《呼啸山庄》和《简爱》中仆人的作用和特点

《呼啸山庄》和《简爱》中仆人的作用和特点Abstract(English) (i)Abstract(Chinese) (ii)Chapter 1 Introduction (1)Chapter 2 The Roles of Servants (8)Chapter 3 The Characteristics of Servants (27)Chapter 4 Emily and Charlotte’s Presentation of Servants (46)Chapter 5 Conclusion (51)Bibliography (53i)AbstractIn 1847,with the publication of Wuthering Heights,Agnes Grey and Jane Eyre,threeBronte sisters caused great curiosity of the readers and critics,especially Emily Bronte,the authoress of Wuthering Heights,and Charlotte Bronte,the authoress of Jane Eyre.Jane’sstruggle for independence and her romantic love with Rochester and the passionate and controversial love between Catherine and Heathcliff have been reviewed for more than 100 years.Many critics have made tremendous contributions to criticism of the sources of the novels,their narrative styles and creating motivations as well as the analysis of the protagonists.This thesis,however,focuses on the roles and characteristics of servants inthese two novels.Even though servants are minor characters,it doesn’t follow that theyplay no roles and have no characteristic and therefore can be neglected.Although twonovels tell quite different stories,readers can easily find some interesting and controversial images of the servants who are inseparable from the development of the protagonists andthe whole stories.When they are confronted with the changeable fate of the protagonists, especially when there is the lacking of the image of the mother,they participate in theactions,even intending to influence the protagonists’judgment and showing their inborn conscience;some become totally callous and help to exacerbate the tragedy of the protagonists.But employed,dependent and fundamentally confined in a low socialposition in patriarchal society in which men are supreme,they cannot understand theexterior and interior struggle of protagonists,nor can they have independent thinking,despite the fact that some of them are somewhat literate and strongly religious.Byexposing the conscience and callousness demonstrated by the servants in two novels,thethesis intends to dig out the social and psychological state of the servants in the early 19th century,finding that they are still enslaved in the patriarchal society.It is clear that Emilygives the reader richer and more vivid description of the servants,and pays more attentionto these people than Charlotte.ii摘要1847年，随着《简爱》、《呼啸山庄》、《阿格尼斯·格雷》的出版，勃朗特三姐妹引起了读者和评论界的极大兴趣，尤其是《简爱》的作者夏洛特?勃朗特和《呼啸山庄》的作者艾米莉?勃朗特。

一百多年里，简对个人独立的不懈追求和她与罗切斯特先生之间浪漫而又波折的爱情故事，凯瑟琳和希刺克利夫之间狂热而又颇引人争议的爱情故事一直为人们所津津乐道。

但是长期以来评论家们更多关注的是故事的主人公而忽略了次要人物。

本文着眼于两部小说中的仆人形象，对《简爱》中的女仆贝丝和非而菲克斯太太、《呼啸山庄》里的耐莉和男仆约瑟夫进行了详细的分析。

他们虽处于隶属地位，但他们具有各自的性格特征，并在小说中扮演一定的角色。

他们不但亲眼目睹而且参加到了主人公跌宕起伏的命运当中，并试图施加影响以改变他们的命运。

通过对他们的分析，试图找出19世纪早期仆人的共同特征和生活状态，在他们身上既可以看到人性光芒的闪烁，良心的展现，同时也发现了人性的麻木、酸腐、冷酷、虚伪，但总的来说他们怎么也无法摆脱他们所隶属的父权社会对他们思想的深深烙印，没有多少自己独立的思想和自我。

同时，通过分析也发现艾米莉?勃朗特给了这些人物更为细致的描述。

Chapter 1 IntroductionGrown up and educated in the early 19thcentury in Haworth,an industrial town whichis straddling in the main route between Yorkshire and Lancashire,three Bronte sisters, Charlotte,Emily and Anne,drew much concern with the publication of their works,JaneEyre,Wuthering Heights and Agnes Grey in the same year.Over centuries,the protagonists in their novels,the Bronte’s living context and theirspectacular lives have been analyzed and explored by numerous ardent readers of theirnovels and critics.The thesis focuses on the roles and characteristics of servants in Wuthering Heightsand Jane Eyre.Although those servants are minor characters,it does not follow that theydon’t play a role and have no distinct characteristics.In my opinion,it is worthwhile toattach importance to their roles and characteristics.The fact can’t be ignored that in bothnovels the servants play a key role in the development of the changeable fate ofprotagonists and the plot with the image of mother lacking.It is known that after givingbirth to six children,Maria,Elizabeth,charlotte,Branwell,Emily and Anne,Mrs.Bronte,Maria Branwell,died when Charlotte was only six years old,and Emily only 3 years old.After their mother died of stomach cancer in 1821,the four eldest girls suffered from protracted hunger,illness,and cold at the harsh Clergy Daughters’School at the CowanBridge in Lancashire,model for the Lowood School of Jane Eyre.In fact,their two older sisters,Maria and Elizabeth,died at the school before Charlotte and Emily were withdrawnand brought home in 1825.Under such severe reality,they must have been