Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

Title: Jane Eyre


Author: Charlotte Bronte (English, 1816-1855)
Originally published:  1847
Page count: 416


Dates read: 8/8/19-8/27/19
2019 book goal progress: 21 out of 41
Back to the Classics category: 
Classic by a Female Author

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Description on back of book:
Orphaned as a child, Jane has felt an outcast her whole young life. Her courage is tested once again when she arrives at Thornfield Hall, where she has been hired by the brooding, proud Edward Rochester to care for his ward Adèle. Jane finds herself drawn to his troubled yet kind spirit. But there is a terrifying secret inside the gloomy, forbidding Thornfield Hall. Is Rochester hiding something from Jane? Will Jane be left heartbroken and exiled once again?

The novel contains elements of social criticism, with a strong sense of morality at its core, but is nonetheless a novel many consider ahead of its time given the individualistic character of Jane and the novel's exploration of classism, sexuality, religion, and proto-feminism.

First sentence:
"There was no possibility of taking a walk that day."

Favorite quotes:
"It is far better to endure patiently a smart which nobody feels but yourself, than to commit a hasty action whose evil consequences will extend to all connected to you - and, besides, the Bible bids us return good for evil."

"Women are supposed to be very calm generally: but women feel just as men feel; they need exercise for their faculties, and a field for their efforts as much as their brothers do; they suffer from too rigid a restraint, too absolute a stagnation, precisely as men would suffer; and it is narrow-minded in their more privileged fellow-creatures to say that they ought to confine themselves to making puddings and knitting stockings, to playing on the piano and embroidering bags. It is thoughtless to condemn them, or laugh at them, if they seek to do more or learn more than custom has pronounced necessary for their sex."

"Feeling without judgment is a washy draught indeed; but judgment untempered by feeling is too bitter and husky a morsel for human deglutition."

"Laws and principles are not for the times when there is no temptation: they are for such moments as this, when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigour; stringent are they; inviolate they shall be. If at my individual convenience I might break them, what would be their worth?"

CAWPILE Rating: Overall - 9.6 - ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Characters      - 9
Atmosphere   - 9
Writing Style - 10
Plot                - 10
Intrigue          - 10
Logic             - 9
Enjoyment     - 10
What is a CAWPILE Rating?

Review:

This is the third or fourth time I've read Jane Eyre - which says a lot. I have so many books I want to read that I rarely spend the time to read a book more than once. That being said, this is probably one of my favorite books! It's about an orphan girl who rises above her situations, which are often dreadful. The book has friendship and romance, intrigue and mystery, horror and tragedy, as well as loss and reconciliation. It really is a great read, if a bit black-and-white, and I suggest everyone should read it at least once.

Jane is an extremely strong character and, yet, docile at the same time - she's not interested in extravagance, she feels strongly, she expresses herself in a straightforward way, and she cares deeply about doing what's right. I identify with her in many ways - which is probably, at least partially, why I enjoy the book so much - and I love her representation of feminism.

Jane is proposed to by two men. One who loves her and she loves him, but when a secret he withheld is revealed, their relationship is inevitably altered and Jane leaves him. The other does not love her nor does she have a wife's love for him, but they would work together as missionaries trying to do as good work as possible. In addition to being unloving, he is also passive-aggressively abusive and quite manipulative. It is no wonder that, after she had time to think over the revealed secret, Jane returns to her first love to discover what became of him after she left.

Now I'm off to read another book... but since a review should be more about the author of the book than about the writer of the blog, I will let Charlotte Bronte have the last words:

(Note: The book does not have much humor, but I enjoyed the little it had. The following is a conversation between a School Master and Jane, who is 10 years old at the time.)

"'Do you know where the wicked go after death?'
'They go to hell,' was my ready and orthodox answer.
'And what is hell? Can you tell me that?'
'A pit full of fire.'
'And should you like to fall into that pit, and to be burning there forever?'
'No, Sir.'
'What must you do to avoid it?'
I deliberated a moment; my answer, when it did come, was objectionable: 'I must keep in good health, and not die.'"