Writing the Female Body in 19th Century Fiction: A Critical Discussion of Physicality in Emily Brontë's Wuthering Heights and Charlotte Brontë's Villette

Facultad de Filología GRADO EN ESTUDIOS INGLESES TRABAJO DE FIN DE GRADO CURSO: 2023-24 Título: Writing the Female Body in 19th Century Fiction: A Critical Discussion of Physicality in Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights and Charlotte Brontë’s Villette Alumno/a: María Salagre Alba Firmado: Tutora: Carolina Sánchez-Palencia Carazo Firmado por SALAGRE ALBA MARIA - ***7449** el día 14/05/2024 con un certificado emitido por AC FNMT Usuarios Salagre Alba 2 Table of Contents 1.Introduction ............................................................................................................................. 3 2.Historical Context ................................................................................................................... 4 2.1. Victorian Female Fashion as Gender and Body Politics ................................................. 7 3.Wuthering Heights: Catherine and Isabella’s Body-Psyche Duality ...................................... 7 3.1. Mortal Regret or Going Beyond Physicality ................................................................... 7 3.2. Female Illness: Pregnancy and Psychosomatic Responses to Emotional Stimuli ........ 11 4. Villette, a Journey towards Independence: “The Female Body as a Resisting Tool for Patriarchy” ................................................................................................................................ 17 4.1 Lucy’s Dependent Independence: A Victorian Misfit and a Heroine ............................ 18 4.2. Anorexia Nervosa: General Dissatisfaction and Maladjustment .................................. 19 4.3. The Subversion of Gender Normativity within Gendered Spaces: Rejection of Hyper Femininity by Cross-Dressing .............................................................................................. 24 5. Conclusions .......................................................................................................................... 26 Works Cited .............................................................................................................................. 28 Salagre Alba 3 1.Introduction Throughout history, female bodies have been subdued to male patriarchal values, depriving them from their own agency and freedom. Strict norms concerning women’s physicality had been a tool to impose normative behaviours and categorize women to keep them silent, basing their womanhood on their capacity to fit into the social standards. Nonetheless, despite all efforts to create a patriarchal system that alienates women that step outside the norm, many historical figures and literary characters shared a common array of problems with regards to their own gendered identity and consequently, to the way their bodies were perceived, because, since Western patriarchy has traditionally associated femininity with physicality, to question a woman’s embodied subjectivity means to interrogate her very selfhood. In this paper, I will focus on 19th century English literature. More specifically, I will be analyzing two major works: Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë and Villette by Charlotte Brontë. I will also delve into the different perspectives taken by the different authors to portray the effects of Victorian repression on the female body. Wuthering Heights has been given special attention because of the psychological and psychiatric conditions most of the characters show. Nonetheless, physical illness in the novel serves as a metaphor for injustice in the land-based patriarchy of Victorian England. Moreover, the characters’ physicality and postmortem presence are also very relevant topics in the novel. I will talk about what I. Geerken labels Mortal Regret and how this alters the canonical perception of female embodiment and its link within the Gothic framework of Brontë’s works. It is also worth considering the treatment of pregnancy throughout the novel, and how it emphasizes the objectivization of women with regards to reproductive purposes. Villette, on the other hand, exemplifies the ternary classification of women in Victorian literature according to Susan Gubar and Sandra Gilbert: The Angel in the House, The Fallen Angel and The Madwoman, represented by the two main female characters of the novel: Polly and Lucy. In this case, Villette outlines the lonely journey towards female maturation and personal fulfillment. This novel becomes, in critic Jane Carlisle’s words “a journey into a world that is spectral because it is dead, a world that calls into question the stability and sustainability of one’s identity” (Carlisle,1979:267). The dichotomy between beauty and intelligence will be emphasized throughout the novel, clearly portraying the reception of a Victorian public regarding this matter. Salagre Alba 4 2.Historical Context In this analysis, I will also contextualize each novel in time, place, and personal experience of both Brontë sisters, and how the authors used bodily illness as to reflect on their own problematic life as Victorian female writers. Serious diseases and precocious mortality were very present in the Brontë sisters' life. Cholera, tuberculosis, rabies, fevers, madness, hysteria among many others pervade all their novels. Death was routinary in Victorian England. In general, “the mortality rate was 10.5 percent higher than the law considered needing special attention” (Barker, 2012:635). The average age in Haworth, Yorkshire, where the Brontë sisters lived for almost all their lives, was only twenty-five years . Hence it not only related to the health issues endured in Victorian England, but it also symbolized and addressed more generalized