hungry forwarmth,comfort and encouragement from people living with them.With the responsibilityof caring for six growing children,Patrick Bronte got the help from Elizabeth Branwell, Charlotte’s aunt,and also he employed some servants to help him while he could throwhimself into religion,politics and his innovations.It is recorded that in April 1820 Patrick brought his wife,Maria,his six children,Maria,Elizabeth,Charlotte,Branwell,Emily and Anne as well as two maidservants to thenow famous parsonage in Haworth.Although his salary of around?170 was too small toenable them to acquire any savings and any luxuries,he could afford the wages for some servants1.At that time in Haworth the Bronte family was among the list of gentlemen’shapter 1 Introductionfamily.According to Juliet Barker,in the kitchen of parsonage in Haworth the children wouldgather round the fire to pass the long,dark winter evenings with their imaginary games andto listen to the tales of their much-loved servant,Tabby Aykroyd,who stayed with thefamily for thirty years2.Their servant,Sarah Garrs recollected that in evening sessions Patrick gathered hischildren around him“for re citation and talk,giving them oral lessons in history,biographyor travel”3.As the only clergyman covering the entire chapel at that period,Patrick Bronte waskept immensely busy.On average he baptized 290 children and carried out 111 burials ayear4.With the mother lost at their early age and the father who was highly busy,theBronte children needed the care and warmth from the image of mother.We have everyreason to believe that they got maternal love and counseling from Elizabeth Branwell,their aunt,who came to live with the Brontes after the mother died and Tabby Aykroyd,aservant who lived with them for 30 years.The prototypes of Bessie,Mrs.Fairfax and NellyDean were their aunt,Tabby Aykroyd and other maidservants.The influence those figureshad on the Bronte children was well presented in their novels.Since Charlotte had two experiences of being governess in 1839 and 1841,the creation of Bessie and Mrs.Fairfaxmight have been inspired by the servants in her employer’s houses.While Emily had no experience of being governess,the presentation of Nelly Dean was probably mostly fromher own family and account of her sisters.They had experiences of being children without the mother’s care,so they naturallyturned to old servant and their aunt to seek comfort and emit their inner plight.Due to long experience of living with the family and great knowledge of the family,especially of the master,Patrick Bronte,the servants tended to exert their influence on those children,whichhelped the Bronte sisters to create the images of Nelly Dean in Wuthering Heights and Mrs. Fairfax,Bessie in Jane Eyre.That is to say they experienced the life of living with servants personally.In their ownlife they were strongly influenced by servants since they had lost mother,and meanwhiletheir father was so busy.It is because servants,especially female servants,played anhapter 1 Introduction3important role in their real life that in their created works,servants also played a vital role. Among the servants characterized in these two novels,only Nelly Dean caused greatattention at a given period,especially in 1950s and 1960s.John Fraser gave a humaneanalysis to Nelly Dean,declaring that Nelly did all the things in the name of action5However,James Hafley argued that Nelly Dean is'The Villain in Wuthering Heights'.Sheis both ambitious and resentful of her lack of status within the family,and uses herprivileged access to people's emotional weaknesses to manipulate events so that she is left effective mistress of Thrushcross Grange6.More attention was given to the narratingfunction Nelly played in Wuthering Heights,the critics think that her narration is notreliable.Through analyzing Nelly Dean,Joseph in Wuthering Heights and Mrs.Fairfax,Bessiein Jane Eyre,the thesis is intended to show that they play an important role in thedevelopment of the story,without their interference there would be another story.Their characteristics are stereotyped but complexed.Some are kind and conscious enough to give valuable comfort to the protagonists in trouble and isolation,exerting the profoundinfluence on protagonists to provide a shelter for them.Others are not totally callous and merciless,giving up the social bias to treat the protagonists cordially as they faithfullymaintain the social rules that they think to be conventional in light of norms of thepatriarchal society.Still others unconsciously