The Brontës: Wild Genius on the Moors: The Story of a Literary Family

by Juliet Barker

With the death of Aunt Branwell, the girls, together with their cousin in Penzance, Eliza Kingston, had all inherited an equal share in their aunt’s estate. She had left each of the Brontë children – including Branwell – a personal memento, but she chose to leave her money to the four nieces who stood most in need of it.94 Probate and administration was granted in December and, according to an inventory of the residue of Aunt Branwell’s property, the girls could expect to get just under £300 each.95 Most of the money was invested in shares in the York and North Midland Railway, but as the youngest niece, Anne, had already passed her twenty-first birthday, they could be cashed in. Though not a sum which would transform their lives, the Brontë girls now had at least the benefit of a cushion against immediate financial hardship should their father die.

Charlotte was in high spirits; she had been the least close to her aunt and so felt her death less keenly than the other members of her family.

She was determined to return to Brussels and there was no one to oppose her, her aunt being the only person who could have exerted sufficient pressure. Aunt Branwell would certainly have moved heaven and earth to prevent Charlotte travelling alone across England and Belgium, as she intended to do because she could not find a suitable escort. It is a measure of Charlotte’s influence over Patrick that he was persuaded to agree to such an ill-advised plan.

Despite her success in Brussels, Emily had no wish to return. She gave up her place at the Pensionnat Heger willingly, almost, one senses, with a feeling of relief, and agreed t...

Anne, who had now spent nearly two years with the Robinsons, was clearly appreciated by them – so much so that, young Edmund Robinson having outgrown her care, they were prepared to accept her suggestion that her brother should be appointed his tutor. At the e...

With all her family gainfully employed, Charlotte had nothing to restrain her. She could an...

Charlotte returned to the Pensionnat Heger as a teacher on a salary of sixteen pounds a year, out of which she had only to pay for her own German lessons. As befitted her new status, the Hegers gave orders that in future she was to be called ‘Mademoiselle Charlotte’ and she took charge of the small but brightest group of pupils in the First Class.

I ought to consider myself well off and to be thankful for my good fortune – I hope I am thankful – and if I could always keep up my spirits – and never feel lonely or long for companionship or friendship or whatever they call it, I should do very well

Though Charlotte made light of her loneliness, it did indeed signify. In following her desire to return to Brussels she had not reckoned on the consequences of being alone, without the constant companionship of Emily which had made her first residence there not only bearable but happy. Then it had not mattered that there was a self-erected barrier between the Brontës and their fellow pupils. Now, however, when she stood in great need of friends, she had few resources to call upon.

Possibly the greatest single influence on Charlotte, both as a person and as a writer, was the time she spent in Brussels;

on Emily it is almost impossible to see any effect, however subtle.

Monsieur Heger’s teaching certainly had no influence on her poetic style, which remained as terse, evocative and simply phrased as ever. Even Emily’s friends were sceptical of the effect Brussels had had upon her. Mary Taylor, writing to Ellen Nussey from Germany, where she was now supporting herself by teaching, enquired curiously: Tell me something about Emily Bronte. I can’t imagine how the newly acquired qualities can fit in, in the same head & heart that is occupied by the old ones. Imagine Emily turning over prints or ‘taking wine’ with any stupid fop & preserving her temper & politeness!2 Mary clearly considered that Emily’s advantages in Brussels had been purely social, rather than academic. This may have been a recognition of her obstinate resistance to Monsieur Heger’s teaching practices, but it failed to take into account the fact that the Pensionnat Heger had immeasurably improved her French as well as her German and her music. If nothing else, she had at least gained access to a whole new world of German literature which, with its dramatic qualities and stern tone, would appeal more to the creator of Wuthering Heights than the comparatively frivolous French novels Charlotte read so avidly.

Charlotte had returned to Brussels knowing that Monsieur Heger held her in the highest regard as one of his star pupils. This was the first time that someone outside her family, capable of informed judgement and himself of an intellect equal, if not superior, to her own, had recognized and encouraged her talent. It is not surprising, therefore, that in at least three of the essays she wrote this year she raised the question of the nature of genius.8 She had done this once before, in her essay on ‘Peter the Hermit’, identifying herself with him because she saw that the spiritual flame within him overcame his physical insignificance.9 That essay had been written when her command of French was comparatively weak and, as her powers grew, she returned to the subject again and again with a tenacity of purpose which suggests that she was not only seeking to define genius for herself but demanding recognition from Monsieur Heger. In the light of his comments, her own opinions were radically changed.

