Charlotte Bronte and the Woman Question

Syrie James's Secret Diaries is generally quite accurate historically, and even the presentation of the early jostling between Charlotte and her father's new cleric, Arthur Bell Nicholls, may be on target. Still the emphasis on women's rights -- a major if still emerging issue already by the middle of the 19th century -- may give us a false sense of Charlotte's more complex and generally more conservative (Tory?) feelings. Charlotte's most famous utterance is a key passage in Jane Eyre, which we will get to later this term; her most complete statement may be a letter she wrote to her friend and future biographer, the novelist Elizabeth Gaskell, after reading a widely circulated, controversial article, "The Enfranchisement of Women," published in the liberal Westminster Review under the name of John Start Mill, a leading proponent of increased rights for women, but actually written by his wife, Harriet Taylor. (See more on the article here.)

Here is Charlotte's largely critical take on the Mill/Taylor piece, largely arguing for removing emotions (love) as the central concern of a woman's life:

Of all the articles respecting which you question me, I have seen none, except that notable one in the 'Westminster' on the Emancipation of Women. But why are you and I to think (perhaps I should rather say to FEEL) so exactly alike on some points that there can be no discussion between us? Your words on this paper express my thoughts. Well-argued it is,—clear, logical,—but vast is the hiatus of omission; harsh the consequent jar on every finer chord of the soul. What is this hiatus? I think I know; and, knowing, I will venture to say. I think the writer forgets there is such a thing as self-sacrificing love and disinterested devotion. When I first read the paper, I thought it was the work of a powerful-minded, clear-headed woman, who had a hard, jealous heart, muscles of iron, and nerves of bend[*] leather; of a woman who longed for power, and had never felt affection. To many women affection is sweet, and power conquered indifferent—though we all like influence won. I believe J. S. Mill would make a hard, dry, dismal world of it; and yet he speaks admirable sense through a great portion of his article—especially when he says, that if there be a natural unfitness in women for men's employment, there is no need to make laws on the subject; leave all careers open; let them try; those who ought to succeed will succeed, or, at least, will have a fair chance—the incapable will fall back into their right place. He likewise disposes of the 'maternity' question very neatly. In short, J. S. Mill's head is, I dare say, very good, but I feel disposed to scorn his heart. You are right when you say that there is a large margin in human nature over which the logicians have no dominion; glad am I that it is so.