i remember reading jane eyre and feeling such a strong connection to the character and it reflects to me how people have always just been people no matter how much time separates us
This is one of my favorite books of all times! Jane Eyre is not afraid to speak up for herself, and defends that women should be independent and have a space for themselves besides being a wife. Thank you for this wonderful video!
This was excellent. I've never heard anyone sum up my feelings on Jane Eyre so well. I know people who absolutely hate Mr. Rochester, and the reasons they hate him aren't actually bad, which is why I often struggle to defend my fondness of him. But the reason I can't let go of him is that the things he loves about Jane are actually the things everyone else *hates* about her. She's too opinionated and angry? He loves that (and majorly gets off on it, too). She's too quiet at other times? He loves that. She's too plain? He loves how she looks, which is different from just thinking she's beautiful. It's like Charlotte Bronte is sending a message to us: "You know those traits everyone else tells you to squash, to repress and remove from your being? One day, you will meet someone who loves you not in spite of those things, but BECAUSE of them." From what I've learned about her life, she may have needed to hear that message herself.
Jane Eyre is my favorite book. When you alluded to a the famous quote, I thought you might be thinking of this one, which I think summarizes her as a character and the conflict of the book as a whole: "I care for myself. The more solitary, the more friendless, the more unsustained I am, the more I will respect myself[...] I will hold to the principles received by me when I was sane, and not mad--as I am now. Laws and principles are not for the times when there is no temptation: they are for such moments as this, when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigour; stringent are they; inviolate they shall be. If at my individual convenience I might break them, what would be their worth? They have a worth--so I have always believed." I also thought it was interesting how you characterized the love between Jane and Edward -- I don't know if I agree with it. I wouldn't call it brutal or harsh; I would say that for the first time, Jane has found someone that truly "matches her freak." She's an odd person that has always felt alienated; on the day they meet, Edward comments on Jane's strange drawings, asks her where her little elf friends are, accuses her of bewitching his horse, etc., but she keeps up with him. I think it's the first time he's able to talk that way and not have others recoil from him. I think that's the basis of their love; his morbid, passionate nature complements her discipline and self-respect, and they meet in their alienation from the world.
I'm firmly in the Stella Gibbons "Cold Comfort Farm" camp, myself, but this was very interesting and enjoyable, and much more informative than I expected.
@@GlutenbergBible it took 18+ years to complete. At age of 14 I accidently saw this novel in library. I didn`t know what is that. I just glanced it over and this moment mid age lady that was working there despisesingly said: "Come on it`s not for boys". Still can`t understand why I follow her "advise", but I didn`t take Jane Eyre that day. Stupid cliche from born and raised in Soviet Union woman, obviously it didn`t hurt mentally, it didn`t womanized etc. Only in October 2024 I suddenly remember that moment and realised its time complete this novel. After 18 years of hiatus it tooks only 2 weeks. I am not ashamed to say Jane Eyre forever will be part of my life. Symbolically, according to wiki originally Jane Eyre was pusblished in October. Thank you for video again.
I read Jane Eyre this last January and love it so much. You are saying almost all of the things I love about this book. Thanks for this video, it's an excellent discussion on the book 😊
Thanks for watching! If you're a fan of Jane Eyre I have a podcast recommendation, the Hot & Bothered podcast. You'll have to scroll back a while to find the episodes, but they did a whole series they called "On Eyre" reading through Jane Eyre a couple chapters at a time, talking in depth and interviewing academics - I really enjoyed it!
This was wonderful, thank you. I have read Jane Eyre several times but you’ve made me want to pick it up again. I’ve not read anything about the Brontes’ lives, so those details were fascinating. I love lots of classics, but the first one I loved was Wuthering Heights which I read at school. In my twenties, I fell in love with Jane Austen’s work, despite hating Emma at school, which I now adore (read at the same time as Wuthering Heights so clearly my teenage self preferred the gothic drama to the regency romance!). Pride and Prejudice remains my absolute favourite classic which I could read over and over again and I’m sure I’d find something new each time. Great video!
