Villette (Penguin Classics)

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a b Griesinger, Emily (Autumn 2008). "Charlotte Bronte's Religion: Faith, Feminism, and Jane Eyre". Christianity and Literature. 58 (1): 29–59. doi: 10.1177/014833310805800103. Charlotte Brontë and Defensive Conduct: The Author and the Body at Risk, Janet Gezari, University of Pennsylvania Press, 1992

Miller, Elaine (1989). Reclaiming Lesbians in History 1840-1985 (1sted.). London: The Women's Press. p.36. ISBN 0-7043-4175-1. The metaphors of storms and shadows occur over and over throughout the narrative, reflecting Lucy’s inner world as it describes the outer setting. The stormy nights are the ones in which new discoveries are made, new secrets come to light, and when she must internally struggle with herself and her life’s path. Potter, Dawn (Summer 2010). "Inventing Charlotte Brontë". The Sewanee Review. 118 (3): 393–399. doi: 10.1353/sew.2010.0014. S2CID 161213323. To not hide from who I am, but to allow it into the light. To be open to the potential of new discoveries, and embracing — not hiding from — the fear and trepidation that accompanies each revelation

Charlotte Brontë Poetry

My expectations, however, are very subdued—very different, I dare say, to what yourswere before you were married. Care and Fear stand so close to Hope, I sometimes scarcely can see her for the shadow they cast. And yet I am thankful too, and the doubtful future must be left with Providence. And then slowly, almost unconsciously, there grows up the real affinity, the love “venturing diffidently into life after long acquaintance, furnace-tried by pain, stamped by constancy.” The whole experience is life itself, as a woman’s heart can feel and make it. Lane, Margaret (1953). The Brontë Story: a reconsideration of Mrs. Gaskell's Life of Charlotte Brontë. Words so desolately, bitterly true were never penned till the spirit that conceived them had itself drunk to the lees the cup of lonely pain. The Bronte Sisters – A True Likeness? – Photo of Charlotte Bronte". brontesisters.co.uk . Retrieved 6 September 2017.

Those veiled and agonized passages of Shirley are all that she will tell the world of woes that are not wholly her own. But of her personal suffering, physical and mental, she is mistress, and she has turned it to poignant and lasting profit in the misery of Lucy Snowe. The focus of the book lies primarily with the development of Lucy’s character. Because I had read Lyndall Gordon’s amazing biography of Charlotte beforehand, I felt prepared for Villette. After the various visits and excitements of the summer Charlotte tried to make progress with the new story, during the loneliness of the autumn at Haworth. But Haworth in those days seems to have been a poisoned place. A kind of low fever—influenza—feverish cold—were the constant plagues of the parsonage and its inmates.

The novel retains many gothic elements: far-fetched coincidences, ghosts and dream-like sequences, which contend with its prevailing realism. Its predominantly sombre mood is intensified rather than lightened, by moments of bleak humour. These contradictions, which made it unsatisfactory for many Victorian readers, are precisely what make it so appealing to many twentieth century ones. As a rule, so far, women have been poets in and through the novel-Cowper-like poets of the common life like Miss Austen, or Mrs. Gaskell, or Mrs. Oliphant; Lucretian or Virgilian observers of the many-colored web like George Eliot, or, in some phases, George Sand; romantic or lyrical artists like George Sand again, or like Charlotte and Emily Brontë. Here no one questions their citizenship; no one is astonished by the place they hold; they are here among the recognized “masters of those who know.” Magnificent-minded, grand-hearted, dear faulty little man!” It may be true as Mr. Leslie Stephen contends, that—in spite of his relation to the veritable M. Héger—there are in him elements of femininity, that he is not all male. But he is none the less man and living, for that; the same may be said of many of his real brethren. Maye, Brian. "Understanding Emily Brontë: 'Stronger than a man, simpler than a child' ". The Irish Times . Retrieved 6 June 2021.

Charlotte and Emily's Belgian essays, juvenilia The History of the Year and Tales of the Islanders, her Preface to Wuthering Heights. The Crimes of Charlotte Brontë by James Tully is a (very) speculative novel about sinister goings-on in the family. Adaptations Both Villette and Jane Eyre resonate with me because I am still defining myself and finding my place in the world, just as Charlotte was and just as her heroines strive to do. Allison, SP; Lobo, DN (10 February 2019). "The death of Charlotte Brontë from hyperemesis gravidarum and refeeding syndrome: A new perspective". Clinical Nutrition (Edinburgh, Scotland). 39 (1): 304–305. doi: 10.1016/j.clnu.2019.01.027. PMID 30777294. S2CID 73468434. Perhaps with slips of him you might light an occasional cigar—or you might remember to lose him some day—and a Cornhill functionary would gather him up and consign him to the repositories of waste paper, and thus he would prematurely find his way to the ‘butterman’ and trunkmakers.A Plaque is Unveiled in Brussels to Commemorate the Stay of Charlotte and Emily Brontë at the Pensionnat Heger". Brontë Society Transactions. Taylor & Francis. 17 (5): 371–374. 1980. doi: 10.1179/030977680796471592.

It is as poets then, in the larger sense, and as poets of passion, properly so-called—that is, of exalted and transfiguring feeling—that writers like George Meredith, and George Sand, and Charlotte Brontë affect the world, and live in its memory. Never was Charlotte Brontë better served by this great gift of poetic vision than in Villette—never indeed so well. The style of the book throughout has felt the kindling and transforming influence. The rival lamps were dying: she held her course like a white fate. Drum, trumpet, bugle, had uttered their clangour, and were forgotten; with pencil-ray she wrote on heaven and on earth records for archives everlasting.”

Like her sisters, taken from life in its prime

You kindly propose to take The Professor into custody. Ah—no! His modest merit shrinks at the thought of going alone and unbefriended to a spirited publisher.