lost their humane emotion and like a devilliving in the choking and isolated environment.1.1 Charlotte Bronte and Emily Bronte and their creationsLiving a seclusive life with her three sisters and one brother,Charlotte and Emily read voraciously and rambled on the moors.Together,the four remaining Bronte children (Charlotte,Emily,Anne,and Branwell)vividly detailed imaginary worlds in story form,recording them in miniature volumes written in minute script.The three sisters,whenadults,drew on their early literary efforts and published a book of poems together underthe pen names Currer,Ellis,and Acton Bell,neutral appellations,since the female authorswere tended be looked on with prejudice.The fact that their book of poems sold only twocopies disappointed them and they were determined to support themselves as writers,thehapter 1 Introduction4young women began to work on novels thereaft er.Unfortunately Charlotte’s first matureeffort,The Professor,was rejected by numerous publishers,but the firm Smith,Elder&Co.urged her to try a three-volume novel with more action and excitement.The result was the immediately successful Jane Eyre,a novel that treats the struggle for independence,self-respect and social recognition of a woman in mid-nineteenth century Britain.In thesame year Emily published her novel Wuthering Heights,which tells a love story takingplace in two old isolated families.Anne published Agnes Grey.The astonishing story of their family has been often told,but we should rememberfrom it the long apprenticeship in fantasy with their brother and sisters,the consumingmental passion of Angria,the imagined world Charlotte created in the writings of herchildhood and youth.She enacted dialectic of fantasy and reason,or release and repression.Her importance in the history of the novel is that they provide a bridge from Richardsonand the Romantics to modern psychological literature,to the experiments of James and Lawrence’s transcendentalism.Wuthering Heights is the most purely romantic novel but,its energies are held in a dynamic balance by sophisticated technique.Its symbolism is established on a considered,symmetrical structure,its language is pellucid,and the double insulation of those phlegmatic reporters,Lockwood and Nelly Dean,ensures amatter-of-fact rather than a baleful account of its wonders.Together with Jane Eyre andVillette it accomplishes a late but complete accommodation of the romantic impulse to the formal demands of the novel.Though the main actions of their psychodramas take place inthe isolation of the moor,or the claustrophobic enclosure of house or mansion,thetopography and dating are real7.To our grief,they two all died very young,Charlotte diedon 31 March,1855,in the early stage of pregnancy,aged 38,Emily died of consumptionon 19 December,1848,aged 30.In her life,Charlotte created Jane Eyre,Professor,Shirleyand Villette,Emily left us only Wuthering Heights and some pieces of poems.1.2 The condition of the working people in the early 19thcenturyIn order to get knowledge of servants’social status and their living condition,it isnecessary to review the condition of the working-class which servants belonged to.Bydoing this,the thesis is intended to explore the psychology of servants who escaped fromhapter 1 Introduction5the poorly ventilated wool working shops.Behind them,there was the harsh reality withlittle dignity,poor sanitation and high mortality,before them,they witnessed the leisurelyand luxurious life of the upper-class and getting-on middle-class.There must have beensome strong conflicts on the bottom of their heart and even inner twist.Their innerconflicts and twist must be represented i n their attitude to masters and account of masters’stories.With the Industrial Revolution,during the early nineteenth century very large proportions of the population hovered dangerously near some absolute subsistence level,and were frequently below the borderline which,by any standards,delineated thepossibility of minimum health and moderate comfort.The effect of industrialization on working-class living standards was uneven preciselybecause the pattern of working-class skills and incomes was uneven,Thus,relativelyskilled workers—printers,carpenters,building craftsmen,fine spinners,engineeringworkers,toolmakers,some iron workers,etc.