Vivie warren

The Victorian era was remarkable for its rigid gender roles, which defined societal interactions. The prototypical Victorian woman existed in the domestic sphere, where she acted as a moral compass to guide her husband and children toward traditional morality. This vision was mostly limited to the middle and upper classes, but if her family’s circumstances were good, the Victorian woman might have spread her domestic, moralizing influence outside of her home to help the less fortunate. The Victorian man, on the other hand, occupied the public sphere, where he dealt with business and politics, and the more complex moral codes of the two. His home was a retreat, where he could take comfort in the morally upright space his wife made for him. However, as the period wore on, these strict gender roles proved to be too oppressive, and a “New Woman” emerged. The New Woman, as portrayed by Vivie Warren in Mrs. Warren’s Profession, steps out of the domestic sphere, a move that requires agency, moral complexity, and separation from – sometimes even emulation of – men. Because this stance was so different from the typical Victorian woman, it posed challenges not just for the New Women themselves, but for all members of society they interacted with.
In addition to gender roles, social classes were incredibly important in Victorian life. The typical woman’s life was framed mostly by her interactions with men of equal social standing. For Vivie, this means the middle class. Because the prototypical Victorian woman was most common in the middle class, a New Woman like Vivie encountered resistance to her way of life. The resistance was often passive, though, a result of men who are unable to comprehend a more independent woman. Mr. Praed is a f...

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...g out of traditional teachings of the domestic sphere and understanding the complex workings of the world. Vivie ceaselessly and independently follows her own vision of what is right, and while it may baffle and offend some, she cannot be persuaded to violate her own code. Vivie’s final separation from all that she knew before – her mother, Frank, even her old home – is perhaps the most telling signal of her independence. She has fully abandoned the domestic sphere and its obligations, and instead focuses on work. The debate over whether Vivie’s move is an appropriate one for women is still being held today over working mothers, but the move was even more radical then. One thing is certain, though – the challenges New Women like Vivie presented to Victorian society laid the foundation that generations of women have built on in pursuit of their unconventional dreams.