Agnes Grey
by Anne Brontë
Published 1847
Victorian Literature/Fiction
Victorian Literature encompasses anything written during the reign of Queen Victoria (1837-1901). Authors that fall into this category are Lewis Carroll, the Bronte Sisters, Robert and Elisabeth Browning, Charles Dickens, and George Eliot to name a few…
There is much speculation as to the autobiographical nature of Agnes Grey to Anne’s own experiences as a governess. It is also said that a romantic relationship may have taken place with her father’s curate.
The darkest part of this book is the fascination with torturing animals at the beginning. One of Agnes’ pupils has a fondness for ripping the heads, wings and feet off of poor nesting birds. Agnes’ is incredibly compassionate and tries to teach him how wrong it is. She even goes so far as to flattening a nest of baby birds with a rock so her pupil doesnt have a chance to torment them.
One of my favorite exchanges was with Mrs. Bloomfield, “You seem to have forgotten that the creatures were created for our amusement” to which Agnes comes back quoting scripture on how treating animals poorly is not very Christian… “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy” and “The merciful man shews mercy to his beast”. Me thinks Agnes would be a vegetarian…… 
I really enjoyed this book. Not really knowing much about it other than it was another Bronte governness novel, I really enjoyed Anne as a character and the story as a whole.
Anne
A Little Background…
Charlotte, the eldest of the Bronte sisters, born in 1816 and is best known for Jane Eyre (1847). She also wrote Shirley (1849), Villette (1853), and The Professor which was written before Jane Eyre but published posthumously in 1857. Emily, the middle sister, was born in 1818, the year Jane Austen’s last novel Persuasion was published. Emily is best known for Wuthering Heights (1847). I read this in high school, loved it and plan on reading it again shortly. And Anne, born in 1820, wrote Agnes Grey (1847) and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (1848). Apparently 1847 was a big year for these three…
Family Life…
Portrait of the sisters painted by their brother Branwell. The blur between Emily and Charlotte is where Branwell painted himself out.
Their mother died in 1824 and left her children’s care to her sister and her husband. Their two eldest children got ill and died, Maria and Elizabeth. There was also a brother, Branwell. In 1846, the three sisters published a collections of poems called Poems by Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell which only sold two copies. The next year they each wrote very successful novels.
The Bells…
Currer (Charlotte), Ellis (Emily) and Acton (Anne) were their pen names. One day Charlotte stumbled upon some of Emily’s poetry and urged her to get it published. Anne was writing quite a bit on her own as well. They decided to put together Poems by… using pen names because “the ambiguous choice being dictated by a sort of conscientious scruple at assuming Christian names positively masculine, while we did not like to declare ourselves women, because- without at that time suspecting that our mode of writing and thining was not what is called ‘feminine’- we had a vague impression that authoresses are liable to be looked on with prejudice…” There was much speculation over the Bells… Anne and Charlotte had to physically go to their publishers together to convince them that it was not one person using different first names. And there was, of course, much speculation over their gender.
Self Portrait of Branwell
Branwell died in 1847 of tuberculosis brought on by his alcoholism and opium addiction. Emily caught a cold at her brother’s funeral in September of 1848 and died in December of the same year. Anne was very much grieved by her siblings death and became very ill early 1849. She died of consumption that year. Charlotte and her father were the only surviving members of their immediate family. Charlotte did not die until 1855 (made it to the ripe old age of 35!!) and their father, Patrick Bronte, passed in 1861. Patrick was responsible for getting Charlotte’s nove The Professor published and helped Elizabeth Gaskell with Charlotte’s biography.
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