — I would rather that he died to-morrow! — rather a thousand times!I have an abiding interest in the rituals by which human beings stave off the decision of killing themselves. Morbid, perhaps, but there's no use in beating around the bush when it comes to the earthly fear of hell or the continued existence of hell on earth. This is, of course, all very Christianity-centric, and my Catholic upbringing has only prepared me for a few works here and there that cleave so insistently to the European vein of Testaments. While I wait for others of a different theological bent to give their views on how well this Bible-laden work deals with suffusions of duty, guilt, and the fight or flight of the socially-ground soul, I will satisfy myself with a familiar spiritual footing. Different as the many religions may be, Protestantism's not the only one that condemns the taking of one's own life.
What he would be, if I did not so watchfully anticipate his wants, and so carefully avoid, or immediately desist from, doing anything that has a tendency to irritate or disturb him, with however little reason, I cannot tell.I may not have given this work the full fathom five, but I can tell you this: Anne Brontë does not fuck around. [b:The Golden Notebook|24100|The Golden Notebook|Doris Lessing|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1367457541s/24100.jpg|99441] and [b:The Piano Teacher|219879|The Piano Teacher|Elfriede Jelinek|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1328823912s/219879.jpg|2179325] may be more incisively brutal in their own respective right, but it was [b:The Tenant of Wildfell Hall|337113|The Tenant of Wildfell Hall|Anne Brontë|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1396038659s/337113.jpg|1389477] that refused to flinch first. I choose other privileged-white-woman narratives to fill the ranks not out of lack of experience with other physiognomical-specific vivisections, but so as to not belittle said latter. Clipped as Helen's wings are, never does she face the prospect of selling her body for food in a far blunter manner than her marriage contract allows for. Do not, however, interpret this as a scoffing at the abuse that is afforded by said contract: what doesn't kill you breaks you for life.
Well then, Arthur, how can you call it nothing — an offence for which you would think yourself justified in blowing another man’s brains out?Alongside the themes of religion and marriage in early 19th century England, there is the matter of the intersection of gender and violence. Rather than indulge in the usual lazy stereotypes of the bitchy woman and the manhandling man, this work affords a glimpse at how these traits are developed for means of survival. Gentrified as the plot of this story may be, the social norm of reputation is shown to be a powerful force indeed when it comes to enforced isolation of both well-off genders. Everyone is allowed to play when all is fine and well, a promise coupled with the slightest misstep guaranteed to be met with a variation on the theme of a caved-in skull. The power plays by which Helen is bound to Huntington's abode have a whiff of [b:The Metamorphosis|485894|The Metamorphosis|Franz Kafka|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1359061917s/485894.jpg|2373750] about them, for what's the form of a woman who will not cooperate with house-bound benefactors?
‘I am satisfied,’ he replied, with bitter emphasis, ‘that you are the most cold-hearted, unnatural, ungrateful woman I ever yet beheld!’Comprehensive as Anne's vision is, I have to wonder whether her continued violation of Helen's confidence for the sake of tying the narrative together was a matter of a writer's inexperience or a commentary on the ubiquity of a woman's lot in life. In terms of Gilbert Markham, when one considers his first person narration and those few ripped out pages of Helen's diary, whether he is a true good or a mere lesser evil will never be riddled out to my satisfaction.
‘Ungrateful, sir?’
‘Ungrateful.’
‘No, Mr. Hargrave; I am not. For all the good you ever did me, or ever wished to do, I most sincerely thank you: for all the evil you have done me, and all you would have done. I pray God to pardon you, and make you of a better mind.’