This is an interesting question and one that Anne Brontë
answers in part of her own accord in the "Preface" to the Second Edition. Though she
does not mention "abuse," either emotional or physical, she does discuss her wish to
contribute "to reform the errors and abuses of society, ... [with] my humble quota
towards so good an aim." She also asserts her aesthetic philosophy that when, in
fiction, "we have to do with vice and vicious characters, ... it is better to depict
them as they really are." Thus Anne Brontë clearly wanted to warn readers against the
vice and viciousness revealed in the pages of her
novel.
What is the vice and viciousness therein revealed?
It revolves around Huntingdon's depraved lifestyle. He spends days and weeks away from
his country seat, away from Helen, burying himself in the activities of London with his
vice-tolerant friends at his side. When the friends are invited to their home in the
country, Helen sees first-hand what that lifestyle partly
entails.
readability="11">
Young Arthur is taught to talk and behave like
his father and friends; he is taught to behave "particularly ill." Even one of the
guests is repulsed by what the father does:
Mr. Hargrave
suddenly ... lifted the child from his father’s knee, where he was sitting half-tipsy,
... and execrating me with words he little knew the meaning of
...
Make no mistake,
though, Brontë isn't opposed only to the vice of the men of the novel; she is equally
opposed to the foolishness of the women who marry them and bring emotional and physical
misfortune upon themselves and their children. Bear in mind that not many of these women
are saved as Helen was by the death of the torturing male and the receipt of an
inheritance. Most of these women have to live out to the end of their days the struggle
to undo what was done and to right what was put
wrong.
I know
that such characters [as Huntingdon] do exist, and if I have warned one rash youth from
following in their steps, or prevented one thoughtless girl from falling into the very
natural error of my heroine, the book has not been written in vain. (Anne Brontë,
"Preface" to Second Edition).
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