social problems, such as overpopulation in urban areas and widespread poverty, “less manageable than the disease itself” (Byrne, 2011:15). Victorian society was marked by profound socioeconomic and cultural changes that significantly impacted on the population. Nonetheless, women faced inequality exacerbated by the preservation of gender roles and male supremacy, which affected their physical and mental health and the cultural representations it inspired. For instance, industrialization and urbanization lead to a rapid and poor development of cities, causing overpopulation and widespread poverty. As Mark Freeman observes, later emphasized by Worth, the realities of rural life were “hidden behind a series of pastoral conceptions of the countryside that accorded rurality a status superior to that of urban cultural life” (Worth, 2018:8). “While the population of England and Wales rose from 17.9 to 36.1 million in the period from 1850 to 1914, the number of people living in rural districts fell from 8.9 to 7.9 million” (Worth, 2018:9). These conditions were particularly harsh for women, who were often relegated to lowpaying and precarious jobs, such as domestic service or factory work, with few opportunities for advancement or financial independence. This caused the rapid development of the tuberculosis epidemic among lower classes due to the unhealthy conditions many had to endure. “All women had a special status, as females and all women suffered disadvantages with regards to the law, marriage, money, business, and employment, regardless of their social class. Salagre Alba 5 It could be contended that women had no social class on their own account, but it derived from fathers and husbands” (Wojtczak, 2003:3). Medicine during this era was not very advanced, and diseases were spreading very rapidly among the population due to limited resources, lack of awareness of hygienical measures and the failure or impossibility to treat and/ or diagnose certain diseases. As mentioned by Jalland “the medicine of the Victorian general practitioner was not much more advanced than that of his predecessors two centuries earlier because he had few effective medications” (Jalland, 1996: 78). The cause of death and the result of diseases such as cholera and typhus remained “deeply obscured and much contested” (Jalland, 1996: 83). Doctors and patients were aware of these limits, and death was surrounded by uncertainty and inexplicable forces that went beyond science at the time. Even when patients were on palliative treatment, rather than criticizing, they still respected and admired the doctors for their labor. In addition, the rate of infant mortality in England was one of the most elevated ones in Europe, apart from Germany. According to the PMC, “Nationally, infant mortality rose in the period 1650-1740, to almost 20 % of all live-born infants” (Davenport, 2021:7). Taking into account the rapid spread of infectious diseases previously mentioned, child labour, malnutrition and infertility were also key factors in the normalization of death among population during the Victorian era, which lead to ritualization and complex management of diseases and death. One instance of this ritual complexity might be found in the development of postmortem photography as a very common practice during the 19th century. Although it might seem unsensitive nowadays, in Victorian England this became a very common and more affordable way of commemoration for the death in a more affordable way and also a way to cope with grief. According to BBC journalist Bethan Bell: “Death portraiture became increasingly popular. Victorian nurseries were plagued by measles, diphtheria, scarlet fever, rubella - all of which could be fatal. It was often the first-time families thought of having a photograph taken - it was the last chance to have a permanent likeness of a beloved child” (Bell, 2016). Considering the above premises, it can be affirmed that family tragedy and death haunted the Brontë sisters from a very early age. Beginning with the premature dead of their mother at the age of thirty-eight due to what is commonly known nowadays as “uterine cancer”, the Brontë sisters spent most of their lives enduring grief and loss as a consequence of the Salagre Alba 6 precarious conditions in Haworth. Consumption, or most commonly known nowadays as tuberculosis, was also fatally crucial in their lives. Five members of the Brontë family (Maria, Elizabeth, Branwell, Emily and Anne Brontë) died of tuberculosis within less than a year. At thirty-three, Charlotte was the only sibling alive. Because of the longstanding effects of malnutrition, lack of knowledge about infectious diseases and the absence of health measures, epidemics and mortality were prevailing in their lives, becoming central to the plot in Wuthering Heights. “With the knowledge of modern medicine, the diseases described in Victorian novels can be identified with considerable certainty” (Bloomfield, 2011:293). Special attention is paid to the depiction of patients with tuberculosis. Barnes argues that “tuberculosis was the most familiar face of death in the 19th century and so it became a vessel into which could flow a variety of fears, griefs and emotions” (Barnes, 2023:251). While tuberculosis was perceived as a “somehow noble” and generated feelings of sympathy, mental illness was socially unacceptable in the 19th century and considered “a disgrace” because, to a great extent, the mentally ill, marginalized from society and normally retained in institutions, were often blamed for bringing on their own illnesses and were sometimes seen as victims of bad fate, religious and moral transgression and even witchcraft” (Bloomfield 2011: 296). Historical evidence shows that Charlotte Brontë visited prisons and asylums to witness solitary confinement