Kay's Bookshelf

Although I have not noticed when previously reading the book, this time I discovered many things I have in common with Jane. As is the case with other Bronte characters (like Lucy Snowe in Vilette, for example), Jane is a plain-looking girl, with no fortune of her own, trying to build a place for herself in the world by honest work. Whatever quality she lacks on the outside though is thoroughly compensated by her inner qualities: she’s good-hearted, empathic, never afraid of hard work and also unafraid to speak her mind if the situation requests it. Mr. Rochester is a Byronic hero if there ever was one, but his passion for Jane redeem his faults in the eyes of the reader (or at least in mine), making him one of the most powerful characters in the book. As his opposite we can perhaps name Jane’s cousin, St. John Rivers (predestined name?), a man dedicated to doing good and living right — but, alas, too much so in order for him to be actually interesting in my eyes (I do like characters bent on doing good, of course, but in St. John’s case it seemed more an obsession than anything else).

One of the most poignant parts of the book for me was the part where Jane has to choose between her love and her principles. A tough choice if there ever was one (making me wonder what my own choice would have been, were I in Jane’s stead). I liked the fact that Jane herself has had trouble choosing between the two, other than sternly choosing the principles (because, after all, she is a respectable 19th century heroine), because it made her more human, more real as a character. Sure, the story was bound to end nicely for her regardless of her choice — but on the whole I like the fact that she chose the way she did, although the immediate effects were very hard on her. Above all I think doing so was necessary for her as a character, in order to grow, in order to gather enough life experience to know that her Mr. Rochester is what she really wants out of life (after all when she first arrived at Thornfield she was way too young and had way too little previous contact with the world to enable her to know things for sure).

I also found interesting the way the author has managed to make the reader feel the characters’ passion. While the book is completely clean of sexual elements, the chemistry between Jane and Rochester lifts itself off the pages of the book, almost becoming a character in its own right. It’s the kind of love that does not care about the petty things (the difference in their fortunes, the difference in their ages, and ultimately the difference in their health) but only about the high ones — they are alike, they share the same ideals, each of them’s happiness lies only in the arms of the other. Speaking of which, I also liked the way the author chose to insert a “beauty is in the eye of the beholder” element: at first, Rochester asks Jane what she thinks about him and she finds him ugly; later on she finds his face the noblest one around, and longs to see it every day (I tend to think the same happened the other way around, to the way Rochester saw Jane, at first and then later on).

Speaking of looks, I wonder if this isn’t a limitation of the author’s: both ugly characters were flawed, but had redeeming qualities; all the very beautiful ones were simply flawed (Blanche Ingram was too proud, Rosamund Oliver was too shallow, Bertha Mason was shallow and crazy, Adele’s mother was unfaithful, St. John is way too cold-hearted and so on). Jane’s two cousins, Diana and Mary, might break this mold, as they are both very accomplished intellectuals — but truth be told I don’t remember if their looks were exceptional in any way, or just slightly above average. Not that all this made the book less enjoyable for me, of course — I think it too good a book to be bothered about a cliche or two.

A quote whose imagery I liked:

My rest might have been blissful enough, only a sad heart broke it. It plained of its gaping wounds, its inward bleeding, its riven chords. It trembled for Mr. Rochester and his doom; it bemoaned him with bitter pity; it demanded him with ceaseless longing; and, impotent as a bird with both wings broken, it still quivered its shattered pinions in vain attempts to seek him.

What I liked most: The fact that Jane was not the quiet type and she could hold her own in a conversation :) Her need of independence was also one of the things that I found most interesting in her.

What I liked least: It didn’t bother me that much but I could have done without the supernatural bit at the end. I have to say though that think as I might I couldn’t find a better way for the author to reach her purpose at the time so I can see how that bit fits in there although for me contrasts with the rest of the book.