Starting from the impressions Millevoye’s poem evokes, she posed the question of how deliberately he then executed his intention. Having prepared his canvas in this way and traced the first rough outlines of his sketch, has he not carefully sought out the details, assembled the images appropriate for making his principal idea stand out? Has he not weighed each thought carefully, considered thoroughly each secondary thought, minutely measured and adjusted each part of the great Whole in such a way that their union will not sin against the master-principle of composition, the principle of Unity? Is this really the procedure Millevoye followed? Is this the method followed by all great poets?

Alas! I do not know: the great souls alone can reply, but there is one thing I do know for sure because the certainty of it depends more on reason than on genius, it is that, for novices in literature, for those who wish to imitate the great masters, this method is the only one that can lead them to an even remotely desirable end; perhaps in following it they will never find anything except lead in their crucibles, perhaps, though, if the sleeping spark of genius bursts into flame during the operation, a new light will illuminate their souls, the true secret of Alchemy will be revealed and their lead will transmute into gold.10

Charlotte’s allowances for ‘novices in literature’ showed that she still had reservations about Monsieur Heger’s method of teaching by imitation. Having found the courage to question this, she now launched into an explicit defence of her position, that genius was innate and inspirational. I believe that genius … has no need to seek out details, that it never pauses for reflection, that it does not think about unity: I believe that details come naturally without the poet having to seek them, that inspiration takes the place of reflection and as for unity, I think that there is no unity more perfect than that which results from a heart filled with a single idea … The nature of genius is like that of instinct; its operation is at the same time both simple and marvellous; the man of genius produces, without labour and as if by a single effort, results which men without genius, however knowledgeable, however persevering, could never attain.11

In literature, if not in religion, Charlotte was a Calvinist: she had no doubt that she was one of the elect who possessed genius and that those who did not, no matter how hard they tried, could never achieve greatness. This was a passionate defence of her own method of writing, so obvious from the juvenilia and her diary fragments, where an inspirational moment or vision leads to uncontrolled outpourings in which her pen can scarcely keep pace with her thoughts. Though Monsieur Heger wrote frequent approving remarks in the margins of this essay, he took issue with Charlotte’s main thesis to such an extent that he wrote half a page of ‘Observation’ at the end. His argument is worth quoting in full, not only because it was put with equal force to Charlotte’s own, but also because it eventually won Charlotte round to his way of thinking. Work does not make a poet: man does not make his own genius, he receives it from heaven – that is indisputable. Machinery does not create force: it rules its employment, it multiplies its effect a hundredfold. Man does not know what genius is, it is a gift from Heaven, it is something one might call divine. It is the same as force. But imagine two...

According to Charlotte, the distinctive quality of mediocrity is moderation, which is the antithesis of genius. Mediocrity can see the faults of Genius, its imprudence, its recklessness, its ambition, but she is too cold, too limited, too self-centred to understand its struggles, its sufferings, its sacrifices; she is also envious and even its virtues appear to her under a false and tarnished light.14 Though she never actually makes the claim, it is implicit throughout Charlotte’s essay that she aligns herself with ‘passionate, misunderstood genius’

spite of his pride he is modest; he shrinks from eulogy, he rejects panegyric, he never speaks of himself and never allows anyone else to speak of him; his character equals in grandeur and surpasses in truth that of all other heroes, ancient or modern.16 Curiously enough, the very qualities Charlotte praised in Wellington as making his genius superior to Napoleon’s were precisely those she had ascribed to the much despised mediocrity: self-control, balance, disdain for passionate excess, and resistance to the claims of all but conscience.17 This contradiction was removed in the excision of the early passages relating to genius.

Charlotte’s final essay on the subject of genius is one of her most interesting. ‘Letter from a Poor Painter to a Great Lord’, written on 17 October 1843, shows how far she had come to accept Monsieur Heger’s doctrine that genius needs discipline and self-control to achieve its potential. Charlotte seems to have had Branwell very much in mind when she wrote this essay.