and its effects. According to Showalter, “in 1853, Brontë visited both Pentonville prison and Bethlem hospital and saw firsthand the treatment (effective or otherwise) of mad patients there” (Showalter 1985: 68). By the same token the historical objectification of women in Victorian England as previously analyzed, rooted in notions of fragility and the ideal of The Angel in the House, has long been intertwined with societal expectations regarding femininity. This construct, emphasizing women's delicacy, domestic confinement, and submission, has pervaded various aspects of culture, including the realm of fashion. Throughout history, fashion trends have often been dictated by these entrenched ideals, perpetuating harmful standards that prioritize aesthetic appeal over women's well-being and autonomy. From corsets designed to cinch waists to impractical footwear that constricted movement, fashion has served as a tool for reinforcing patriarchal norms, restricting women's freedom and agency for the sake of ornamental beauty. Salagre Alba 7 2.1. Victorian Female Fashion as Gender and Body Politics In the Victorian era, fashion and ideals of slimness were deeply intertwined, largely due to the widespread popularity of the corset. The use of the corset had multiple implications on the bodies and minds of its users. It imposed fashion ideals on women, reinforcing the necessity to be slim and refined in order to be valuable in society. Explicit rules were published in many magazines at the time, stablishing beauty standards for women: “The reason why a small waist is a beauty is because, when it is natural, it goes together with the peculiar litheness and activity of a slenderly built figure. All the bones are small, the shoulders and arms petite, and the general look is dainty and youthful” (Haweis, 1878: 120). The corset reinforced the idea of idle, frail, and weak woman that remained in the confines of the domestic space, entirely dependent on a male power figure, either represented by her husband or her father. A corset produces physical constraint, compressing the upper core and specially the waist, framing the ideal fragile and weak women “languishing in ennui; incapable of constancy, decision or stature, the middle-class woman was, until recently, consistently disparaged” (Mcclintock 2012: 160). 3.Wuthering Heights: Catherine and Isabella’s Body-Psyche Duality 3.1. Mortal Regret or Going Beyond Physicality With regards to previous historical background, it is worth considering the relevance of death in Wuthering Heights. The narrative of this book is more than a tale about longing from the dead. The life-death divide is completely blurred. Although death connotates an attempt to transition into a post-life state, different from that of the living, in the world of Wuthering Heights, death and life can coexist within the same person. In this novel, there is definite proof that dead bodies are not entirely annihilated from life. Heathcliff characterizes himself as a mere transition into a nearby realm, one animated by the enduring spirit of Catherine. Heathcliff's response to Catherine's death is governed by anger and torment, yet he maintains a steadfast belief that Catherine's absence is not permanent but Salagre Alba 8 rather a temporary state of being untraceable: "Where is she? [...] Not there - not in heaven - not perished - where?" (Brontë, 2000:175). Catherine's demise fundamentally reshapes Heathcliff's inner and outer world. Furthermore, her passing serves as the pivotal backdrop through which the entirety of the narrative's environment is interpreted and understood. Catherine serves as the element to metamorphose Heathcliff’s internal and external landscape. According to Geerken, Heathcliff suffers from Mortal Regret throughout the whole novel. Mortal Regret is “an experience of profound object loss. Four major acts that express Mortal Regret are: 1) clutching, 2) corpsing, 3) exhumation, and 4) incantation” (Geerken 2004, 378). Heathcliff checks all the boxes. First, he clutches Catherine’s body in a desperate attempt to prevent separation: "I tried to draw back my arm, but the hand clung to it" (Brontë, 2000: 32). Secondly, he identifies with the dead loved one by what Geerken describes as “corpsing”, that is, playing dead. In a way, “corpsing makes the experience of death accessible by representing what it feels like to be dead” (Geerken, 2004: 380). Thirdly, Heathcliff exhumes the corpse in order to obtain physical intimacy and asks the sexton to leave a spot for him to be buried with her: “I got the sexton, who was digging Linton’s grave, to remove the earth off her coffin lid, and I opened it. I thought, once, I would have stayed there: when I saw her face again— it is hers yet!—he had hard work to stir me; but he said it would change if the air blew on it, and so I struck one side of the coffin loose, and covered it up” (Brontë, 2000: 209). “Fourth, he calls on her to haunt him wishing to literally raise her from the dead: “‘May she wake in torment!’ he cried, with frightful vehemence, stamping his foot, and groaning in a sudden paroxysm of ungovernable passion” (Brontë, 2000: 149). Somehow, Brontë changes the meaning of life and death through the characters of Catherine and Heathcliff. On the one hand, Catherine is resurrected as a ghost while Heathcliff succumbs to death. Heathcliff's desperate plea for Catherine to awaken imbues her spectral form with vitality, evidenced by her bleeding in the opening scene: “I observed several splashes of blood about the bark of the tree, and his hand and forehead were both stained” (Brontë, 2000: 150). Salagre Alba 9 In contrast, Heathcliff regresses to primal instincts, splattering blood on the tree's bark and emitting feral cries. Following Catherine's demise, the narrative dynamics shift, with the two lovers exchanging roles. Brontë presents the intertwining of life and death, portraying Catherine as life-in-death and Heathcliff as death-in-life, exploring this duality as a possibility and gothic feature in Wuthering Heights. Catherine’s physicality is very ambivalent. Firstly, Heathcliff endures with Catherine’s death as if she were a “"living thing in flesh and blood ... a substantial body in the dark” (Brontë, 2000: 290). Catherine’s ghost becomes solidified due to Heathcliff’s dependence on Catherine. Her whole existence is mainly marked by abuse, and even after her death, her memory, legacy, and corpse are manipulated by patriarchy. Catherine’s agency is never respected, and both Heathcliff and Edgar Linton’s exploit female independence. Heathcliff's possessive fixation on Catherine persists beyond her passing, as he endeavors to exert control over her even in death, insisting on being buried to rest beside her: “of dissolving with her and being more happy still!” (Brontë, 2000, 209). According to scholar Kathryn Colvin, the grave in Wuthering Heights is portrayed not necessarily as a place of separation, but at times as a “sensualised and even yearned-forsite of erotic union; especially, the female lover’s grave is a liminal space where a man,‘wild’with the twinned hungers of despair and desire, can seek in this heightened state to transcend the taboo boundary between life and death” (Colvin 202:385). Heathcliff's necrophiliac longing for Catherine's grave is so intense that he finds solace in a peculiar dream where he imagines himself in eternal rest beside her, his heart ceased, and his cheek pressed against hers. However, it is the tantalizing idea of merging with her, a sensual concept of complete dissolution and union—the ultimate, unbreakable physical intimacy—that brings him even greater joy. This transcendent experience represents a permanent and immortalized form of their fleeting earthly sexual connection, intensifying Heathcliff's happiness even further. In addition, Heathcliff’s extreme fixation on Catherine’s body provokes him to desecrate her coffin to replace Edgard’s lock of hair with Heathcliff’s. Hair held significant fetishistic value, embodying various symbolic meanings deeply ingrained in the cultural and social fabric of the era. Often regarded as a potent symbol of femininity, virtue, and even eroticism, hair played a central role in defining gender norms and societal expectations. Some parts of their Salagre Alba 16 readership. In addition, motherhood ends up tragically with her life. Firstly, she is abandoned by her alleged husband in his son’s early years. Not only that but she contracts tuberculosis from her son, which in her case, will eventually be the cause of her death. Her son, although he manages to survive from that disease, is described from the minute he is born as a weak creature: "He was christened Linton, and, from the first, she reported him to be an ailing, peevish creature" (Brontë, 2000: 133). This could also be alluding to the fact that her marriage was as weak as their child. In contrast with Catherine, he is a wanted child, although he is completely neglected by his paternal figure once he has achieved his purpose. Tuberculosis adds up to the weakness and feeble aspect of Isabella. Taking into consideration the historical context previously analyzed, it makes sense that Brontë decides to link this disease to Isabella. Tuberculosis was socially interpreted in the 19th century as a graceful demise and generated feelings of sympathy. There was neither shame nor stigma on it, but it implied some sort of pity for those who suffered and died as a result of its infection. As the disease implied consumption, Isabella’s vanishing from the narrative (not without leaving a painful testimony of her suffering) can be associated to the erasure of her female existence in a story dominated by powerful masculine interests, thus proving her role as a sacrificial figure, in tune with the definitions of Victorian normative femininity. Isabella is the embodiment of victimhood. She is not only victim of tuberculosis but also victim of male abuse. In 1878, Frances Power Cobbe’s uses the term Wife-Torture in England (qtd. Pike, 2009: 375). According to Pike, while Emily Brontë was writing her novels, discussions on domestic violence were occurring discreetly within Parliament, particularly in debates concerning divorce laws and defining cruelty as grounds for divorce (qtd. Pike, 2009: 375). Brontë's decision to incorporate this theme, a topic her sister Anne also explored in The Tenant of Wildfell Hall a year later, sparked considerable controversy during that period. After she is expropriated from her fortune and family, Isabella ends up being deprived of her very life. After her marriage, she not only loses her social status but also her former identity. She is no longer described as childlike girl, but somehow, she acquires a degree of coarseness that allows her to grow up into a married woman, different from the original. There are some instances in the text that prove her aversion to using her married name. For instance, she signs the letter Nelly receives simply as Isabella. In addition, the letter references indirectly the fact that she is no longer Isabella Linton but Isabella Heathcliff, unrecognizable for those who knew the true Isabella: “My name was Isabella Linton” (Brontë, 2000:100). Salagre Alba 17 Although her letter showcases Isabella Heathcliff's development of a nuanced and commanding narrative voice, she remains constrained by the legal limitations of coverture. Isabella's inquiry regarding her husband's possible insanity holds significance within the context of her time. Elizabeth Foyster's examination of Wife Battery spanning from the Edwardian era to the Victorian period