The Tenant of Wildfell Hall for her association with [her sisters'] imperative spirits." Mary Ward, a novelist, who was widely known for her anti-feminist views, in her introduction to 1900 edition of "The Tenant", accused Anne of "the narrowness of view" and absence of "some subtle, innate correspondence between eye and brain, between brain and hand, [which] was present in Emily and Charlotte." She concluded that "it is not as the writer of "Wildfell Hall", but as the sister of Charlotte and Emily Brontë, that Anne Brontë escapes oblivion." May Sinclair, while famously saying that "when [Anne] slammed the door of Mrs. Huntingdon's bedroom she
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall against spousal abuse needs no scandal-mongering allusions to be sensational. The character of Helen Graham may have been inspired by Anna Isabella Milbanke, the wife of George Byron, who also thought at first that her religious obligation was to improve her husband's behavior, but very soon she got disillusioned, separated from him and raised their child alone. Despite this, she – like Helen – believed in the ultimate salvation of her husband's soul. In "The Tenant" vice is not unique to the men. Lady Lowborough's adultery has a particularly devastating effect on her husband, and the malice of Eliza Millward