This edition contains the
original and unabridged
text of Agnes Grey, the debut novel of English author
Anne Brontë
, which was first published in December 1847.
Agnes Grey
, a governess, works for several bourgeois families. The choice of central character allows Anne Brontë to deal with issues of oppression and abuse of women and governesses, isolation and ideas of empathy. Agnes Grey also mimics some of the stylistic approaches of bildungsromans, employing ideas of personal growth and coming to age, but representing a character who in fact does not gain in virtue.
Scholarship and comments by Anne's sister Charlotte Brontë suggest the novel is largely based on Anne Brontë's own experiences as a governess for five years. Like her sister Charlotte's novel Jane Eyre, it addresses what the precarious position of governess entailed and how it affected a young woman.
The Irish novelist George Moore praised Agnes Grey as "the most perfect prose narrative in English letters," and went so far as to compare Anne's prose to that of Jane Austen. Modern critics have made more subdued claims admiring Agnes Grey with a less overt praise of Brontë's work than Moore.