highlights how societal norms of decorum and the expectation for men to exhibit restraint led to conjecture, particularly among observers of domestic abuse, that the husband's violent behavior was indicative of madness (qtd. Pike, 2009: 356). According to Algernon Charles Swinburne “the details of deliberate or passionate brutality in Heathcliff’s treatment of his victims make the reader feel for a moment as though he were reading a police report” (qtd. Pike, 2009: 356). Isabella and Catherine are clearly subjected to male violence. Although their management is different, psychosomatic responses to unhealed trauma in both characters are present throughout the novel, finally causing their tragic deaths. Motherhood and girlhood in the Victorian Era are topics covered in the novel by the author. Emily Brontë's own tragic relationship with motherhood can be reflected in the novel as well. As stated by Gubar and Gilbert, “To be a lady is to be diseased” (Gilbert & Gubar, 1984: 269). 4. Villette, a Journey towards Independence: “The Female Body as a Resisting Tool for Patriarchy” As previously stated, womanhood during the 19th century implied facing gender-specific risks and vulnerabilities. In contrast with Wuthering Heights, Villette was written by Emily Brontë’s sister Charlotte five years after Emily’s death and four after her other sister, Anne’s. This novel seems to serve her as a way of alleviating the shock produced after the rapid decease of both her sisters. Villette highlights the challenges women faced amidst the constraints of Victorian societal norms, illustrating their solitary path towards growth, and finding fulfillment. This story is “a journey into a world that is spectral because it is dead, a world that calls into question the stability and sustainability of one’s identity” (Carlisle, 1979:267). The focus of the analysis will be placed mainly on the binary opposition between the two main characters of the novel; Lucy and Polly, and how although they represent contrary ideals, both share the complexity of women’s emotional needs in Victorian society. Some of the limitations of the female roles are expressed in Wuthering Heights, showcasing the causes of social emotional immobility for Catherine. The process of maturing is what damages Salagre Alba 18 Catherine, eventually causing her death. In Villette, Lucy Snowe serves as a response to this, and could be considered “an honest elegy for all those women who cannot find ways out and are robbed of their will to live” (Gilbert & Gubar, 1984:403). 4.1 Lucy’s Dependent Independence: A Victorian Misfit and a Heroine “Who are you, Lucy Snowe?” Ginevra curiously inquires, unable to assign a conventional feminine role to her young teacher, later referring to her as “peculiar and so mysterious” (Brontë, 2018: 307, 309). This quote encapsulates perfectly how Lucy Snowe is perceived by a Victorian readership: ”Silent, invisible, at best an inoffensive shadow, Lucy Snowe has no patrimony and no expectations, great or little” (Gilbert & Gubar, 1984: 400). Lucy represents general misidentification because of several factors: her absent family, her gender, her interest and most importantly, her independence. She is a nobody. Dependency of a man was quintessential for women in Victorian society, considered mentally weaker, hence, more “vulnerable to insanity than men” (Showalter, 2007:7). Normally, due to their own personal circumstances, paternal tyranny, exerted whether by the father or the husband, occasioned the domestication of women constrained only within household activities and consequently, the common development of mental diseases. Lucy is the anthesis to gender normativity within Victorian England. Firstly, she is forced to be independent from an early age, as she is an orphan. Secondly, she does not meet neither the beauty nor the intellectual standards for a woman at the time. Lucy is described by Graham as a sort of androgynous source of intellect with whom he could eventually hold a conversation: “I believe if you had been a boy, Lucy, instead of a girl—my mother’s godson instead of her god-daughter—we should have been good friends: our opinions would have melted into each other” (Brontë, 2019: 315). Graham acknowledges her intellect that is masculine enough to be valid, although not valid enough to trust her because of her gender. “Lucy Snow is tormented by the realization that she has bought survival at the price of never fully existing” (Gilbert & Gubar, 1984: 400). She becomes aware of the social dangers of society of being completely deprived of identity and power. Moreover, although it is never directly addressed in the novel, it can be inferred that this character endures traumatic events during her childhood, probably caused by her orphanhood. This, according to Freudian psychoanalysis could be considered the cause of her hysterical disorder. Nonetheless, she not only suffers mental processes but also physical damage, thus reinforcing the psychosomatic implications of societal constrains for Victorian women. Salagre Alba 19 On the one hand, the highly misogynistic society in which all these authors were writing was the main source of the social illness reflected by their heroines: “Women’s insanity was based on the experience of the biological crises of menstruation and life cycle during which their minds were weakened” (Showalter, 2018:55-56, emphasis mine). The social taboo surrounding this matter contributed to the reinforcement of women’s weaker position in society and dependence of masculine figures, because the public disclosure of this would have violated religious and social dogmas. On the other hand, separating from the norm lead clear marginalization and stigmatization of women’s emotional needs. Lucy suffers the consequences of a repressive society that either alienates her for who she truly is or oppresses her, taking away her freedom and independence. Her separation from the norm as well as the trauma previously endured is what eventually causes her to suffer psychosomatic disorders. 