Challenging Patriarchal Ideology in Charlotte Bronte’s Novels

Coined after its Sovereign, Queen Victoria, the Victorian Period was marked by inequities in the class, religion, and mostly gender domains as women were suffering a political, social, and cultural alienation. Like Capitalism and the injustices that it generated, the patriarchal system was promoting men’s dominance over women. Men were graciously granted active roles and privileges, whereas women were attributed passive roles and constraints. Refusing to bow to that unfair system, Victorian authors like Charlotte Bronte stepped up to denounce women’s mistreatment in their Artworks. Thus, this work examines women’s resistance to patriarchal dominance in Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre (1847), Shirley (1849), Villette (1854), and The Professor (1857). Such defiance is mainly expressed through female characters such as Jane Eyre, Bertha Mason, Caroline Helstone, Shirley Keeldar, Lucy Snowe, Frances Henri, etc.