Anne Brontë | The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, 1848, first edition, 3 volumes

"Acton Bell" [Anne Brontë]

The Tenant of Wildfell Hall. London: T.C. Newby, 1848

FIRST EDITION, 3 volumes, 8vo (185 x 111 mm), half-title to volume one, modern calf, edges gilt, lacking one leaf of text (vol. one pp.349-350) and publisher's advertisements, title pages rehinged, minor wear to covers

ANNE BRONTË'S SECOND AND FINAL NOVEL. The Tenant of Wildfell Hall tells the story of Helen Graham, who leaves her violent, drunken and adulterous husband to protect her son and earn an independent living as an artist. Anne Brontë undoubtedly drew on the unhappy life of her brother Branwell, whose life was spiralling out of control when she was writing the novel, in her depiction of Helen's alcoholic husband Arthur Huntingdon. The novel is now celebrated as an expression of feminist values but the powerful descriptions of addiction and debauchery were heavily criticised by reviewers at the time of publication. The novel was a commercial success and was reissued within a year. The second edition consisted of the original sheets supplied with new title pages, but the author also took the opportunity to address her critics with the addition of a preface, which expounds passionately on the moral purpose of the novel: "if I have warned one rash youth from following in their steps, or prevented one thoughtless girl from falling into the very natural error of my heroine, the book has not been written in vain".

The Tenant of Wildfell Hall was reprinted in 1854 but the text was cut and poorly edited. The rights were subsequently transferred to Smith, Elder but unfortunately they reprinted the mutilated text, and this remained the basis of most subsequent editions until the 1990s.

LITERATURE:

Smith 4; Parrish 91