4.2. Anorexia Nervosa: General Dissatisfaction and Maladjustment One of the clearest examples of the impact of Lucy’s mental state on her body is her fasting after her solo vacation: “I hardly knew how I was to live to the end. My spirits had long been gradually sinking; now that the prop of employment was withdrawn, they went down fast. Even to look forward was not to hope: the dumb future spoke no comfort, offered no promise, gave no inducement to bear present evil in reliance on future good. A sorrowful indifference to existence often pressed on me—a despairing resignation to reach betimes the end of all things earthly” (Brontë, 2019:156). As previously mentioned, women were commonly labeled as pathologically nervous and physically weak. Victorian patriarchy enforced gender oppression producing slender figures. Food disorders became closely associated with femininity, encouraging restrictive eating behaviors among middle and upper-class girls. The notion of The Angel in the House described by Patmore vividly illustrates the perception of physical frailty as a symbol of purity, inferiority, and dependency: How often flings for nought, and yokes Her heart to an icicle or whim, Whose each impatient word provokes Another, not from her, but him; While she, too gentle even to force Salagre Alba 20 His penitence by kind replies, Waits by, expecting his remorse, With pardon in her pitying eyes; And if he once, by shame oppress'd, (Patmore, 2014: 1-13) Polly is the living example of this cult of female debilitation in Victorian England which makes of her “the paragon of romance, the perfect lady” (Gilbert & Gubar 1984:428). She is The Angel in the House and is described in the novel as a “little person in a mourning frock and white chemisette, that might just have fitted a good-sized doll” (Brontë, 2018:17). “She was far from disobedient; but an object less conducive to comfort—to tranquillity even—than she presented, it was scarcely possible to have before one’s eyes” (Brontë, 2018:14). The similarities with Patmore’s poem are clear, Polly is the Victorian standard for women in her doll-size and her obedient and submissive disposition. Nonetheless, this extreme adequation to societal norms that were proliferating in conduct books released for Victorian female readership is what perverts Polly’s childhood and leads Lucy to the realization that she does not want to become that. Polly realizes from an early age the perks of womanhood, and instead of rebelling against them, she conforms to social standards, retarding her personal development and leaving her in a constant state of childhood: “a demure little person” (Brontë, 2018: 15). Her full name, Polly Home, anticipates from the very start the domesticity that will govern her future existence. In contrast, Lucy Snowe’s name might be inferring the coldness of womanhood, suggesting a detachment from the world around her. Since she is a misfit, with an unlucky fate in a world of societal Victorian constraints, she is anything but nature's favourite. Her struggles with loneliness and alienation, as well as the possibility for her to become acquainted with what she truly desires, is what eventually allows her to fulfill herself. “Lucy becomes a universal model of Brontë's desired woman” (Showalter, 1977:112). As stated by Lucy herself: “The world is very right in its view [...] yet I believe that also I am not wrong in mine” (Brontë, 2018: 309). Nonetheless, the process undergone by this character is not linear and also showcases the reality among many women at the time. Her position as an outcast woman as well as the trauma endured throughout her life makes her the perfect target to endure the consequences of Salagre Alba 21 patriarchy upon her own body. The humiliations perpetrated by her pupils due to her origin, social class, beauty, and age causes a huge harm to her self-esteem: “I suppose you are nobody’s daughter…you have no relations; you can’t call yourself young at twenty-three. You have… no beauty. As to admirers you hardly know what they are…I believe you never were in love, and never will be. I believe you never in love, and never will be…thought you might have your own heart broken, no living heart will ever break” (Brontë, 2018:146). Lucy’s emotional ambivalence and inability to fit within the norm derives directly into the psychosomatic response of an eating disorder. Lucy is a prisoner of her own gender as the societal constraints imposed over her make her unable to function properly. Society makes Lucy take the definition of The Angel in the House to a complete extreme, as an unconscious sane attempt to prove the restrictive and unhealthy nature of patriarchy: “during the last nine days I had taken no solid food, and suffered continual thirst [...] an inward of faintness” (Brontë, 2018: 167). As addressed in previous sections, the objectivization of the female body as well as the extreme fixation on female weakness were very present within the canon for Victorian women. “Tight lacing, fasting, vinegar-drinking, and similar cosmetic or dietary excess were all parts of a physical regimen that helped women either to feign morbid weakness or actually decline into real illness” (Gilbert & Gubar, 1984: 25). Lucy’s attempt to be an adequate woman, such as Polly that possess the “good femininity”, results in bodily dissociation aimed to wrongly eradicate carnality. For instance, the definition of wrong carnality according to the Victorian audience, and Lucy herself, can be seen in chapter 19: “The Cleopatra” where corpulence is seen as a sign of promiscuity and irrationality. Control