『오로라 리』에 나타난 19세기 영국 중산층의 여성교육

The Nineteenth Century English Female Education in the Middle Class in Aurora Leigh

This paper discusses the aspects and effects of the 19th century English education for middle class women through the analysis of Aurora’s education in Aurora Leigh. The aim of female education in the middle class represented through Aurora’s learning in her aunt’s house is to prepare marriageable women and "angels in the house" who are subservient and agreeable to their husbands. For English men who lead the world, English women are expected to work for comfortable and peaceful homes to provide their husbands solid bases for their social and imperial achievements. Aurora, however, refuses to become a docile dependent woman who caters only for her husband’s needs, rather, she tries to overcome the barriers of womanhood and the walls of class discrimination. What makes Aurora more than a typical English middle class woman is her father’s classical literary education and her Italian mother’s free and natural nurture as well as the inspiration obtained from lower-class woman, Marian. Aurora has become a successful poet and happy novel heroine through her synthetic education which has universal and equal values that will lead to the annihilation of gender discrimination and class inequality. Elizabeth Barrett Browning shows the traits and limits of the 19th century English female education in the middle class, and suggests possible compensation represented through Aurora’s transnational and interclass experience.