by Charlotte Bronte
"I felt an inexpressible relief, a soothing conviction of protection and security, when I knew that there was a stranger in the room, an individual not beloning to Gatehead, and not related to Mrs. Reed" (18).
"...[I]t is weak and silly to say you cannot bear what it is your fate to be required to bear" (56).
"Presentiments are strange things! and so are sympathies; and so are signs: and the three combined make one mystery to which humanity has not yet found the key" (223).
"In leaving England, I should leave a loved but empty land--Mr. Rochester is not there: and if he were, what is, what can that ever be to me? My business is to live without him now: nothing so absurd, so weak as to drag on from day to day, as if I were waiting some impossible change in circumstances, which might reunite me to him. Of course, [...] I must seek another interest in life to replace the one lost..." (411).
Notes: I remember everyone hating his book in school. I never had to read it. It is not without fault, quite clearly, starting with trite and confined narration. But there is charm to it still... I didn't begin hating it until after Jane and Rochester were engaged, though I knew little would become of such a happy ending only half way through such a tome. I feel all the characters were flat, speaking as though on stage. But, because of that, I enjoyed Jane's non-feminine, non-realistic confidence. I enjoyed her suffering when she believed Rochester was to marry another. I hoped it would have kept that tension, Rochester marrying another and Jane brood over it on a daily basis. Overall, I liked it but felt it lacked depth and strong character representations like that of ol' sis' Wuthering Heights. Now we will see if the story comes across any better in Wide Sargasso Sea. Next up.
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