over desires is what makes a woman worthy, and the slim body represents regulation. Contrary to that, Cleopatra is described as an “extremely well feed” (Brontë, 2018:195). Denotative adjectives with negative connotations compose the depiction of the scene, indicating Lucy’s position towards Cleopatra’s body: “an absurd and disorderly mass of curtain” (Brontë, 2018: 196), “She ought likewise to have worn decent garments-a gown covering her properly, which was not the case” (Brontë, 2018:195), “place now Cleopatra, or any other slug” (Brontë, 2018: 251). Cleopatra represents the rude and more grotesque part of Salagre Alba 22 femininity, one that is not restricted. Lucy’s own rejection of flesh, health or gluttony showcases the indirect discourse that prevails in Victorian England, one that is intended to oppress women. In contrast with Cleopatra and the idea of wrong carnality that this figure symbolizes, Vashti is also used to indirectly convey meaning. In chapter 23, Vashti is portrayed as a powerful figure, previously argued by Sandra Gilbert and Susan Gubar. Nonetheless, a different interpretation should be considered. Vashti is depicted as “pale” and “wasted” (Brontë, 2018: 250), responsible for her own destruction. Although this biblical feminist heroine infers agency and empowerment, Lucy celebrates her “half-consumed” (Brontë, 2018: 250) body. Vashti becomes “an emblem of her containment within the nineteenth-century society” (Johnson, 1990 :624). Another difference indicating Lucy’s antithetical relationship with the female normativity represented by Polly, is thar Lucy shows instances of appetite, although she purposely represses it. On the contrary, Polly does not have an appetite. In the case of men, they never show signs of deprivation. They can freely fulfill their needs and enjoy food. In this case, starvation operates both ways: those whom society values, in this case men, society feeds, whereas those whom society does not value, must starve, seen in the case of Polly and Lucy. This intrinsic necessity to restrain themselves apart from the fact that it was highly linked with the idea of weakness that the concept of The Angel in the House promotes, is also another distinct feature that emphasizes the two separated worlds of men and women. Men could develop themselves in terms of education, within the social sphere and even sexually whereas women were expected to repress her sexuality and emotions and remain within the patriarchal values stablished in society. Women restrictive eating habits underly a deeper meaning, that is, their own depravation from public life, education, and self-fulfillment apart from that of the household. Detailed descriptions of what food is consumed are very frequent in the novel: “o my great joy this food was limited to coffee and cake: “I had feared wine and sweets” (Bronte, 2018: 127). A typology on what a women should eat is stablished, and most importantly, it should never be in front of a man. As proposed in by Gilbert and Gubar, Lucy is living inside a tomb in the sense that anorexia is deeply connected with death. “If food equals death, women’s voluntary abstinence of food would also account for their longing to overpower their induced subjugation” (Sanchez-Ares, 2007:26). Instances of nervous fevers can be found in this novel. Same as Catherine in Wuthering Heights, Lucy undergoes episodes of delirium while fasting, and the diagnose is exactly the same: “I cannot put my case into words, but my days and nights Salagre Alba 23 were grown intolerable; a cruel sense of desolation pained my mind-a feeling what would make its way, rush out, or kill me” (Brontë, 2018: 180). Dr. John's reliance on established medical protocols for diagnosing madness causes him to overlook its potentially liberating effects. Despite diagnosing Lucy with hypochondria, when she is confined within Dr. John's residence for her recovery, she experiences profound mental distress, feeling “racked and oppressed in mind” (Brontë, 2018:146) due to her isolation. Lucy's sense of claustrophobia is not only physical but also stems from being confined by societal expectations of femininity, which she transgresses. Consequently, she suffers both mentally and physically for her defiance. It is thus unsurprising that Dr. John's ostensibly nurturing environment actually imposes a form of enforced isolation, symbolizing Lucy's constrained autonomy. Within this context, Lucy's longing for privacy remains unfulfilled despite her surroundings. Similar to Catherine, Lucy’s inadequacy to the environment can be perceived through the psychosomatic responses to situations that pose her stress or sadness. For instance, after discovering that Dr. John had no interest on her she suffers from fevers, hallucinations, and insomnia as well as maniac depressive episodes that isolates her from the real world: “I am not quite sure what my nervous system is, but I was dreadfully low-spirited" (Brontë, 2018:179). Nonetheless, something remarkable is that despite struggling physically as well as mentally, she never seeks help, even though it is what she craves the most. She wants “companionship, friendship and counsel” (Brontë, 2018:181). Although at a certain point she accepts starvation, her physical reaction would require accepting her mental disease, one that she is well aware of, and afraid of the consequences, she decides to remain silent: “Now don’t make out that I was delirious, for I know differently“ (Brontë, 2018:181). In contrast with Catherine from Wuthering Heights, she does not use her mental and physical state to manipulate people to her interest, but rather it serves as a journey for Lucy to deal with her deepest inner self and realize what she wants in life. The fact that Lucy is isolated by Dr. John after her breakdown can be directly connected to the deeply autobiographical dimension of the novel for Charlotte Brontë. The repressed potential of many women writers at the time is expressed through their literature. Female characters exhibiting traits of creativity found themselves descending into a state of madness. Through the use of Lucy, Brontë explores the consequences of denying women agency and Salagre Alba 24 autonomy. Madness is the product of societal repression, and the emotional expression of women into a state of emotional instability is a rebellion against the system. 