Agnes Grey

Description

When her family becomes impoverished after a disastrous financial speculation, Agnes Grey determines to find work as a governess in order to contribute to their meagre income and assert her independence. But Agnes's enthusiasm is swiftly extinguished as she struggles first with the unmanageable Bloomfield children and then with the painful disdain of the haughty Murray family; the only kindness she receives comes from Mr Weston, the sober young curate. Drawing on her own experience, Anne BrontA"'s first novel offers a compelling personal perspective on the desperate position of unmarried, educated women for whom becoming a governess was the only respectable career open in Victorian society.

Anne Bronte was born in 1820, the youngest of the Bronte family. She was educated at home in the Yorkshire village of Howarth, and later held two positions as a governess, difficult experiences which inspired her first novel, Agnes Grey, in 1847. This was followed by The Tenant of Wildfell Hall in 1848. Anne died of tuberculosis in 1849, aged twenty-nine.

"The one story in English literature in which style, characters and subject are in perfect keeping." -George Moore