Despite criticism of Catherine Grace Gore’s work by notables such as William Makepeace Thackeray, it proved highly popular in its day and included some novels deemed superior to others. One of her best works, Mrs. Armytage, or, Female Domination, excels in its characterization. Always a strong point for Gore, her female protagonists exhibited independence and spirit, and Mrs. Armytage, the Lady of Holywell, provides a clear example. However, her independent mind also proves a closed one, leading to conflict with her son and daughter and great personal loss.

Described early on as pretending to encourage her daughter, Sophia, and son, Arthur, in “freedom of thought and action,” in truth she exercised over them “the utmost rigour or petty despotism.” This personality flaw leads to her alienating her children when Arthur decides to marry Marian Baltimore, a commoner whom his mother feels is undeserving of her son. As the only daughter of “a wealthy, high-principled, high-tempered English squire,” she is judgmental and contrary, all the while preserving a reserved demeanor. Ungovernable as the young Caroline Maudsley, she defied her own father’s wish for her to marry a distant relative, Sir John Maudsley, choosing instead Arthur Armytage—far more attractive but far less suitable. With little wealth, his subservient nature mostly recommended him, and he died at age 28, leaving Caroline Armytage to raise her children alone as a young widow.

Now mature and understanding of the importance of decisions, she has forgotten the value of love and insists on making a desirable match for her children. Cold and dignified, Mrs. Armytage stands in contrast to her neighbor, the Earl of Rotherham, an aristocrat blessed with a good nature shared by his family. His daughter, Laura, becomes good friends with Sophy, and Lady and Lord Rotherham hope that Arthur would one day marry her. However, his mother felt Laura not on a par with Arthur, a sentiment she regretted when she discovered his attraction to the commoner Marian. They marry despite her protests and have a baby, as Arthur contracts a number of debts from which his mother must help release him.

Arthur struggles with his feelings of gratitude. Due to his mother’s temper, he “dared not exhibit half so warmly as he could have wished the tenderness of a son.” Exposure to her mother’s continued disagreeable demands affects Sophy’s constitution, and she begins to grow weak. When Arthur becomes alarmed over her condition, Mrs. Armytage insists it is only due to the weather. He would like to remove the despondent Sophy from Holywell, but at his income, he cannot afford it. The plot includes many additional characters, many enjoying the high social positions that abound in Silver-Fork Fiction.

Predictably, Sophy suffers acute disappointment in life due to her mother, becomes an invalid, and dies. This, among other circumstances, moves Mrs. Armytage to repent and recognize the goodness in her son and daughter-in-law in time to enjoy a position in their home with her grandchild. Arthur undergoes a transformation of sorts, gaining strength following Sophy’s death to confront his mother, releasing his emotions in a manner that would have proved impossible a short time before. The novel ends on a note of justice for Mrs. Armytage, who suffers loss due to her actions. However, her family is restored to her, supporting her position as a dictatorial, but not hateful, woman.

Highly didactic, but entertaining and offering a magnificent characterization of its protagonist, Mrs. Armytage reveals its debt to Jane Austen’s Domestic Realism in its detailed rendering of a family’s everyday life. Its sober tone, however, owes nothing to Austen’s often wickedly ironic presentations. A fine representation of the matters of the wealthy, Gore’s novel depicts the leveling power of grief and loss, resulting from a powerful woman whose world proves of interest to feminist critics.

Bibliography
Jump, Harriet Divine, ed. Silver Fork Novels: 1826–1841. Vol. 6. London: Pickering & Chatto, 2005.

Categories: British Literature, Literature, Novel Analysis

Tags: 19th-century literature, British aristocracy in fiction, British novels, Catherine Grace Gore, Catherine Grace Gore’s Mrs. Armytage or Female Domination, character-driven novels., characterization, didactic novels, domestic realism, English Literature, family dynamics in fiction, Female Domination, female protagonists, feminist critics, feminist literary analysis, feminist readings, grief and loss in literature, high society in literature, independent female characters, independent women in literature, jane austen influence, Literary Criticism, literary themes, marriage and family in literature, mother-son conflict in fiction, Mrs. Armytage, Mrs. Armytage or Female Domination, silver-fork fiction, social class in literature, Victorian Literature, William Makepeace Thackeray