With an Introduction & Notes by Peter Merchant Canterbury Christchurch University College The Tenant of Wildfell Hall is a powerful & sometimes violent novel of expectation love oppression sin religion & betrayal It portrays the disintegration of the marriage of Helen Huntingdon the mysterious tenant' of the title & her dissolute alcoholic husband Defying convention Helen leaves her husband to protect their young son from his father's influence & earns her own living as an artist Whilst in hiding at Wildfell Hall she encounters Gilbert Markham who falls in love with her On its first publication in 1848 Anne Bronte's second novel was criticised for being coarse' & brutal' The Tenant of Wildfell Hall challenges the social conventions of the early nineteenth century in a strong defence of women's rights in the face of psychological abuse from their husbands Anne Bronte's style is bold naturalistic & passionate & this novel which her sister Charlotte considered an entire mistake' has earned Anne a position in English literature in her own right not just as the youngest member of the Bronte family This newly reset text is taken from a copy of the 1848 second edition in the Library of the Bronte Parsonage Museum & has been edited to correct known errors in that edition