Which Brontë novel was published in 1847 under the pseudonym Acton Bell?

Agnes Grey was the Brontë novel published in 1847 under the pseudonym Acton Bell.

It was Anne Brontë’s first novel and follows Agnes, a young woman who becomes a governess after her family’s financial circumstances worsen. The story draws heavily on the social isolation, insecurity and difficult employers Anne encountered during her own years working as a governess. Its realism gives the novel a different tone from the more dramatic Gothic intensity associated with her sisters’ books.

Agnes Grey was published by Thomas Cautley Newby in December 1847 as part of a three-volume set. Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights occupied the first two volumes, while Agnes Grey formed the third. Anne used the name Acton Bell, just as Charlotte and Emily published under the masculine-sounding names Currer and Ellis Bell.

A common mix-up is to associate Acton Bell with Jane Eyre or Wuthering Heights. Those novels were written by Charlotte and Emily respectively; Anne’s other novel, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, was also published as Acton Bell.