A Spark Ignited

     This semester, my group mates and I were introduced to many Transatlantic Victorian women writers. Some of them for the first time! Charlotte Bronte was a well-known name coming into this course but we had never actually delved into Jane Eyre prior to this and Fanny Fern was an unknown name that quickly became a favorite through our first-time readings of Ruth Hall. Our shared first impressions of these novels were that they seemed to be written so differently in regards to female agency, gender norms, and quick wit, despite being written only seven years apart. And although there were some differences, one similarity that we did notice running through the veins of these esteemed literary works and that was of the female protagonist realizing the power that her words could hold once she was able to speak up and fight for common respect. The difference in what they were fighting for in terms of equality was most intriguing to us because it seemed to differ from British to American soil. This led us to be interested in researching what feminist thinking was happening transatlantically during the time that these novels were being published and how that thinking could’ve influenced Bronte and Fern’s creation of their protagonists.