Biographical Notes on the Pseudonymous Bells | Page 2

the ambiguous choice being dictated by a
sort of conscientious scruple at assuming Christian names positively
masculine, while we did not like to declare ourselves women,
because--without at that time suspecting that our mode of writing and
thinking was not what is called 'feminine'--we had a vague impression
that authoresses are liable to be looked on with prejudice; we had
noticed how critics sometimes use for their chastisement the weapon of
personality, and for their reward, a flattery, which is not true praise.
The bringing out of our little book was hard work. As was to be

expected, neither we nor our poems were at all wanted; but for this we
had been prepared at the outset; though inexperienced ourselves, we
had read the experience of others. The great puzzle lay in the difficulty
of getting answers of any kind from the publishers to whom we applied.
Being greatly harassed by this obstacle, I ventured to apply to the
Messrs. Chambers, of Edinburgh, for a word of advice; THEY may
have forgotten the circumstance, but I have not, for from them I
received a brief and business-like, but civil and sensible reply, on
which we acted, and at last made a way.
The book was printed: it is scarcely known, and all of it that merits to
be known are the poems of Ellis Bell. The fixed conviction I held, and
hold, of the worth of these poems has not indeed received the
confirmation of much favourable criticism; but I must retain it
notwithstanding.
Ill-success failed to crush us: the mere effort to succeed had given a
wonderful zest to existence; it must be pursued. We each set to work on
a prose tale: Ellis Bell produced 'Wuthering Heights,' Acton Bell
'Agnes Grey,' and Currer Bell also wrote a narrative in one volume.
These MSS. were perseveringly obtruded upon various publishers for
the space of a year and a half; usually, their fate was an ignominious
and abrupt dismissal.
At last 'Wuthering Heights' and 'Agnes Grey' were accepted on terms
somewhat impoverishing to the two authors; Currer Bell's book found
acceptance nowhere, nor any acknowledgment of merit, so that
something like the chill of despair began to invade her heart. As a
forlorn hope, she tried one publishing house more--Messrs. Smith,
Elder and Co. Ere long, in a much shorter space than that on which
experience had taught her to calculate--there came a letter, which she
opened in the dreary expectation of finding two hard, hopeless lines,
intimating that Messrs. Smith, Elder and Co. 'were not disposed to
publish the MS.,' and, instead, she took out of the envelope a letter of
two pages. She read it trembling. It declined, indeed, to publish that tale,
for business reasons, but it discussed its merits and demerits so
courteously, so considerately, in a spirit so rational, with a
discrimination so enlightened, that this very refusal cheered the author
better than a vulgarly expressed acceptance would have done. It was
added, that a work in three volumes would meet with careful attention.

I was then just completing 'Jane Eyre,' at which I had been working
while the one-volume tale was plodding its weary round in London: in
three weeks I sent it off; friendly and skilful hands took it in. This was
in the commencement of September, 1847; it came out before the close
of October following, while 'Wuthering Heights' and 'Agnes Grey,' my
sisters' works, which had already been in the press for months, still
lingered under a different management.
They appeared at last. Critics failed to do them justice. The immature
but very real powers revealed in 'Wuthering Heights' were scarcely
recognised; its import and nature were misunderstood; the identity of
its author was misrepresented; it was said that this was an earlier and
ruder attempt of the same pen which had produced 'Jane Eyre.' Unjust
and grievous error! We laughed at it at first, but I deeply lament it now.
Hence, I fear, arose a prejudice against the book. That writer who could
attempt to palm off an inferior and immature production under cover of
one successful effort, must indeed be unduly eager after the secondary
and sordid result of authorship, and pitiably indifferent to its true and
honourable meed. If reviewers and the public truly believed this, no
wonder that they looked darkly on the cheat.
Yet I must not be understood to make these things subject for reproach
or complaint; I dare not do so; respect for my sister's memory forbids
me. By her any such querulous manifestation would have been
regarded as an unworthy and offensive weakness.
It is my duty, as well as my pleasure, to acknowledge one exception to
the general rule of criticism. One writer, endowed with the keen vision
and fine sympathies of genius, has