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Review: Jane Eyre
Feb. 5th, 2009 11:18 pmAs I noted before, Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre is surprisingly gripping for a book from the mid 1800's. There were many surprises and a lot of suspense.
It's also a horror tale. You've got some sort of mysterious evil presence and also a fortune teller. Not to mention some really scary bad guys.
It's also a romance, in that period when romance (or at least marriage) was of supreme importance, which makes it all the more exciting. It reminded me of Jane Austin and Georgette Heyer romances in that way: two weirdos go together nicely. My favorite part is that it explains perfectly why the right guy was the right choice in a way that is easy to generalize, basically the same moral as in Accidental Tourist: Pick someone it is easy to be with and around whom you like yourself.
It's also kind of an odd slow-motion thriller due to the sort of slow-action weapons in use such as verbal abuse, burnt gruel, and religious sermons. There are these long races against time such as whether someone will be able to escape starvation and whether one person will happen to outlive another.
The sentences are well crafted, the reasoning behind what the narrator does is perfectly clear, reality really jumps out, and the author even made me laugh out loud a few times.
The thing is, it's just so depressing. The good news is generally mixed with the bad news, sort of like how in the 1940s World War II came along to end the Great Depression. Yea? And the bad news is pretty much just bad news. At first I thought I could recommend just skipping the first nine chapters if you don't like seemingly hopelessly depressing scenarios, but, well, there's really no escape. (Still, if you don't like the first few chapters, do skip to chapter 10 and read that and chapter 11 before giving up.)
The fact that the story is written in the past tense implies that the narrator, at least, manages to survive whatever terrible experiences you're reading about at the time. Though who knows if she's writing it from her deathbed at age 23 with her pencil in her teeth because her hands don't work?
All in all, it was riveting and I didn't want to put it down, though there were several passages I didn't want to be happening. I had definite opinions about what our narrator should be doing at various points and was always curious to see what she would do and what would happen next. It was fun going back and forth between thinking she might be dumb and thinking she might just have very few choices in that particular culture.
However, I don't think I will be reading this book again. I think it will stick with me much better than most books, but I don't need to experience it again (sort of like "Saving Private Ryan"). Yes, it's good, but there's too much unpleasantness for my taste. Four stars out of five.
Warning: I'm not going to be so careful about spoilers in any comments.
It's also a horror tale. You've got some sort of mysterious evil presence and also a fortune teller. Not to mention some really scary bad guys.
It's also a romance, in that period when romance (or at least marriage) was of supreme importance, which makes it all the more exciting. It reminded me of Jane Austin and Georgette Heyer romances in that way: two weirdos go together nicely. My favorite part is that it explains perfectly why the right guy was the right choice in a way that is easy to generalize, basically the same moral as in Accidental Tourist: Pick someone it is easy to be with and around whom you like yourself.
It's also kind of an odd slow-motion thriller due to the sort of slow-action weapons in use such as verbal abuse, burnt gruel, and religious sermons. There are these long races against time such as whether someone will be able to escape starvation and whether one person will happen to outlive another.
The sentences are well crafted, the reasoning behind what the narrator does is perfectly clear, reality really jumps out, and the author even made me laugh out loud a few times.
The thing is, it's just so depressing. The good news is generally mixed with the bad news, sort of like how in the 1940s World War II came along to end the Great Depression. Yea? And the bad news is pretty much just bad news. At first I thought I could recommend just skipping the first nine chapters if you don't like seemingly hopelessly depressing scenarios, but, well, there's really no escape. (Still, if you don't like the first few chapters, do skip to chapter 10 and read that and chapter 11 before giving up.)
The fact that the story is written in the past tense implies that the narrator, at least, manages to survive whatever terrible experiences you're reading about at the time. Though who knows if she's writing it from her deathbed at age 23 with her pencil in her teeth because her hands don't work?
All in all, it was riveting and I didn't want to put it down, though there were several passages I didn't want to be happening. I had definite opinions about what our narrator should be doing at various points and was always curious to see what she would do and what would happen next. It was fun going back and forth between thinking she might be dumb and thinking she might just have very few choices in that particular culture.
However, I don't think I will be reading this book again. I think it will stick with me much better than most books, but I don't need to experience it again (sort of like "Saving Private Ryan"). Yes, it's good, but there's too much unpleasantness for my taste. Four stars out of five.
Warning: I'm not going to be so careful about spoilers in any comments.