4.3. The Subversion of Gender Normativity within Gendered Spaces: Rejection of Hyper Femininity by Cross-Dressing As explored in previous sections, Lucy serves Brontë to challenge female roles and expectations in an era where repression and lack of autonomy were necessary features to fit in the norm. Nonetheless, not only does she challenge female agency, but she also challenges gender identity. In chapter 14 “The Fête”, Lucy acts in a school play organized to celebrate Madame Beck’s birthday. What is remarkable about this chapter is the fact that Lucy, despite being reluctant at the beginning, reenacts the role of a man. For a 19th century audience, female actresses representing male characters was not surprising. From the Restauration period onwards, female actresses were brought into the stage. The Victorian audience was well acquainted with this sort of acting. Nonetheless, what is remarkable in this scene is the use of conventions and male gaze to gain agency and power and explore gender identity. Lucy is well aware of her appearance. Early in the novel, she is surveilled by Madame Beck, which makes her able to identify how she is perceived and what she should do to gain respect, in the scene in which she rips a piece of paper and threatens other students to gain the attention of both her class and Madame Beck herself. In the school play however, Lucy condemns the figure of the “flop”, as it is based on shallow preconceptions on merely appearances. The “flop” is used here for many reasons. Firstly, it enables Lucy to put herself in a position of power and authority: “By-and-by, feeling the right power come-the spring demanded gush and rise inwardly” (Brontë, 2018: 137-38). In addition, she not only “dresses like a man” but she also acts as one. This idea goes back to Judith Butler’s idea of gender as a performance. According to Butler, transvestism questions reality, and is intended to “denaturalize heterosexual gender norms” (Butler, 1993: 85). By performing gender in such a way, Lucy blurs the line between male and female traits and showcases the impossibility to categorize women within a fixed identity. This could also be compared with Charlotte Brontë’s use of male pseudonyms, to avoid being exposed to the prejudices linked with female writers many editors had at the time. In a way, both the author and Lucy intended to assert their own voice effectively. Salagre Alba 25 As already examined by Gilbert and Gubar, nineteenth century female writers found themselves deprived of role models, invalidated by the patriarchal canon, and judged by reductive stereotypes treating them as outsiders. In this case, Charlotte Brontë shows “anxiety of authorship” (Gilbert & Gubar, 1984:45). In a sense, this scene in which Lucy dresses as a man intends to distance herself from the female sex, transcending her own anxiety. The same thing happens with Brontë. By signing her works as “Currer Bell”, she both accepts her fear of literary death and assumes the consequences of the implications of femininity for the profession, repudiating them and enacting a male role, like Lucy, that will allow her to transmit her message. Secondly, the fact that the play is a vauderville2 reinforces the fact that the whole play is a parody of the school itself. The vauderville “lifts social constraints, subverts gender identity and disrupts conventional romance plotting” (Surridge, 1995:6). Lucy’s cross-dressing not only emphasizes patriarchal hierarchy, but it is also used by the author as a narrative technique to give cohesion to the plotline, anticipating the ending of the love triangle in which these characters are entangled. Lucy represents Ginerva’s real suitor Coronel Alfred de Hamal, but at the same time, Isidor represents Dr.John that is also part of the audience. Ginerva favours Lucy not only because she is more inclined towards the figure of the “flop” to whom she will end up marrying but also to keep her other suitor interested, exploring their mutual attraction. This leads Lucy to reject Dr.John, both in real life and in the play. It is also worth mentioning that Lucy’s refusal to wear men’s garment goes beyond patriarchal discourses well embedded within the culture, but it could also be an attempt for Lucy to avoid being sexually objectivized by the male audience. Women in breeches scenes carried deep sexual connotations, used for the purpose of satisfying the male gaze. Lucy seems to be aware of it, although she consciously attempts to resemble a man: “Having loosened my hair out of its braids, made up the long black hair close, and brushed the front hair to one side” (Brontë, 2018: 137). In addition, this could also point to a complete rejection of hyperfeminine clothing, intended to repress women, especially with the corset. The use of the corset had multiple implications on the bodies and minds of its users. It imposed fashion ideals on women, reinforcing the necessity to be slim and refined in order to be valuable in society. Lucy opts for 2 A French vauderville was a very popular form of entertainment in the 19th century. According to the Oxford English Dictionary: “ 2. A play or stage performance of a light and amusing character interspersed with songs; also without article, this species of play or comedy”