—formed an economic‘aristocracy of labor’.Their real incomes undoubtedly tended to rise,and by the end of the period the more prosperous among them enjoyed living standards and even lifestyles which were associatedwith the respectable lower middle class.Of them,a modern social historian has written:These were the workers who ate meat,vegetables,fruit and dairy products,lived in the bestand newest cottages and filled them with furniture and knick-knacks,bought books and newspapers,supported mechanics’institutes and friendly societies,and paid the heavy subscriptions to the craft unions8.Nor was it only these sorts of skills that received bettercompensation as the industrial society emerged.Many factory workers and miners,traditionally associated with the mainstream of industrial development,were among thebetter paid of the labor force and also among the group which saw a rise in the purchasingpower of their wages.Compared with skilled workers and the better-placed employees of factories andmines,men and women with skills or occupational commitments unwanted byindustrialism or susceptible to the competition of the machine were much less fortunate. Agricultural laborers were under great pressure,as were casual laborers in towns.But the outstanding,and most heartbreaking,example of such casualties was undoubtedly thehand-loom weavers employed mostly in their own homes.The fierce competition of thehapter 1 Introduction6power loom,the ease with which non-mechanized weaving could be learned,and thereluctance of handloom workers to leave their jobs resulted in a remorseless squeeze onwages9.Rural working-class girls might receive some part of a basic elementary education (grammar,geography,and arithmetic)and then return to work as farmhands,mine laborers,or various kinds of servants.In England in 1851,“over 10 percent of the female populationwere working as maids,washerwomen,and charwomen”10.Urban working-class girls,with or without education of any kind,generally labored at exhausting,menial,and often dangerous factory jobs in trades such as textile production,nailmaking,and match-making. Merryn William said it is worth remembering that,except where factories offeredalternative work,the majority of working-class women(13 percent of all women in 1851)were servants of some sort for at least a few years of their lives.Novelists could hardlyhelp mentioning servants,as no middle-class family was without them,but they are usuallythere only to open doors and bring tea11.Although they were great in number,servantswere invisible in eyes of their masters.The wages of servants seem small.The labor of a man was cheaper than that of ahorse.In London,where there were at least 10,000 female servants always looking for‘a place’,from?6 to?10 was a typical yearly wage for a maid-of-all-work,including roomand board.An upper housemaid was paid?12 to?20 a year with allowances,though alady’s maid was paid only?12to?15,probably because she had extra pay in the way ofcast-off clothing.A cook could earn from?14 to?20 a year,and a private chef,butler,steward,and housekeeper were higher,usually starting around?40 or?50 a year12.The thesis is intended to analyze the roles and characteristics of servants in chapter 2and 3 respectively,and further explores charlotte and Emily’s presentations of servants.Notes on Chapter 1:1.Baker,Juliet.The Haworth Context,in Glen,Heather,ed.,The Cambridge Companion to:The Brontes.Shanghai:Shanghai Foreign Language Education Press,2004:272.Ibid.283.Ibid.304.Ibid.185.Fraser,John.The Name of Action:Nelly Dean and Wuthering Heights,Nineteenth-Century Fiction.hapter 1 Introduction7Los Angeles:California University Press,V ol.20,No.3,Dec.,1965:223-2366.Hafley,James.The Villain in Wuthering Heights,Nineteenth-Century Fiction.Los Angeles: California University Press,V ol.13,No.3,Dec.,1958:199-2157.Hemstedt,Geoffrey.The novel,in Lerner,Laurence,ed.,The Victorians:the Context of English Literature.New York:Holmes&Meier Publishers,Inc.1978:12-138.Altic,Richard.Victorian People and Ideas.New York:Norton,1973:529.Supple,Barry.Material development:the Condition of England 1830-1860,in Lerner,Laurence,ed., The Victorians:the Context of English Literature.New York:Holmes&Meier Publishers,Inc.1978: 60-6110.Altic,Richard.Victorian People and Ideas.New York:Norton,1973:5211.Williams,Merryn.Women in the English Novel 1800-1900.London:Macmillan Press.1990:1212.Brown,Julia Prewitt.A Reader’guide to the Nineteenth-Century English Novel.New York: Macmillan Publishing Company,1985:11-12r 2 The Roles of Servants8Chapter 2 The Roles of Servants2.1 Women’s social context in early nineteenth-century BritainThree of four servants the thesis focuses on are female and the protagonists withwhom they have more interactions are also