Recommend it to? Anyone, as it’s not only a classic but also one of my favorite books :)

Written by the same author:
Biographical Notes on the Pseudonymous Bells

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In my opinion, the very idea of publishing the two parts together was a great one. I know that it might have been born out of necessity, as neither of them alone could have made an actual book, being so very short, but I find it very lucky that these two were brought together and nothing more, because I think they fit very well. The first part starts with narrating the first steps of the sisters on their road to becoming published authors, including the bad reception their first books met with, moving on to the thing that seemed to sadden Charlotte the most: the fact that almost everyone (critics and readers alike) was certain that the author of Wuthering Heights was the same as Jane Eyre, namely Charlotte herself (despite Wuthering Heights being more criticized than praised, Charlotte felt this misattribution to be detracting from her sister’s own merits). Which is why I think she gladly welcome the chance to write the preface to her sister’s book, taking advantage of the situation to make things right once and for all.

I think it’s a great thing that, by reading this book, we get to find out more about the Bronte sisters. While all their works are classical pieces now, unanimously acclaimed by critics worldwide, not much is known by the average reader (such as I) about the sisters themselves. Which makes this book a little gem, as not give us a few details about the three sisters, how their lives were, how they thought, but it also has the enormous quality (in my eyes at least) of having been written back then, by one of them even (back then when they had yet to become the quaint authors we consider them today).

It is interesting to notice that none of the three sisters was learned, they never studied the art of writing. They had only their imaginations and their observations of the (limited, as they lived quite isolated) human nature around them. Speaking of which, I think it’s worth noting Charlotte’s opinion of how Wuthering Heights and its characters came to be:

Though her feeling for the people round was benevolent, intercourse with them she never sought; nor, with very few exceptions, ever experienced. And yet she know them: knew their ways, their language, their family histories; she could hear of them with interest, and talk of them with detail, minute, graphic, and accurate; but WITH them, she rarely exchanged a word. Hence it ensued that what her mind had gathered of the real concerning them, was too exclusively confined to those tragic and terrible traits of which, in listening to the secret annals of every rude vicinage, the memory is sometimes compelled to receive the impress. Her imagination, which was a spirit more sombre than sunny, more powerful than sportive, found in such traits material whence it wrought creations like Heathcliff, like Earnshaw, like Catherine.

What I liked most:
The way Charlotte talked about her sisters, making the reader feel the warmth of her sisterly love for them even though she’s not only pointing out their qualities but their faults as well.
She said about Emily:

In Emily’s nature the extremes of vigour and simplicity seemed to meet. Under an unsophisticated culture, inartificial tastes, and an unpretending outside, lay a secret power and fire that might have informed the brain and kindled the veins of a hero; but she had no worldly wisdom; her powers were unadapted to the practical business of life; she would fail to defend her most manifest rights, to consult her most legitimate advantage. An interpreter ought always to have stood between her and the world. Her will was not very flexible, and it generally opposed her interest. Her temper was magnanimous, but warm and sudden; her spirit altogether unbending.

and of Anne:

Anne’s character was milder and more subdued; she wanted the power, the fire, the originality of her sister, but was well endowed with quiet virtues of her own. Long-suffering, self-denying, reflective, and intelligent, a constitutional reserve and taciturnity placed and kept her in the shade, and covered her mind, and especially her feelings, with a sort of nun-like veil, which was rarely lifted.

And the best quote about them both:

I may sum up all by saying, that for strangers they were nothing, for superficial observers less than nothing; but for those who had known them all their lives in the intimacy of close relationship, they were genuinely good and truly great.

What I liked least:
This is not an actual fault of the book, but I was sorry to see that it was more about Emily and Anne, Charlotte ignoring to write much about herself. A natural thing given the fact that she was the author and her natural modesty, but she is my favorite of the three (quite to be expected given that she has written more books by far than her sisters combined) and I would have liked to find out more about her too.

Recommend it? According to Amazon this is “widely considered to be one of the top 100 greatest books of all time”, so I’d say it’s quite a must read for any Bronte fan. Not counting the fact that it’s one of the shortest books I’ve ever read too :)

Written by the same author:
Jane Eyre

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