Jane Eyre

Jane Eyre is Charlotte's most famous novel, which was a runaway success for her. It is the story of an orphaned child, who has been looked after by a relative, Mrs Reed. Jane does not like Mrs Reed who is not kind to her and her cousins, John, Eliza and Georgiana, are even more unpleasant. John bullies her and is rough with her, but Jane fights back. She is not a meek or gentle child. Mrs Reed decides to send her away to school, and she is sent to a school called Lowood. It is a harsh place. She makes friends with a quiet shy saintly child, Helen Burns. Illness runs through the school because the girls are so badly fed and treated, and Helen dies. Jane continues to stand up for herself and things do improve. A nicer teacher becomes headmistress and Jane stays there for several year, rising to becoming a teacher herself. When she is 18 or so, she decides to leave and seek a post as governess. She gets a job at a Yorkshire house, called Thornfield, and her charge is a small French child called Adele. The housekeeper Mrs Fairfax is kindly, though strict, and Jane finds Adele silly and vain (she attributes this to her being half French) but not a difficult pupil. She does not meet her employer at first, as he travels a lot. Then one day she is out walking and meets a rather ugly man who has had a fall from his horse. She helps him and he is gruff but not ungrateful. She finds that he is her employer, Mr Rochester. He has come back to his estate and tells Mrs Fairfax that he will be holding a house party there soon. The housekeeper finds the place lonely, so she is not displeased. Jane is intrigued by the man, who seems rude and rough in his manner but he asks her to bring Adele in to meet his guests.

Tenant of Wildfell Hall Part III

Gilbert is unhappy and worried that there is gossip about Helen... but then she gets news that her husband is very ill. In spite of her anger towards him, she feels it is her duty to go and see him. He has been drinking very heavily and his health is almost destroyed. He was injured in a fall from a horse, and now, he is dying of gangrene. He is frightened of death but Helen wants him to repent. She tries to be kind to him, but he is very ill and afraid. He dies, and she inherits Grassdale Manor on behalf of her son. The estate is in poor shape because Arthur was extravagant and a bad landlord, but Helen's uncle dies soon afterwards and leaves her a fortune. Gilbert visits, and hears that there is a wedding in the local church. He is upset that Helen is now pretty well off and he is only a gentleman farmer. He goes to the church, expecting to find Helen is getting married, but finds instead that her brother is marrying Esther Hargreave, the sister of Millicent who has been a long term friend of Helens. He speaks to Helen and finds that she still loves him, and they plan to marry. Some of Huntingdon's friends reform, shocked by his horrible death. Millicent's husband gives up drinking and Lord Lowborough gets a divorce from his wife and she is left badly off. He gives up drinking and opium and reforms, and he marries a plain middle aged woman who makes him happy. Helen and Gilbert are also a happy couple and young Arthur grows up under their care.

Tenant of Wildfell Hall Part II

Gilbert reads the diaries, and finds that Helen was married to Arthur Huntingdon, a handsome young man who owns Grassdale Manor. She was young and romantic and in love.. and they were happy at first. But she began to find him selfish and controlling. He was jealous of their son when he was born and Helen grew to dislike his friends, who were nearly all heavy drinkers and gamblers and she found Arthur's drinking very hard to take. She at first thought she could reform him but things got worse. She realised that Arthur was having an affair with his friend's wife Lady Lowborough, and was upset. Another of his friends tried to seduce her but she snubbed him. She grew increasingly unhappy as Arthur began to teach little Arthur to drink and swear and she found that he was having an affair with a young woman who had been engaged as the child's governess. Helen decides to leave him, which she knows will be difficult and scandalous but she is determined. She has a brother whom she did not live with as a child but who is willing to help her, and he is Frederick Laurence, so that's why he visits her occasionally. Lawrence offers her a home at Wildfell Hall, though the house is neglected and she has only one regular servant, her maid Rachel. Gilbert realises why Helen is so cool with him. She has been hurt, and she is not a free woman so she cannot receive his courtship. He tries to persuade her that she owes nothing to her husband.

