Jane Eyre HC Charlotte Bronte Mercier Binding International Collectors Library

Description

Jane Eyre Hardcover
by Charlotte Bronte (Author)

Originally published under a pseudonym, Charlotte Brontë’s first and most popular novel is a tale of passion and principle, exploring themes of class, spirituality, and femininity. Brontë’s first-person narrative – now a common device, but then a literary revolution – puts the reader inside the mind of our heroine, Jane Eyre, whose growth from childhood to adulthood the story charts. Yet as her journey along the thorny path of life brings a degree of harmony, so appears the brooding, mysterious Mr Rochester, exacerbating life’s complications – and transforming its possibilities.

Early responses to Jane Eyre, first published in 1847, were mixed. Some held the book to be anti-Christian, others were disturbed by a heroine so proud, self-willed, and essentially unfeminine. The modern reader may well have trouble understanding what all the fuss was about. On the surface a fairly conventional Gothic romance (poor orphan governess is hired by rich, brooding Byronic hero-type), Jane Eyre hardly seems the stuff from which revolutions are made. But the story is very much about the nature of human freedom and equality, and if Jane was seen as something of a renegade in nineteenth-century England, it is because her story is that of a woman who struggles for self-definition and determination in a society that too often denies her that right. But self-determination does not mean untrammeled freedom for men or women. Rochester, that thorny masculine beast whom Jane eventually falls for, is a man who sets his own laws and manipulates the lives of those around him; before he can enter into a marriage of equals with Jane he must undergo a spiritual transformation. Should the lesson sound dry, it’s not. Jane Eyre is full of drama: fires, storms, attempted murder, and a mad wife conveniently stashed away in the attic. This is very sexy stuff – another reason Victorian critics weren’t quite sure what to make of it.

Hardcover
Publisher: International Collectors Library
Bound-in place ribbon, top edge gilt, green faux leather binding.

You know all those ‘classic’ novels you read in high school? How many of them do you actually remember? Well, if Jane Eyre was one of those long-forgotten books, pick up a copy. To read it as an adult is a joy: it’s a sweeping, disturbing, intense, thrilling, very romantic gothic love story, written in the voice of a very intense, almost claustrophobically self-aware young heroine. Jane is no Ophelia – she’s a complicated, remarkable character, and a very strong female character in a genre that usually draws women as beautiful victims at best.

There’s something for everyone in this book: Windswept castles, difficult and neurotic family members, dark secrets about tragic former lovers, good triumphing over evil, all that good juicy stuff that makes a great romantic story. What elevates Jane Eyre is Bronte’s remarkable style & skill and her sharp and complex characterizations.

Trust me on this: If you don’t remember it from your teens, you should give it a try now. Here is one novel that more than lives up to it’s ‘classic’ status.

Book is in near mint condition.

Book is in near mint condition.