ABSTRACT
Mesmerism offered a vision of a field of magnetic powers, in which human beings were suspended like any other physical entity - much as in the opening paragraph of Bleak House. Hillis Miller has forcefully demonstrated the tyranny of system in Bleak House, and a useful way to regard the recurrent epithet is as another instrument for assimilating individuals into rigid patterns. As Richard's obsession increases, Chancery intrudes into Bleak House, and John Jarndyce, as a potentially rival 'suitor', becomes Richard's great enemy. The Jarndyce household, at the center of Bleak House, reveals all the precariousness of the institution. When the narrative advances in Bleak House, it does not abandon its former alternatives. In Jarndyce's attachment to Esther, the roles of father and husband become conflated, but Woodcourt ensures that they will be distinct and so permits the emerging family to unravel a constricting knot.