I hated the first Jane Austen novel I read for school, Persuasion! And now I love it. I think a lot of Austen’s wit and cleverness just flew over my head when I was 17. But that’s the fun of returning to classics when you’re a bit older, or just in a different point in life!
Love love love Jane Eyre - when I moved abroad and had to (very sadly) significantly downsize my collection, my battered copy of Jane Eyre was the first book I packed! Really enjoyed this video and am loving your channel after happening upon your bourbon refill on instagram 😆
Hey there! This was fun to watch, thanks. What’s more fun that reading books? Talking about them lol. Jane Eyre is not my favorite but I do appreciate it’s brilliance. I am more a fan of Wuthering Heights which I have come to see as a book about Nelly more than anything and her love for people who treat her as a servant and not part of the family.
I love the idea of focusing on Nelly! I feel like in Wuthering Heights and in Frankenstein, it's easy to forget that it's a frame narrative, and that we're getting the main story translated through someone else's perspective and memory, but that adds such a fascinating element to it.
I love Jane Eyre. But if I had to pick a single, favorite work of classic literature, the competition is tough. I assume, for the context, we mean classic novels preceding the 20th century. Dead Souls by Nikolai Gogol is high on my list. The Idiot, by Dostoyevsky, as well as Brothers Karamazov both also sit high on the list for me. (Demons was really interesting and I loved reading it, but the reason I read it was because a novel by Heimito von Doderer prompted me to, and Doderer's novel I think is even better; Crime and Punishment is excellent, but it is at the bottom of a list of Dostoyevsky for me). I used to say my favorite Dickens novel was Bleak House, followed by Dombey & Son, then by Little Dorritt, then by Our Mutual Friend, then by David Copperfield; recently however I think David Copperfield jumped ahead of the other Dickens novels. I had an interesting conversation with someone in a bookstore (I live in Phoenix AZ, she was visiting from Ohio for the Winter). She asked me if I had to choose my last book to read - my death-bed read as I reworded it to her - what would I choose? I immediately knew I would want it to be a book which captured the full scope and drama of humanity and human life. Books like War & Peace and Les Miserables and Don Quixote came to mind. At the time, David Copperfield won out. An actively reading human being probably reads more than ten thousand works of literature if they live long enough, and if they are posed Ohio lady's deathbed question: Of all the books you have read in your life, which would you choose to be the last one you read? Or, possibly, the one you are found dead having been in the middle of? The book they select I think is a strong candidate for being their favorite book. David Copperfield, War & Peace, Les Miserables, Jane Eyre. . . . There is a very good reason books like this end up having "classic" status; it's that all-encompassing sense of humanity they share which compelled Wordsworth to spend his whole life studying Milton's Paradise Lost . . . you know? I think you do know. The "text" of Paradise Lost "took on new meanings," as you say about classics, for Wordsworth, who saw himself as the Miltonic heir. Picking a favorite classic: that is hard; that is tough; it is like you yourself said: it's pitting favorites against favorites; it is pitting them against each other. It would have to result in a competition resembling social theorist hijackings of Darwinian theory. Let's say mine is Miserables and stick with it. This declaration does not come lightly; it comes at the sacrifice of the likes of Gaskell's "Mary Barton," of "Jane Eyre" and "Villette," and of Austen's "Emma," and of "A Simple Story" by Elizabeth Inchbald. It comes at the sacrifice of "Lost Illusions" by Balzac - which is not an easy decision. But I do think it is the right choice for me. It comes at the inevitable, sinful lower grading of Don Quixote and Anna Karenina and War & Peace. But at those losses, let's say my favorite classic novel is Les Miserables. If you ever should so choose to change your mind on the matter of reading literary studies of your favorite book, one you would probably get a lot out of is a book actually titled "The Madwoman in the Attic" (you're probably aware of it, given your academic background and the fact that you self-identify as a madwoman in an attic). The book is a late-1970's critical study of female English authors in the 19th century. The book is divided into six parts and a preface. The fourth part is entirely dedicated to Charlotte Bronte and consists of four chapters, the second of which is entirely devoted to the novel Jane Eyre. "The Madwoman in the Attic" is among the best works of literary studies published in the 1970's, 2nd perhaps only to the by-then seasoned M.H. Abrams and his book "Natural Supernaturalism." In addition, "Madwoman in the Attic" may very well be the greatest feminist work of literary criticism yet to be published. It's closest contender, Elaine Showalter's "A Jury of Her Peers" is good, but nowhere near as good as "Madwoman in the Attic". There is also the excellent essay on the Bronte sisters from Elizabeth Hardwick's 1974 book, "Seduction and Betrayal."