My Lord, I believe that I have talent. Do not be indignant at my presumption, do not accuse me of arrogance, I do not know that feeble feeling, the child of vanity; but I know well another feeling, Respect for myself, a feeling born of independence and integrity. My Lord I believe that I have Genius. This declaration shocks you; you find it arrogant, I find it perfectly simple. Is it not universally recognised that without genius no artist can succeed? Would it not then be sheer stupidity to devote oneself to the arts without being sure that one has this indispensible quality?18 In describing the poor artist’s early difficulties, however, Charlotte spoke with the voice of bitter personal experience. Throughout all my early youth the difference which existed between me and most of the people who surrounded me, was an embarrassing enigma to me which I did not know how to resolve; I thought myself inferior to everyone and it distressed me. I thought it was my duty to follow the example set by the majority of my acquaintances, an example sanctioned by the approbation of prudent and legitimate mediocrity, and yet I felt myself incapable of feeling and behaving as that majority felt and behaved … There was always excess in what I did; I was either too excited or too despondent; without wanting to I allowed everything that passed through my heart to be seen and sometimes there were storms passing through it; in vain I tried to imitate the sweet gaiety, the serene and equable spir...

Only a month before she wrote this essay, Monsieur Heger had presented Charlotte with a copy of his speech at the annual prizegiving at the Athénée Royal.21 In it, he had stoutly defended the importance of encouraging pupils to strive to emulate the best in everything they did; emulation was the key to self-improvement. The speech had obviously struck a chord in Charlotte’s nature as she drew on it in her essay; having left his country and gone abroad, the poor painter declared: I lacked neither courage nor fortitude, I set to work immediately; sometimes, it is true, despair overwhelmed me for an instant, for when I saw the works of the great masters of my art, I felt myself truly despicable; but the fever of emulation came to drive away that momentary demoralisation and from that profound consciousness of inferiority, I drew new strength for work – it aroused in me a fixed resolution – ‘I wish to do all, to suffer all, in order to win all’22 Through the medium of her poor painter addressing his patron, Charlotte, the writer, could speak out far more boldly to her tutor than she could in the flesh.

Essays like this one were the key elements in Charlotte’s relationship with Monsieur Heger, as her later novels make abundantly clear. Three out of Charlotte’s four novels contain an essay written by a pupil for her teacher, Jane Eyre being the only exception. In each case the essay serves as the midwife of love, the means by which the hero is brought to a recognition of the intellectual powers and emotional depth hidden beneath the otherwise unexceptional exterior of an apparently conventional young woman.

Significantly, in each case, greater prominence is given to the teacher’s reaction to the essay than to the pupil’s production of it.

Clearly Charlotte, consciously or subconsciously, had hoped to win more than simple intellectual admiration from Monsieur Heger.

The vexed question of Charlotte’s relationship with Monsieur Heger has haunted Brontë scholars since the revelation, at the beginning of this century, of the letters she wrote to him after her return to England. Their passionate and frank admissions of attachment might suggest that there was even an adulterous affair, particularly as Monsieur Heger’s side of the correspondence is missing. One of his surviving letters, written to another former pupil several decades later, suggests otherwise. Though this relationship was beyond all doubt entirely proper, the letter breathes an intimacy and sensuality which a susceptible woman would find deeply erotic. ‘I only have to think of you to see you’, he told the lady in question. I often give myself the pleasure when my duties are over, when the light fades. I postpone lighting the gas lamp in my library, I sit down, smoking my cigar, and with a hearty will I evoke your image – and you come (without wishing to, I dare say) but I see you, I talk with you – you, with that little air, affectionate undoubtedly, but independent and resolute, firmly determined not to allow any opinion without being previously convinced, demanding to be convinc...

Charlotte ended her letter with a confession which she could probably have made to no one but Branwell. It is a curious metaphysical fact that always in the evening when I am in the great Dormitory alone – having no other company than a number of beds with white curtains I always recur as fanatically as ever to the old ideas the old faces & the old scenes in the world below32 A resumption of Angrian imaginings was probably the last thing Charlotte needed at this juncture. It was a sign not only that the novelty of her continental education had well and truly worn off but also that she was no longer finding intellectual fulfilment in it.

Charlotte’s disillusionment was also reflected in a significant shift in her attitude towards Madame Heger, repeating the familiar pattern of her relationships with previous employers. From being grateful and appreciative of her kindness, Charlotte had now begun actively to dislike her – but, typically, blamed it on Madame Heger’s attitude towards herself.

As Charlotte herself pointed out, though, Madame Heger could not understand why her new teacher refused to socialize with her fellow teachers. The obvious contempt with which Charlotte regarded them and her pupils cannot have helped to make relations easy in a boarding school of such small proportions.

