“[T]he laws themselves must be wicked and imperfect”

The portrayal of marriage in A Flame of Fire is due to the combination of MEH's personal experiences with an adulterous husband, and her political feminist views. The normality of married life is disrupted by violence, and as such it is suggested that the private sphere was actually an enabler of abuse. It is contestable that MEH was drawing upon her own memories when writing this text. The novel diverges from MEH's biography in the depiction of Quekett's abuse towards Aglae, but remains firmly in agreement with her political stance. MEH designs a deliberately regressive narrative structure, in which Aglae begins the novel married, and therefore the expectations for the novel to conclude with Aglae settled in a happy marriage are quashed from the outset. The novel openly judges the subordinate position which the law forced women into, and by challenging literary traditions MEH can be seen as equally radical as other New Woman novelists.