Reframing
the Victorians: The ‘Taboo’ of the Kept Mistress during the Victorian Era
During the
Victorian era it was not uncommon for a married middle-class man to financially
provide for a mistress who in return for this economical support provided his
sexual satisfaction. Although this kind of conceit should seem corrupt and
immoral to modern society, to the Victorians, this was simply a common convention
within a middle class Victorian man’s life. Marriage in Victorian England was
more of a contract rather than an act of love; sex within marriage was viewed
as a way in which to procreate, not to fulfill the sexual desires, especially
the sexual desires of the wife. The conventional Victorian wife was a specimen
of submission and piety, her sexual desire was supposed to be non-existent.
Therefore, married middle-class men would often turn to prostitutes to fulfill their sexual desires as well as keeping mistresses.
Not currently on
display at the moment, but found on the Tate gallery website, is William Holman
Hunt’s painting entitled ‘The Awakening Conscience’ (1853). Hunt’s painting
depicts a young mistress perched on the lap of a married man; we can
acknowledge that the two are not
married due to the mistresses’ lack of a wedding ring as well as the various objects scattered around the room which are
constant reminders of her ‘kept’ status. The gentlemen’s hat is placed on the
table, making reference to the fact that his visit is only temporary rather
than returning home to a wife. There is a cat toying with a mouse under the
table, this relationship between cat and mouse mimics the relationship of the
gentlemen and the
mistress wherein the girl’s fate is at her ‘master’s’
complete dispense. The cat’s gaze and expression is exactly the same as the
gentlemen’s expression suggesting the gentlemen’s predatory form in regards to
his mistress. The girl seems to be transfixed by some sort of spiritual calling, referencing her sudden realization of the dishonesty she is taking
part in.
From this extract it
is evident that women had a specific role to play in Victorian society,
however, it is also evident that various deceptions took place behind closed
doors. “Walter’s” ‘My Secret Life’ is a testimony to this philosophy of
Victorian life. The anonymous memoirs describe the nameless narrator’s various
sexual encounters with numerous Victorian women, “One of Lucy's sons, in after
years, I saw fucking a maid in a summer-house: both standing up against a big
table; I was on the roof. Many years before that, I fucked a nurse-maid, she
laying on that table, in the very same summer-house” (Chapter II, Vol. 1). The
text is a clear illumination of the sexual conceit that existed in Victorian
society, committed by both men and women.
Observation of
Hunt’s painting reminded me of various scenes within Charlotte Bronte’s novel Jane Eyre, wherein it seems that Jane’s
relationship with Mr. Rochester is similar to that of the relationship between
a master and his mistress (obviously, before the revelation of Rochester's wife Bertha Mason,
the reader is unaware that Jane really is
a kind of mistress). During chapter sixteen Jane seems to categorize the
relationship she has with Mr. Rochester as a form of prostitution wherein she
is entirely submissive,
It does good to
no woman to be flattered by her superior, who cannot possibly intend to marry
her; and it is madness in all women to let a secret love kindle within them,
which, if unreturned and unknown, must devour the life that feeds it; and, if
discovered and responded to, must lead, ignis-fatuus-like,
into miry wilds whence there is no extrication (186/187).
Although this
master-and-mistress relationship is classed as socially unacceptable and
corrupt by Jane, it is still a fantasy consisting of the “hopes, wishes, sentiments
[that Jane] had been cherishing” (186).
Works Cited
Bronte, Charlotte, Jane
Eyre. Penguin Classics, Penguin Books: London, 2006.
The Girl’s Own
Paper, “Etiquette for all Classes” http://www.mostly-victorian.com/GOP1881/etiquette01.pdf
My Secret Life, Anonymous. http://www.gutenberg.org/files/30360/30360-h/secret1.htm
William Holman
Hunt, ‘The Awakening Conscience’ http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/hunt-the-awakening-conscience-t02075
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ReplyDeleteInteresting how are posts are on the same topic, I like your take on it and combination with the text My Secret Life - I did mine earlier and compared the gentleman in the photo with Henry Carson from Mary Barton - I like how you talked about sexuality in regards with the painting ~ kudos :)
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