Whenever a new ideology is introduced to a culture or society, habitus (subconscious, socially-conditioned behaviors and responses) inevitably lags behind conscious ideology. Even when an individual adopts or promotes a newly-introduced ideology, they are still a product of the society they were raised in, which had not previously been imbued with this ideology, given its newness. This can take a number of forms, and is particularly relevant when studying progressive racial and gender ideology. Novels offer a unique glimpse into the dynamics of this habitus-ideology lag, given they grant access to both an author’s conscious intent and subconscious worldviews. Literature, of course, is one of the oldest ways of conveying social and political messages, and has been used by authors throughout history to promote radical ideologies. And yet, at the same time, the expansive nature of the novel gives readers a glimpse into the author’s implicit worldviews and values given how they build character, the logic of their fictional worlds, and more. Oftentimes, when habitus-ideology lag complicates psychology and worldview, self-contradictions may be found between overt and implicit messaging in novels written during periods of intense ideological shift. Thus, focusing on the era of first-wave feminism, this project investigates how, if at all, habitus-ideology lag complicates messaging and themes in the proto-feminist novels of Gaskell and Bronte.