Victorian Era Essay

Sidney Poole

LIT 2202

Kay Berg

20 March 2015

Education, Marriage, and Societal Standards

Cite examples from several Victorian authors who address the role of women during this period. Your answer should illustrate various issues women faced during the Victorian Era.

        The Victorian Era was a difficult time for women just like previous years, however with the new rule of Queen Victoria things started to change for the better. Victoria herself believed in furthering or gaining an education for women and even understood the hardships for them that came with marriage. Victoria herself wrote to her daughter once she was married about how “…men are very selfish and the woman’s devotion is always one of submission…” (1608) so it was no surprise when feminism thoughts soon showed up in the writings of this time. Despite believing in these she did have mixed emotions about the gaining equality of women, she still did not think they should have any political matter. These beliefs of Queen Victoria were shared with the majority of the writers of this time including John Mill, Elizabeth Browning, Christina Rossetti, and many more. It has been showed of strong women in the writing of Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s “Aurora Leigh” and Christina Rossetti’s poem “No, Thank You, John”. It has also taken the comedic impact of showing how absurd the way society tells women how they should act in Oscar Wilde’s “The Importance of Being Earnest”. Feminists of this time were fighting for the rights of women to gain an education, choice and freedom in marriage, and to suppress the standards that society held on women.

        Education was very limited for women of this time period; however opportunities were slowly popping up. With universities opening and the encouragement of the Queen and other activists to gain a higher education; the idea was gaining ground for many women. In Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s “Aurora Leigh”, you can see her support of getting and education through her character Aurora. In this poem, Aurora is put through many studies by her aunt and it was very important that she has a wide range of subjects taught to her. Browning writes just about a list of the studies Aurora was put through such as “I learnt the collects and the catechism/The creeds, from Athanasius back to Nice,/The Articles, the Tracts against the times…” (392-394), the list continues about her education on multiple languages, sciences, and mathematics taught to her by her aunt. Without the education Aurora received she would have never fell in love with the idea and writing of poetry. She tries to find herself and her calling in life with the poetry she loves and expressing herself. This idea of fulfillment through poetry gives readers the reaction that education can bring a higher meaning to life and the fact that the protagonist was a woman shows woman can achieve this as well. Aurora announces she feels she has a higher meaning in life when rejecting her cousin Romney by saying “…Ah, you force me, sir,/To be overbold in speaking of myself:/I too have my vocation,--work to do,…” (453-455). With this she goes on to find her fulfillment in life with her poetry and would have probably never achieved this without the education set up for her by her aunt.

        Another big point that was haunting women of this time was marriage. Marriage for women included many sacrifices they had to make to keep the marriage and/or man they married happy. Married women had no freedom and were sometimes forced into a marriage depending on if it would benefit the family she belonged to or not. It was about gaining social status and basically left at that. Marriage also imposed many misogynistic ideas of what women can and cannot do within in a marriage, which leads into the objectification of women. At the time men could divorce for adultery, but women could only divorce under certain circumstances of adultery. Married women could also not own or handle their own property, so with the limitations and the treatment of married women it is understandable why so many feminists called against it regardless of what they would be thought of or labeled if they never marry. In Christina Rossetti’s poem “No, Thank You, John” even shows the struggles of rejecting a proposal. Christina herself never married and that idea is reflected in this poem. By the words used and the almost exhausted manner while reading this poem may have the reader thinking she has been asked by this man more than once for her hand in marriage. The fourth stanza that says that “I have no heart? – Perhaps I have not; / But then you’re mad to take offence / That I don’t give you what I have not got:” (13-15), can be seen that it is almost expected of a woman to openly say yes to a man’s proposal. During this time to many acting feminist marriage did not sound very enthusing and Rossetti captures this in her poem.