Nor can it have escaped Madame Heger’s notice that her husband was the one person excepted from Charlotte’s general condemnatory attitude.

Just as she had done at the Sidgwicks’ and the Whites’, Charlotte directed all her venom at the mistress and found every excuse for the master.

If Charlotte thought Madame Heger was estranged from her because she had uncovered her guilty secret, then one can only sympathize with Madame Heger.

All her instincts told her that her growing obsession with a married man was totally reprehensible and she obviously needed to talk to someone, if only to get the guilty secret off her chest.

What no one but Charlotte herself could decide was what she ought to do. Morally, there was no doubt that she ought to remove herself from the Pensionnat Heger, but she could not do so without admitting that the Brussels experiment had been a failure. It had not lived up to her expectations; it had not become a dramatic escape route from her earlier career though she could now place a higher price on her teaching services.

Yet I have no thought of coming home just now. I lack a real pretext for doing so; it is true, this place is dismal to me, but I cannot go home, without a fixed prospect when I get there; and this prospect must not be a situation; that would be jumping out of the frying-pan into the fire.

If Charlotte had hoped that her dilemma would be resolved for her by a summons back home, she was mistaken. Her family could not or would not take the decision for her.

So she tried, somewhat half-heartedly, to give her notice to Madame Heger: If it had depended on her I should certainly have soon been at liberty but Monsieur Heger – having heard of what was in agitation – sent for me the day after – and pronounced with vehemence his decision that I should not leave –45 Charlotte could not overlook so decided an intervention: at the very least it was proof that Monsieur Heger still held her in high regard and that was more important to her at this juncture than her personal pride or inclination.

Charlotte’s experience reflected that of Lucy Snowe, it was not an altogether happy one, her master becoming increasingly severe and sarcastic as her abilities improved. The intention was to provoke her to greater effort but, in Charlotte’s low state of mind, the effect was simply to discourage her and the lessons were soon given up.

Charlotte’s desperation can be measured by the fact that she made no excuses for returning home and, more significantly, that she had no prospective employment lined up in England.

intellectually and emotionally, had marked her for life. She had successfully undergone the rigours of an academic discipline imposed by Monsieur Heger, emerging as a better and more powerful writer. And she had fallen in love for the first time – with a man who was the antithesis of everything that she had previously valued. Monsieur Heger was as far removed as it was possible to be from Zamorna: small, ugly, short-tempered and, above all, Catholic, he shared only his married state with the hero who had dominated Charlotte’s imagination for so long. Her unrequited passion for him was to alter permanently and radically her vision of what the male hero should be. The future creator of Mr Rochester and Paul Emanuel was born.

Charlotte claimed that it was her wish to commence a school, as indeed everyone now expected her to do. She had sufficient money and qualifications for the undertaking but, she asserted, there was now an insuperable barrier to her attaining the objective for which she had striven so long: her father’s health. I have felt for some months that I ought not to be away from him – and I feel now that it would be too selfish to leave him (at least so long as Branwell and Anne are absent) in order to pursue selfish interests of my own –77 Though this argument has been universally accepted by Charlotte’s friends and biographers, it was disingenuous. It would obviously have been a greater comfort to Patrick to know that his children were all well placed to earn their livings for the foreseeable future than to have them unemployed at home and dependent on his own inadequate salary. The parsonage was comfortably run with the assistance of two loyal and reliable servants, Tabby Aykroyd and Martha Brown; more importantly, he had Emily to act as his housekeeper and, when necessary, as his amanuensis. There was no need for Charlotte to remain at home. Her father’s ill health was simply a convenient excuse for her own depression of spirits and resultant lethargy which were the real reasons for her reluctance to make a new start.

There was then a tinge of envy in Charlotte’s remark that Branwell and Anne, who had just returned to Thorp Green after the Christmas holidays, were both ‘wondrously valued’ in their situations.78 In both cases, this had been achieved by hard work and at considerable personal cost. Branwell had found it extremely difficult to adapt to being a tutor again after the comparative independence of his post on the railway.

In ‘The Captive Dove’, echoing a subject Emily had already treated, she took a totally different stance from her sister, begging not for freedom but for companionship in captivity. Though the poem almost certainly belongs to the Gondal cycle, it is interesting because it undoubtedly reflects Anne’s own character: unlike Emily, who was selfish and single-minded in the pursuit of her liberty, Anne was prepared to accept her duty, however uncongenial, though she too longed for freedom.86

Emily’s dependence on Gondal had never faltered and even now, when there was nothing to disturb the equilibrium of her existence, when she was secure in her home and free to control her own destiny, she retreated into her imagination. Unlike Charlotte or Anne, for whom there was a certain desperation in clinging to Angrian and Gondal fantasy, for Emily it was neither a relief from, nor a frustration of, the daily routine: it was a necessary part of life.

