The Brontës and the military

Butcher, Emma

Abstract

This thesis examines the presence of war and the military in Charlotte and Branwell Brontë’s juvenilia. Their collaborative fantasy saga of Glass Town and Angria, written between 1829–1839, offers an insight into how the siblings understood and reimagined both Napoleonic and colonial warfare whilst growing up in early nineteenth-century Britain. Their writings shed new light on how canonical literature and the contemporary media had the potential to influence the public imagination. The saga is an exceptional case study of how young people interpreted war and militarism in a period little discussed by social and military historians. In short: this thesis argues that both Charlotte and Branwell are social war commentators and historians in the post-Napoleonic period. To begin, the thesis considers a number of canonical war writers who influenced the Brontë siblings before providing a detailed analysis of their engagement with and reworking of contemporary publications relating to the Napoleonic Wars, post-Napoleonic Britain and the First Anglo-Ashanti War. To conclude, the thesis discusses the legacy of the siblings’ engagement with war in their later literature. Overall, this study offers an alternative youthful history of the post-Napoleonic social landscape that we can use to understand the everyday impact of war and conflict upon a nation.

Citation

Butcher, E. (2017). The Brontës and the military. (Thesis). University of Hull. Retrieved from https://hull-repository.worktribe.com/output/4223824

• Thesis Type: Thesis
• Deposit Date: Jan 17, 2022
• Publicly Available Date: Feb 24, 2023
• Keywords: English
• Public URL: https://hull-repository.worktribe.com/output/4223824
• Additional Information: Department of English, The University of Hull
• Award Date: Feb 1, 2017