Mary Barton is many things, but she is not a conventional Victorian heroine. She may be perceived as the typical Victorian female character at first: young, beautiful, vain, and set on making an advantageous marriage above her station. But Mary evolves and grows as the story progresses. The insights she gains and the actions she takes allow Mary to break the mould that Victorian women are confined to.
The Victorian ideal of The Angel in the House implied that a wife should be meek, submissive, powerless, self-sacrificing, modest, and put her husband first and foremost. Mary Barton shows that she does not share many of those traits with other Victorian heroines.
Humility is one of the qualities that define The Angel in the House. Mary, however, is vain and aware of her beauty. We are told that “she had early determined that her beauty should make her a lady.”1 Influenced by her Aunt Esther, a beautiful and vain woman herself, Mary uses her loveliness to seduce and marry Henry Carson, the son of the rich mill owner Mary’s father used to work for. Mary’s objective is to end a life of privation for herself and her father. In chapter 7, we learn that “Mary was ambitious, and did not favour Mr. Carson the less because he was rich and a gentleman. The old leaven, infused by years ago by her Aunt Esther, fermented her little bosom […]” 2 Her only weapon is her physical attractiveness, and her vanity is her potential downfall.
With financial help from her good friends Job Leigh and his granddaughter Margaret, Mary embarks on a journey to Liverpool, a place she has never been, to find Will Wilson. The purpose of her trip is to find Will, who is supposed to sail for the Americas from there, so he can testify in the trial against his cousin Jem Wilson, wrongly accused of murdering Henry Carson. Will’s testimony, that they were together at the time of the murder, can save Jem from the gallows.
Mary shows courage and determination spurred by love and regret. She will save her beloved Jem come what may. Mary takes the train to Liverpool by herself and hires a boat to follow the ship, which had already set sail. However, she manages to pass the message to Will in the nick of time. She accomplished her mission, which turns out to be an exciting adventure and shows she is most definitely not meek and powerless.
Victorians set great store on a woman’s virtue. Her respectability depended on how she conducted herself, what she wore, whether she attended places of public entertainment, or even if she showed the smallest suggestion of sexual awareness3. A woman’s reputation could turn on a dime and she could be ostracized as a fallen woman. Mary is not aware of the dire consequences her affair with Carson could have on her reputation, however innocent it may seem to modern readers. But she seems to sense that it is wrong and deceitful4 and that she should bring it to an end.
Mary realises that Jem Wilson, whom she had spurned, is her true love. Unfortunately, he was accused of killing Henry Carson. Mary feels responsible and desperate. Such a blow makes her see that her actions were wrong and put her virtue at risk. In a meeting with her friend Margaret, whom she holds in high regard, Mary feels rightly judged and admits she was wrong.
“Oh, Margaret!” said she, “I see – I feel how wrong you think I have acted; you cannot think me worse than I think myself, now my eyes are opened. […] Yes, Margaret, you have a right to judge; you cannot help it […] You, who have always been good, cannot tell how easy it is at first to go a little wrong, and then how hard it is to go back. Oh! I little thought when I was first pleased with Mr. Carson’s speeches, how it would all end; perhaps in the death of him I love better than life.”5 Thus, Mary avoids becoming a fallen woman by a combination of her own actions and fate. By having a hand in saving Jem, Mary takes charge of her future.
Gender roles in the nineteenth century were clearly defined and there was no overlap. The Separate Spheres ideology dictated that men belonged in the public arena. They owned businesses or had a job at one, had the right to vote, had the freedom to do as they pleased outside the home, which included seeing prostitutes. The women, on the other hand, “were considered physically weaker yet morally superior to men, which meant that they were best suited to the domestic sphere.”6.
As a member of the labouring classes the Separate Spheres theory does not apply because Mary Barton needs to earn her keep working outside the home. Even more so after her father loses his job at the mill. The Bartons live in Manchester, an industrial and mill city. Although it is relatively easy to find a job at a factory, John Barton is dead set against it because he blames it for Esther’s fall7. The options open for Mary are going into service or dressmaking. The former is rejected by both Mary and her father.
Eventually, Mary finds employment of sorts as an apprentice with Miss Simmonds, a respectable milliner and dressmaker. The terms of her employment are, to modern eyes, frankly appalling. “Mary was to work for two years without remuneration, on consideration of being taught the business; and where afterwards she was to dine and have tea, with a small quarterly salary.”8 This apprenticeship puts Mary in a position of relative independence compared to women of the upper classes, who were confined to their homes.
Mary Barton reflects the cultural and social circumstances of her day. Mary lives in Manchester, an industrial city where the gap between the rich and the poor widens constantly. At the time of the story, there is an economic slump. The cotton mills grind to a halt and most workers, including John Barton, lose their jobs and descend into poverty and hunger.
Crowding and the lack of sanitation, and polluted air and water create living conditions where disease is rife: “The fever was (as it usually is in Manchester) of a low, putrid, typhoid kind, brought on by miserable living, filthy neighbourhood and great depression of mind and body. It is virulent, malignant, and highly infectious.”9 John Barton becomes politically radicalised out of despair. Mary is aware of this but does not concern herself too much. She is a good daughter who tries to take care of her widowed father as best she can.
A Victorian woman is expected to manage her household perfectly and to manage her husband’s wages. Mary has no choice but to do that and does it well. Years of hardship have taught her how to stretch what little money they have. Also, Mary knows how to behave in different situations without the help of a conduct manual or etiquette guide. She has learnt what to do in each circumstance by observing her late mother and older friends and neighbours. According to Black and Macraild10, working class women passed on values and information in the community in street conversations. Throughout the novel, different characters gather knowledge from their neighbours in this way.
A Victorian woman is expected to manage her household perfectly and to manage her husband’s wages. Mary has no choice but to do that and does it well.
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Mary Barton, with all her virtues and flaws, is a profoundly human character that still appeals to the modern reader. Misguided in her ambition to marry rich Mr. Carson, she eventually follows her heart and finds happiness with Jem Wilson. Had she let Carson seduce her, Mary would have become a fallen woman. She walks to the edge of the morality cliff but makes a timely retreat and avoids the fall that would have ruined her life, as it did her aunt’s. I find that Mary does not conform to the rigid Victorian heroine guidelines. Mary is, refreshingly, her own person.
1 Gaskell, Elizabeth. Mary Barton. (Wordsworth Classics, 2012), p. 25.
2 Gaskell, Mary Barton, p. 76.
3 Flanders, Judith. “Prostitution.” British Library. Web. https://www.bl.uk/romantics-and-victorians/articles/prostitution [Accessed 21 June 2022].
4 Malcolm, Elizabeth. “Mary Barton.” Victorian Web. Victorian Web https://victorianweb.org/victorian/authors/gaskell/malcolm/2.html Web. [Accessed 21 June 2022].
5 Gaskell, Mary Barton, p. 243-244.
6 Hughes, Kathryn, “Gender Roles in the 19th Century” British Library. Web https://www.bl.uk/romantics-and-victorians/articles/gender-roles-in-the-19th-century [Accessed 21 June 2022].
7 Malcolm, Elizabeth. “Mary Barton.” Victorian Web. https://victorianweb.org/victorian/authors/gaskell/malcolm/2.html Web. [Accessed 21 June 2022].
8 Gaskell, Mary Barton, p. 26.
9 Gaskell, Mary Barton, p. 58.
10 Black Jeremy and Macraild Donald M., Nineteenth-Century Britain. (Palgrave Macmillan, 2003), p. 247
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