The family gathering in the summer prompted some discussions about the Brontës’ future and an important decision was taken. Teaching was really the only option and, as Charlotte had pointed out, everyone expected her to open a school on her return from Brussels. Unwilling to leave home again, Charlotte now settled on a slightly different plan. She would open her school in the parsonage, beginning with five or six girls who would board in the rooms vacated by Anne and Branwell. The new scheme had some obvious advantages which allowed Patrick to give it his full support. It would avoid the problem of an initial expensive outlay in buying or renting a property and fitting it out and, if it failed, there would be no great financial loss. The housekeeping duties could be taken on by Emily, who would not have to leave their father unattended and could easily expand her present role to care for a small number of girls with the assistance of tried and trusted servants. ‘Emily does not like teaching much’, Charlotte told Monsieur Heger, ‘but she would always do the housekeeping and, although she is a little reclusive, she has too good a heart not to do everything for the wellbeing of the children.’106 On the other hand, there were two great disadvantages. Should Patrick die, the school would be evicted from the parsonage, either to close or relocate elsewhere. Perhaps more importantly, Haworth was too far from any centre of population for the school to be able to draw on the day pu...

The school scheme was abandoned with little regret. Patrick and Emily were no doubt relieved that their privacy was not to be invaded by strangers, however few and ladylike the pupils might have been. Anne and Branwell had, of necessity, been excluded, at least in the initial stages, so they too had lost nothing by the school’s failure. Even Charlotte, who had most to lose and gain by the plan, seems to have been little more than perfunctory in attempting to ensure its success. Compared with her single-minded determination to get to Brussels, for instance, her efforts on behalf of the school scheme were desultory. All her drive and enthusiasm had deserted her, all her passion was directed into a futile correspondence with Monsieur Heger and a self-destructive longing to return to Brussels to see him once more. ‘Oh it is certain that I shall see you again one day —’, she wrote to him, ‘it must be – for as soon as I have earned enough money to go to Brussels I will go there – and I will see you again even if it is only for a moment.’ In preparation for that forlorn hope she still

To Monsieur Heger alone Charlotte confided the pain of her depressed spirits and the consequent lethargy which afflicted her. I would not know this lethargy if I could write – in the past I could spend days, weeks, whole months writing and not without reward – for Southey and Coleridge – two of our best authors to whom I had sent certain manuscripts were good enough to show their approbation of them – but at present my sight is too weak to write – if I write much I will go blind. This weakness of sight is a terrible privation for me – without it do you know what I would do Monsieur? – I would write a book and I would dedicate it to my literature master – to the only master I have ever had – to you Monsieur. I have often told you in French how much I respect you – how much I am indebted to your goodness, to your advice, I would like to say it once in English – it cannot be – it must not be thought of – the career of letters is closed to me – that of teaching alone is open to me – it does not offer me the same attractions – it does not matter, I will enter it and if I do not go far it will not be for lack of diligence.112 The fact that she was writing in French seems to have broken down the natural reticence and modesty which would once have held Charlotte back from declaring her feelings for any man so openly. It was almost as if the constraints of writing in a foreign language actually liberated her: she could put into French what she could not say in English because she d...

This was a return of Charlotte’s morbid depression and resulting hypochondria in the late spring of 1838, which drove her into resignation from Roe Head. Then she had convinced herself that she was suffering from consumption, as she imagined her sister, Anne, and her friend, Mary Taylor, to be. Now, she persuaded herself that she was going blind, like her father. It was certainly a good excuse for not writing a book but, had it been true, it would have made her intention of setting up school totally impractical. Charlotte was simply wallowing in misery and self-pity, unable to shake off her prostration of spirits and afraid to venture out beyond the safe haven of her home. It would take a major crisis to force her to take up the threads of her life again.

A crisis was indeed brewing: one that would explode on the unsuspecting Brontë family in the summer of 1845. For the first few months of the new year, however, those at Haworth remained unaware of incipient trouble at Thorp Green.

Charlotte, meanwhile, moped about at home, unable to forget Monsieur Heger but doing little to help herself to do so.