The Tenant of Wildfell Hall in Reading the Classics

Jan 17, 2015 Ahtims rated it really liked it

Shelves: borrowed, buddy-group-reads, classic

On the whole a well-written book with a strong female protagonist, who, perhaps is one of the mentally strongest women characters in fictional history.
The young new 'widowed' tenant with her 6 year old son is the cynosure of all people in the small village. She is intelligent, quiet, keeps to herself, and thus is able to irritate the superfluous people of the village, except perhaps Gilbert, a man in his twenties, a young farmer, who is smitten by her. Rumors float about her 'character', she is ...more

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Sep 20, 2011 Erin WV rated it really liked it

Shelves: 2011, fiction, digital-read

I loved parts of this novel a lot; I am a Brontë fan all around, but I especially think that Anne is truly underrated. I do not get the narrative structure of this book, though. It goes something like this: first 20%, a farmer named Gilbert falls in love with a mysterious neighbor, Helen. Next 70%, Gilbert reads Helen's diary, which allows Helen to tell her story in the first person. Last 10%, Gilbert comes back to reflect on what he read.

Why was the Gilbert part necessary at all? It built myste ...more

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Sep 17, 2011 Rebecca rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: sad, classics, religion-and-spirituality, society-and-class, reviewed, favourites, wish-list, gothic

Such an amazing book, I don't know why this isn't as widely read as other Brontë books... Helen is so strong willed that she doesn't come across as overly righteous, you just can't help rooting for her. Gilbert took a bit more getting used to as he is a bit petty and self-righteous that it can get a bit annoying, but I went along with him as Helen obviously could see better qualities in him than I! A powerful comment on Victorian society, it really brought it home to me how trapped women were, n ...more

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Mar 30, 2017 Cee rated it really liked it

Shelves: romance, historical, stand-alone, adult-fiction

I applaud Anne Brontë for writing this honest, brave book. She does not shy away from subjects that were rarely brought into the open in the nineteenth century. Even now, I think her descriptions of a woman being married to a brute of a man will resonate with readers. Though women now have more options to escape a bad marriage, emotional abuse and the pressure to "make things work" have remained relatively unchanged.

Though I appreciate The Tenant of Wildfell Hall for its merits, it was not a boo ...more

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