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Chapter One Origins of Bronte Sisters’ Female Consciousness Every writer belongs to a specific period of history though his/her compositions may have a much longer standing, and hence the social conditions of his/her living time have an inevitable influence on him or her. The Bronte sisters are no exceptional, they were born in an age of reforms and the tremendous changes in Victorian time rooted in these reforms. 1.1 Victorian Background The Victorian Age in which they lived was featured with the cleavage between the wealthy and the poor. With the accomplishment of the industrialization and the development of capitalism in this era, the class antagonism between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie became acute and prominent. Even since the thirties of the 19th century, the struggle between the workers and capitalists became the contradiction in English social life. …… It is impossible to say when women begin to write fiction. Obviously, however, women are not supposed to pursue writing as the professional activity, as reviewed in Robert Southey’s letter to Charlotte Bronte “literature can not be the business of a women life, and it ought not to be. The more she is engaged in her proper duties, the less leisure will she have for it, even as an accomplishment and recreation” (Beer, 1980: 330) . The Bronte sisters are insisting on their dream and career, paving a way for awakening of women. Among the major social development of the Victorian Age, the change of the women’s status should not be overlooked especially when considering those women writers’ works. However, the majority of women in the Victorian Age is oppressed and discriminated against because of their sex, not because of their class. Since the Victorian women were a little educated, but not well-educated, without any property, they are much less competitive in the marriage market. The middle-class women must make a living by themselves, working as nurses, governesses, and novelists, whose activities were