I’m in love. When I first read Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë, I enjoyed it. But now I’m in love. I’ve nearly underlined, bracketed, or annotated every line in that book. It seemed like every single line spoke to my soul. Every character was living, breathing, vitalized. Every observation felt natural and insightful.
I reread this in a very busy season of my life, so I by no means read it quickly, but that suited me nicely because I could savor it. The writing is exquisite. Brontë wrote atmosphere so well, I adored how all the characters interacted, and I felt right at home being welcomed into Jane Eyre’s internal world. It’s so challenging to articulate why I fall in love with a book, and this one is no exception, but I think that I fell in love with, not Jane Eyre herself, but the lens in which she viewed the world. She is such a principled, forthright person, and she can seem submissive, but she will not let her principles be crossed. Despite that, she still maintains a sense of humor, and she combines honesty and wit in all of her dialogue. She displays a quiet strength with a very humanly imperfect undertone. She’s extremely contemplative, and she explains the world as she sees it so descriptively and perceptively.
This story is often viewed as simply a love story, and though I have not seen all of the many film adaptations of Jane Eyre, I believe most either pass quickly through or exclude altogether Jane’s childhood at the Reed home and at Lowood and her excursion to her cousins’, instead making Jane’s romance with Mr. Rochester the main focus. That’s such a disservice to the book. That part is definitely the most passionate, the most mysterious, the most gothic, all of which I definitely appreciate as parts of the book, but those elements are not the highlight for me. The charm lies in Jane’s introspections. And that part of the book is definitely not the only conflict. Conflicts abound throughout the novel, and you can so distinctly track Jane’s growth as she deals with the conflicts and learns more about herself, and the other people around her, through dealing with them. You can’t understand Jane’s attraction to Rochester’s mind without knowledge of her educational development and boredom at Lowood, you can’t understand her yearning for companionship without knowing her neglected childhood at the Reed’s, or her strict self-recriminations of her place and belonging in the world as “pure, plain, and obscure” without knowing of how the world had drilled it into her.
Speaking of the romance, I vaguely remember that when I first read the book (it has to be a decade ago), I didn’t understand Mr. Rochester’s appeal and was kind of shocked and maybe even a tad bit disappointed when they hinted at romantic attachment. He’s an ugly, temperamental, caustic, calculating man prone to vice and manipulation. In other words, far from your typical hero. And too unprincipled for Jane. I perhaps even wanted her to end up with John Rivers, myself preferring brooding coolness over mercurial heat. But now I am totally fascinated by and drink in Jane’s and Rochester’s interactions. And while Rochester manipulated situations, Jane knew how to manipulate Rochester’s emotions, teasing and soothing him in turn. Jane was aware of his flaws, and she noticed when they started to disappear for her and she began to idolize him. She took herself away from the situation and returned on a more equal footing (though I have thoughts about her needing to feel economically equal to him to have an adequate relationship). But at the end, when Jane was bantering with him again, I thought, yes, perhaps this is better, the best place for her, the best person for her. She was obviously more natural and more happy. She could balance her religious principles with her passion. I think his rudeness and flawed nature comforted her because his entire being was laid out transparently before her. What she needed most was frankness. Frankness in emotion and for someone to need and love her very soul. Their relationship will never be perfect or be a “storybook romance,” which is entirely what makes it so unusually interesting to read about.
I will say I wasn’t a huge fan of the supernatural moment that called Jane Eyre and Mr. Rochester back to each other. That seemed very convenient and bizarre in an otherwise realistic novel. I wish they had found their way back to each other in a more natural, explainable way. Perhaps Brontë wanted to justify the relationship between religious, principled Jane and disreputable Rochester by making it seem like divine calling? I’m not sure.
There is so much in this book to explore and discuss, and I’ve barely scratched the surface. I already feel like I need to reread it again. I can’t skim the book to see the best parts that I annotated since I nearly annotated the whole book, so I feel like I’m missing some important aspects I wanted to comment on and note down to remember, but more analysis will just have to wait for another reread.
Onto the Favorites Shelf this one goes.
