everything good comes out of Nazareth, or Yorkshire
I just read Jane Eyre for the first time today. (I know this is probably a SHOCK to some people, but 'tis true.)
I had read Charlotte Bronte's Shirley a few weeks ago on the flight from England, and was surprised to find that I was delighted with it. I expected to like it, but I hadn't properly experienced Charlotte's insight into both human nature and social issues. I expected either a worthy-but-narrow commentary on social justice in newly industrial England, or a charming story along the lines of Jane Austen. It was neither, as it was both a lively story of the heart and the head. Charlotte managed to bring the story of a few individual struggles -- often rather serious and difficult ones, e.g. spousal abuse, acute friendlessness and isolation, and continuous threats of death, to note the situations of three characters -- together with a concern for the conflicts, wraught by tensions between workers and new machinery which threatened to leave them unemployed, which ushered in the industrial age. She managed to create this story in a setting that expressed her deep love for West Yorkshire while admitting its faults, and she also sucessfully imagined wonderfully rounded characters of all walks of life, so that no one was perfect yet no one was entirely reproachable. In truth, I was impressed by how much complexity Charlotte was able to fit into an average sized novel.
So it was with a particular recent appreciation for Charlotte Bronte that I set out to read Jane Eyre. I found it a very different book than Shirley in that it has, obviously, one definite heroine, and speaks less of large social issues -- though I found the same strong bits of commentary on the need of women for occupation and purpose in life, and the same discontent with simple notions of class. Happily, though, these observations were never phrased in the bitter and harpyish way which certain modern feminists might phrase them -- there was no reproach upon society for being repressive and idiotic; rather, the opinions were simply if forcefully expressed, as if their own merits and the deep belief of the author, as well as the actions of her character, would recommend them.
But I digress a little: I wanted to say especially that I liked Jane Eyre as a character, though who could help liking her? I think that any of us who have been poor, obscure, plain and little -- or who have thought ourselves so -- must find a friend in Jane, even as we admire her honesty and forthrightness (which I, at least, confess I probably wouldn't have in many of the situations in which she displays them). She isn't a saint, but she is admirable; she is a very good heroine. I did so love her story. I knew the general plot long before I finally got around to reading the book, and I almost felt as if I had read it before; but all of the wonderful words, Charlotte's ways of describing things and Jane's way of appraising things, were all new to me.
Interestingly, I don't have much desire to read Emily and Anne Bronte's books; I am nearly sure I wouldn't like Wuthering Heights, but I may someday try something of Anne's. They may all have been sisters, and they may all have been formed by the same wild and heartrending moors, but they are very different authors. I suppose we'll see -- right now though, I'm perfectly content to express my appreciation for Charlotte Bronte's writing, as it has an incisive depth that I wouldn't have looked for based on the general comments I've heard about Jane Eyre. These would have seemed to place it in a lighter category of reading. I expected a Jane Austen, and I was, joyfully, given a Yorkshire-woman instead.
(Note, I love Jane Austen's books, and wouldn't mean to belittle her -- her writing is simply in a different category. She is witty and sensitive into the human character, as well as a bit satirical; she is not sharp and provocative and, well, northern, as is Charlotte Bronte.)
I had read Charlotte Bronte's Shirley a few weeks ago on the flight from England, and was surprised to find that I was delighted with it. I expected to like it, but I hadn't properly experienced Charlotte's insight into both human nature and social issues. I expected either a worthy-but-narrow commentary on social justice in newly industrial England, or a charming story along the lines of Jane Austen. It was neither, as it was both a lively story of the heart and the head. Charlotte managed to bring the story of a few individual struggles -- often rather serious and difficult ones, e.g. spousal abuse, acute friendlessness and isolation, and continuous threats of death, to note the situations of three characters -- together with a concern for the conflicts, wraught by tensions between workers and new machinery which threatened to leave them unemployed, which ushered in the industrial age. She managed to create this story in a setting that expressed her deep love for West Yorkshire while admitting its faults, and she also sucessfully imagined wonderfully rounded characters of all walks of life, so that no one was perfect yet no one was entirely reproachable. In truth, I was impressed by how much complexity Charlotte was able to fit into an average sized novel.
So it was with a particular recent appreciation for Charlotte Bronte that I set out to read Jane Eyre. I found it a very different book than Shirley in that it has, obviously, one definite heroine, and speaks less of large social issues -- though I found the same strong bits of commentary on the need of women for occupation and purpose in life, and the same discontent with simple notions of class. Happily, though, these observations were never phrased in the bitter and harpyish way which certain modern feminists might phrase them -- there was no reproach upon society for being repressive and idiotic; rather, the opinions were simply if forcefully expressed, as if their own merits and the deep belief of the author, as well as the actions of her character, would recommend them.
But I digress a little: I wanted to say especially that I liked Jane Eyre as a character, though who could help liking her? I think that any of us who have been poor, obscure, plain and little -- or who have thought ourselves so -- must find a friend in Jane, even as we admire her honesty and forthrightness (which I, at least, confess I probably wouldn't have in many of the situations in which she displays them). She isn't a saint, but she is admirable; she is a very good heroine. I did so love her story. I knew the general plot long before I finally got around to reading the book, and I almost felt as if I had read it before; but all of the wonderful words, Charlotte's ways of describing things and Jane's way of appraising things, were all new to me.
Interestingly, I don't have much desire to read Emily and Anne Bronte's books; I am nearly sure I wouldn't like Wuthering Heights, but I may someday try something of Anne's. They may all have been sisters, and they may all have been formed by the same wild and heartrending moors, but they are very different authors. I suppose we'll see -- right now though, I'm perfectly content to express my appreciation for Charlotte Bronte's writing, as it has an incisive depth that I wouldn't have looked for based on the general comments I've heard about Jane Eyre. These would have seemed to place it in a lighter category of reading. I expected a Jane Austen, and I was, joyfully, given a Yorkshire-woman instead.
(Note, I love Jane Austen's books, and wouldn't mean to belittle her -- her writing is simply in a different category. She is witty and sensitive into the human character, as well as a bit satirical; she is not sharp and provocative and, well, northern, as is Charlotte Bronte.)