Author: Charlotte Brontë

Published in: 1847

Publishing house: Oxford University Press

Charlotte Brontë

Charlotte Brontë was born in Yorkshire 21 April 1816. She was one out of the six children Patrick Brontë and Maria Branwell Brontë had gotten together. When Charlotte was 5years old her mother died. That was a very critical moment of her life. 3 years later, in 1824, Charlotte and her two older sisters, Elizabeth and Maria were sent of to a new school. The school was called Cowan Bridge Clergy Daughters’ school.

They had been at the school for under a year when Maria and Elizabeth got ill and died because of the conditions at the school. Charlotte’s father brought Charlotte home immediately after her sister’s death. Now it was there Aunt Bess who became the sister’s teacher.

The four children who were left did all support each other and soon all of them wrote poems and stories. In 1931 Charlotte was sent away to a school called Roe Head School because of her father’s bad health. It was not more than 10pupils there at the same time so it became like a small family for Charlotte. After 2 years Charlotte returned home to instruct her sisters. 

In 1835 Charlotte went back to the Roe head School were she started as a teacher. After some years as a teacher and as a governess, she decided to move to Brussels. In Brussels she studied French. She stayed in Brussels for 2 years. 

In 1848 her 2 sisters and her brother died. Charlotte felt alone but famous authors and friends supported her. 

Charlotte got married in 1854, but she died one year later of tuberculosis. Then she was thirty-nine years old.

Bibliography:

Link:

http://www.gradesaver.com/ClassicNotes/Authors/about_charlotte_bronte.html

The Story

The story starts when Jane Eyre is 10years old. She lives with her three cousins and her aunt. They are all cruel to poor little Jane. They hate Jane and Jane hates them to.

One time when John, her cousin throw books on Jane and punch her, Jane doesn’t stand it any more. She starts to take back at him and make resistance. Her aunt Mrs Reed became so angry that she sent Jane up to the red room. That was the room where Jane’s uncle had died. After many ours in the red room Jane got sick. She thought that she had seen her uncle’s ghost. When Jane woke up from her illness her doctor was there by her side. Jane and the doctor talked for a while and the found out that it would be better for Jane to be sent away to a school. Mrs Reed agreed of that because she hated Jane so much and didn’t want to se her any more. Before Jane left she swore that she never would call Mrs Reed for aunt again.

The school, which is a charity school, was very strict. Jane did only get one friend there. Her name was Helen Burns. She taught Jane to not be so mad and told her to get rid of all the hate in her heart. After only one year at the school Helen died. Jane was now alone at the school. She stayed at the school for 8 years.

When Jane had finished the school she went out to found a job. She found one. Her new job was as a governess for a little girl called Adele. After some weeks she finally met the master of the house, Mr Rochester. He had been abroad and was finally home again. Mr Rochester and Jane seemed to have a very good eye to each other from the very first beginning. Jane develops an attraction to Mr Rochester but she keeps it secret. She don’t like him cause of his look, because his is not so good looking, but because of his personality. Jane soon says to her self that she can’t like him. She thinks that Mr Rochester is in love with lovely Miss Ingram. Mr Rochester and Miss Ingram spend a lot of time together and they had plans to marrying each other, but Mr Rochester understood that Miss Ingram liked him because of his money.

One day Jane receives a message about her aunt. Mrs Reed was about to dying and she wanted to talk with Jane. Jane got permission to travel back to Gateshead.

There she discovered that her cousins still didn’t like her. Jane was very nice to her aunt and talked good to her. Mrs Reed told Jane that she has an uncle in Madeira. Jane’s uncle had sent a letter to Mrs Reed when Jane was a kid. In the letter her uncle had written that he wanted Jane to come live with him and inherit all his money. Mrs Reed told Jane that she had hated Jane so much that she didn’t want her to get happy. Jane did not get mad cause of that. Just disappointed. Mrs Reed died and Jane returned to Thornsfield. When Jane came back Mr Rochester asked her if she would marry him. Jane says yes of course.

On the wedding day in the church, a lawyer and another man called Mr Mason interrupted the ceremony. They told that Mr Rochester couldn’t marry because he was already married. He was married to Bertha Mason, a mad woman who was locked up at Thornsfield. Jane found at that she couldn’t marry Mr Rochester now. She still loved him but she had to get away.

She packed her stuff and after a long time travelling, she found a house she liked. St. John, Diana and Mary who lived in the house, took Jane inside and gave her food and a bed to sleep in. Jane stayed there and St. John gave her a job as a teacher on a girl school.

6 months later, Jane and St. John found out that they were cousins. It was a letter about there dead uncle which made them found out. Jane had inherited her uncle but she was happier about the fact that she had relatives. She shared the money equal with her cousins.

St. John asked her if she would marry him but she turned him down. Instead she went to find Mr Rochester. Jane still loved him. She found him. He had been trough an accident so he had lost one arm and was blind. She didn’t care about that. She wanted him and he wanted her also. They got married.

Describing the persons

Jane Eyre: In the beginning of the book Jane Eyre is a young girl who has a lot of anger in her body. She is a rebellion but she is also treated very unfair. In the book she develops to a sensitive, kind-hearted woman. She doesn’t get furious so easy as she did as child. Jane is all the time in search of independence both emotional and financial.

Edward Rochester: Rochester is a supposed wealthy man, but inside he doesn’t feel so wealthy. His dark past is still following him, but he want to start over again. Unlike other people Mr Rochester doesn’t care about society status. He loved Jane for what she was. He is a man who is very nice to other people. Mr Rochester has brought Adele to his home, even though it’s not sure that she is Rochester’s daughter. That shows Mr Rochester’s good heart.

Surroundings

 Jane Eyre is surrounded bye different class in society all the time. In the beginning she lives with a rich family. The relationship in the family is not very good. The other children don’t really love their mother, and all of them are very cruel.

On the school there are bad conditions and the headmaster is an angry man. I don’t get any expression of what its like on the school other than that.

At Thornsfield it was a good environment. Almost everybody was kind to each other and the housekeepers were not badly treated at all.

Theme/message

The book shows Jane’s search for independents. She is constantly making decisions of what’s best for her independents.

In this book we see the different between social classes. The writer of the book tells that it is possible to fell in love, even when you’re in different social class.

My opinion

I chose this book because I was recommended to read it. And I didn’t get disappointed. It was easy to understand this book. I think the writer have done an excellent job. She avoids boring descriptions about people and places. That is important to me because if it’s too much description I loose interest.

The author has made up many different personalities, which is a good thing. The book was interesting and I liked it because of the good story. It was not very predictable story either.

I’m now getting use to like books I read. Usually I always think that the book I’m going to read is boring but it always turned out to be pretty good.