Brontë, Anne

(British, 1820–49)

Sister of Charlotte and Emily, Anne was educated largely at home where she grew particularly close to Emily, inventing with her the imaginary world of Gondal. Anne worked as a governess and this experience was vividly portrayed in Agnes Grey (1847) which charts the development of a young woman leaving her idyllic, close-knit home to receive harsh, disdainful treatment from her employers. Anne's hotheaded brother Branwell is often regarded as the inspiration for Arthur Huntingdon, the alcoholic husband of Helen Graham in Anne's more ambitious second novel, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (1848). This tells of Helen's struggle to free herself from the excesses of her dying husband and her fears for the effect of Huntingdon's behaviour on their son. Though the latter novel proved particularly controversial at the time, both are powerful indictments of Victorian society.

  bk Charles Dickens, Elizabeth Gaskell, George Eliot  RP