My Brilliant Career Themes

As Sybylla grows into a young woman, she grapples with what it means to be a woman navigating her social world. She encounters many women over the course of the story, and each of them teach her something about being a woman. Mrs. Melvyn demonstrates refinement and ladylike culture, but she also reveals to Sybylla the dangers of marriage and motherhood when a woman is bound by virtue to a bad husband. Mrs. Bossier teaches…

Poverty in My Brilliant Career drains the life and spirit from all the characters it affects. By emphasizing the physical and mental toll of poverty, Franklin reveals the tangible hardships of poverty to her middle-class readers. The narrative specifically critiques upper-class perceptions of poverty through the characters at Caddagat. Though Mrs. Bossier and the residents of Caddagat provide meals to the homeless men who visit, Sybylla is the only member of the household who…

Despite Sybylla’s independence, she expresses a deep desire to be loved throughout the story. This often manifests due to her insecurities: she frequently calls herself unlovable, to the extent that she believes Harold’s affection for her must be false. When she leaves both Possum Gully and Caddagat, Sybylla begs Gertie and Aunt Helen to miss her and think of her when she is gone. Gertie’s tearful response fills Sybylla with “savage comfort,”…

My Brilliant Career sees Sybylla grow from a little girl to a young woman, and she grapples with maturing before she is ready. Mrs. Bossier and Aunt Helen note that Sybylla is older than her years, and much of that maturity comes the responsibility she has to take on in her family. Once the Melvyns move to Possum Gully, Sybylla’s parents fail to treat her as a child. When she brings her drunken father home…