female,therefore,it is necessary to get the knowledge of women in nineteenth century.In early nineteenth century,supply of female servants was in surplus.After receiving a basic education,they came to be servantsearning less money,doing tedious routine work,trying to be obedient,loyal and winningthe trust from the masters.Since servants received the education and training which met the needs of the mastersin patriarchal society,most of them were not quite aware of the plight of the womenincluding the upper-class women.At that time,the law and the social environment werenot favorable to women.In nineteenth-century in Britain the lives of married women did not offer more options.Women in all social classes were denied legal identities separate from their husbands:Once married,a wife could not sue or make a contract on her own nor could theymake a will without her husband’s consent.If he wished to confine her against her will,asMr.Rochester does his wife at Thornfield Hall,until 1891 he was well within his rights indoing so.He could“correct”her if he wished,too,a right which was supposed to meanonly verbal chastisement but in practice often meant physical punishment1.That’s why Mrs.Fairfax thinks highly of her master in spite of the fact that he locks his wife in an attic andthe mirthless laugh is often heard.Not only did married women have limited legal protection,they also had highlyrestricted legal rights to their children and property.In case of divorce,custody of thechildren automatically reverted to the husband;In Wuthering Heights after the death of Isabella,young Linton is naturally handed over to Heathcliff although Edgar was amagistrate and unwilling to betray his sister’s will.The situation improved somewhatwith the passage of the Infants’Custody Act of 1839,which allowed a mother to petitionfor custody of children under the age of seven.Finally,prior to the Married Women’sProperty Act of 1882,any property that a woman owned automatically became herhusband’s upon marriage.G.M.Trevelyan wryly notes the irony in this last feature ofr 2 The Roles of Servants9early nineteenth-century law:“The law was in curious contrast to the words of themarriage service,when the man was made to say‘with all my worldly goods I theeendow.’It was really the other way around”2.As of the early nineteenth century,British women had few options for social oreconomic independence open to them,and the restrictions against which Jane struggleswould have been widespread among women in real life.The call for a meaningfuleducation for girls and women issued by Mary Wollstonecraft’s A Vindication of the Rightsof Women in 1798 went largely unheeded for the first half of the nineteenth century.While affluent girls were trained in ornamental idleness,lower-middle andworking-class girls,if educated at all,were trained in propriety and deference to theirsocial superiors.“Charity schools”for“respectable”girls in reduced circumstances,suchas the Lowood School in Jane Eyre,churned out modest,well-mannered graduates whowould become governesses or schoolmistresses3.2.2 Nelly Dean in Wuthering HeightsNelly Dean cannot be ignored when we read Wuthering Heights,she is not only anoutsider of a big family invisibly observing the masters’secret and a narrator of the storyhaving happened in the Wuthering Heights and Thrushcross Grange,but also an important participatant in the story,she witnessed the oneness and separation of Catherine andHeathcliff,the marriage between Catherine and Edgar Linton,the temporarily miserable marriage between Catherine II and Linton Heathcliff and finally the happy marriage of Catherine II and Hareton.In addition,she is ambitious,repeatedly influencing her mistressand masters to divert the course of the fate of masters.Strictly speaking,she nursed two children,Hareton and second Catherine whose mothers all died shortly after giving thebirth.In the end of the story,the third generation of the two families,Catherine II andHareton unified happily.As the foster-mother of the two,Nelly succeeded in reverting the development of the story into the conventional.But Catherine I ended up in tragedywithout getting what she wanted,because she never accepted what Nelly asserted whichwas also what the patriarchal society demanded.Her story might be arbitrary,because sheis the only witness of the story,each character is judged by her moral standards complyingr 2 The Roles of Servants10with the norms of patriarchal society of the time.Sandra M.Gilbert and Susan Gubar commented that as Milton’s cook,in fact,NellyDean is patriarchy’s paradigmatic housekeeper,the man’s woman who has traditionallybeen hired to keep me n’s houses in order by straightening out their parlors,their daughters,and their stories.