Tenant of Wildfell Hall

This is Anne's second and last novel. It is set in Yorkshire, and it starts with a letter from GIlbert Markham, a gentleman farmer, to his brother in law. He is writing to tell his friend about how he, Gilbert, came to marry his wife. He has a prosperous farm, though he sometimes longs for a more exciting life. A few years earlier, a new neighbour came to live at Wildfell Hall, a big house nearby which had not been used for some years. Gilbert is intrigued by the new tenant, an attractive woman who has a son, Arthur. The neighbours find her strange as she does not want to socialise much. She tells them that she has to earn a living and she is a painter so she does not have time for parties. She has few servants and seems rather cold and unfriendly. Mrs Markham, Gilbert's mother does not take to her, she thinks that Mrs Graham is too fussy about her son. She disapproves of drinking, and gives the little boy alcohol mixed with emetic, as a medicine so he dislikes the taste of it. Gilbert is a rather clumsy young man, who flirts with one of the local girls but finds himself being drawn to Helen Graham. But he is not much good at paying court. He begins to be suspicious of Helen, that she has a man visiting her privately. He meets Frederick Lawrence, one of the neighbours on the road to Wildfell Hall and over reacts wildly, attacking the man. Helen is upset and gives him her diaries to read so she can explain that there is nothing wrong in her relationship with Lawrence.

The Professor II

William's employer is kind to him and he gets friendly with Mademoisell Reuter who runs a girls' school. He is attracted by her but then realises that she is not sincere. He overhears her and M Pelet talking about their oncoming marriage and cools on her. He is suspicious of women, especially Catholic ones. Mlle Reuter continues to try to draw him in, and asks him to teach one of her junior teachers, Frances Henri, who is half Swiss and half English, and she wants to learn better English. William likes her, she is not a Belgian Catholic, and he begins to fall in love with her. But Mlle Reuter is jealous of their friendship, and dismisses Frances, refusing to let William know her new address. He is angry and realises that Mlle Reuter has become emotionally drawn to him, in spite of M Pelet. He leaves his job, and searches for Frances. When he finds her, he manages to find a new job at a college and they get married. After a time they return to England and set up their own school. They have a son, and William is a rather strict father to the boy. But they are happy. The story is rather lacking in action, and the awkward William is nothing like M Heger. He is clumsy and insensitive and bigoted. Charlotte revisited the Heger relationship and her time in Brussells when she wrote Vilette which is a much better novel

The Professor

This was Charlotte's first proper novel, which she tried to get published but it continually failed. She and her sisters also produced a book of their poetry but while that was published it failed dramatically. It got a few reviews but only sold 2 copies. Finally Charlotte, while she was nursing her father after his cataract operation, started to write Jane Eyre, and when she sent that to a publisher, George Smith, his reader was fascinated by the novel and found it impossible to put down. It was published, and was a roaring success. But the Professor never attracted much attention. It did not get published until some years after Charlotte's death, after being edited by her widower, Arthur Nicholls. It is based on her time in Brussels and is written from the point of view of the hero, William Crimsworth. William is an Englishman whose brother invites him to take a job in his business, starting as a clerk. William dislikes the work and he can't stand his brother's wife, so he decides to try his luck abroad and to become a teacher. He has a Yorkshire friend, Yorke Hunsden, who helps him to get a job in Brussels in a boys' school.

Shirley II

Shirley is not one of Charlotte's better novels. She researched the history of the Luddite riots in Yorkshire but social comment was not her forte. There is a touch of feminism, in that Shirley and Caroline both discuss careers for women.. but what Caroline really wants to do is to get married. She is depressed when Robert seems to be courting Shirley and Shirley in spite of her friendship with Caroline, seems willing to entertain Robert's addresses. However we learn that Shirley is in love with someone else, who only appears in the later part of the book. Louis, Robert's brother, is a tutor and Shirley loves him in spite of his low status. They get married, Robert's mill becomes successful again and he marries Caroline. The book is rather clumsy, with awkwardly comic portraits of the local curates, who are based on curates that Charlotte knew in Haworth. Shirley is said to be based on Emily Bronte.. but she is not really like her. However it was courageous of her to continue writing the book when she had suffered the awful losses of her two sisters and her brother.