“My heart invariably cleaved to the master’s,in preference to Catherine’sside”4,she herself declares,and she expresses her preference by acting throughout thenovel as a censorious agent of patriarchy5.Her position in the family is very special,neither the older Mrs.Linton nor Mrs.Earnshaw plays much part in the story.And without a mother figure,Nelly Dean naturallyruled in the kitchen,which was connected with an everyday,productive life6.Lisa Stemlieb considers that“as a character[Nelly]has experienced this story withjudgment and lack of emotion;as a narrator she is able to convey the intensity of feelingthat motivates nearly all her acquaintance”7.No matter who is her master,Nelly Dean is a loyal servant strictly performing herduties to keep the master’s house in order and stick to the patriarchal principles.EmilyBronte demonstrates that the power of the patriarch,which is backbone of Nelly.Althoughat the beginning,Edgar is not strong enough in body to combat with Heathcliff and also inmind to resist the charm of Catherine,but Edgar’s power,begins with words,for heaven is populated by“spirits Masculine,”and as above,so below.Edgar does not need a str ong, conventionally masculine body,because his mastery is contained in books,wills,testaments,leases,titles,rent rolls,documents,languages,all the paraphernalia by which patriarchal culture is transmitted from one generation to the next8.But with thede velopment of the story,Edgar’s power became weaker and weaker,because his propertywould be inherited by his nephew when he was dead since he had no son.During theprocess from his possession to dispossession,he yielded to Heathcliff whom he called“plough boy”.Only when his daughter married Linton,could she lead a decent life andown Thrushcross.Edgar is truly patriarchal representative despite his apparent effeminacy,so before themarriage of Edgar and Catherine,Nelly naturally switches to Edgar.From the beginning,inher eyes,compared to Heathcliff and Catherine,Edgar is a real gentleman with both classr 2 The Roles of Servants11and property and as an legitimate heir of the Thrushcross Grange.There is a sharp contrast between Catherine and Edgar,although they were born to the upper-class’s family,as a daughter,Catherine has no right to inherit the property,by nature she is closely linked witha good marriage to sustain the rich life,that is to say,she must depend on a man who is legitimate heir to lead the life which she has been used to.Catherine has no what Edgarwill possess,in patriarchal society,she was inborn to be inferior to Edgar and must dependon Edgar.When she was very young,Catherine lost parents,exactly an orphan withoutright to attain property and who can not receive the parental love.Although Nelly Dean issonly nine years older than her,to some degree,Nelly Dean takes the place to be a motherto moralize her actions so that she grows up complying with the social conventions.When Heathcliff becomes possessed of property,Nelly aimed at his property for the sake of hermiss’happiness.In the end of the novel,with the death of Heathcliff and possession ofHareton,Nelly finishes her last duty to fulfill her late master’s will,promoting andwitnessing the happy marriage between Catherine II and Hareton.She is always accompanying the masters in possession.Cathy II and Hareton marry happily and becomethe owners of the two mansions.Elliott B.Gose,Jr.said that only Hareton and Cathy IIhave a hope of recapturing what they were deprived of.Not only do they have a fire toshare,they have a mother to guide them.Their new start will be in the house with NellyDean,who considers them“in a measure,my children”9.In Wuthering Heights,when Catherine I and Hindley were young,Nelly wasreasonably the companion to them,she is the foster-sister to Hindey,the heir of Wuthering Heights.When Frances,the wife of Hindley and the only idol Hindley cared greatly,diedafter giving birth to Hareton,naturally the duty of nursing Hareton fell into her hands.Asan only young heir with the mother lost,Hareton cannot get the normal parental love from Hindley who is addicted to drinking and gambling,hates him and tortures him,love andcare education from the foster-mother,Nelly,is valuable.As a foster-mother,Nelly is notsimple servant in the manor,but a mother role who can interfere with the fostered child’sfate.。