I'm planning to reread JA and dive into this lonely melancholic story of self search ❤ Although I don't think Jane was ugly. She is described as plane, which is ordinary. Back in days having plane daughters was almost a crime because no one wanted marry them
i remember reading jane eyre and feeling such a strong connection to the character and it reflects to me how people have always just been people no matter how much time separates us
This is one of my favorite books of all times! Jane Eyre is not afraid to speak up for herself, and defends that women should be independent and have a space for themselves besides being a wife. Thank you for this wonderful video!
This was excellent. I've never heard anyone sum up my feelings on Jane Eyre so well. I know people who absolutely hate Mr. Rochester, and the reasons they hate him aren't actually bad, which is why I often struggle to defend my fondness of him. But the reason I can't let go of him is that the things he loves about Jane are actually the things everyone else *hates* about her. She's too opinionated and angry? He loves that (and majorly gets off on it, too). She's too quiet at other times? He loves that. She's too plain? He loves how she looks, which is different from just thinking she's beautiful.
It's like Charlotte Bronte is sending a message to us: "You know those traits everyone else tells you to squash, to repress and remove from your being? One day, you will meet someone who loves you not in spite of those things, but BECAUSE of them." From what I've learned about her life, she may have needed to hear that message herself.
Jane Eyre is my favorite book. When you alluded to a the famous quote, I thought you might be thinking of this one, which I think summarizes her as a character and the conflict of the book as a whole:
"I care for myself. The more solitary, the more friendless, the more unsustained I am, the more I will respect myself[...] I will hold to the principles received by me when I was sane, and not mad--as I am now. Laws and principles are not for the times when there is no temptation: they are for such moments as this, when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigour; stringent are they; inviolate they shall be. If at my individual convenience I might break them, what would be their worth? They have a worth--so I have always believed."
I also thought it was interesting how you characterized the love between Jane and Edward -- I don't know if I agree with it. I wouldn't call it brutal or harsh; I would say that for the first time, Jane has found someone that truly "matches her freak." She's an odd person that has always felt alienated; on the day they meet, Edward comments on Jane's strange drawings, asks her where her little elf friends are, accuses her of bewitching his horse, etc., but she keeps up with him. I think it's the first time he's able to talk that way and not have others recoil from him. I think that's the basis of their love; his morbid, passionate nature complements her discipline and self-respect, and they meet in their alienation from the world.
I enjoyed this so much. I'm so glad you have started a channel, and look forward to more. Exactly what I was hoping to find.
I'm firmly in the Stella Gibbons "Cold Comfort Farm" camp, myself, but this was very interesting and enjoyable, and much more informative than I expected.
Jane is so mentally strong, honest, even innocent. You started to support her from first novel`s paragraph
Yes, I so agree! But even though there's that innocence, there's such a toughness and prickliness to her as well, I love it.
@@GlutenbergBible
it took 18+ years to complete.
At age of 14 I accidently saw this novel in library. I didn`t know what is that. I just glanced it over and this moment mid age lady that was working there despisesingly said: "Come on it`s not for boys". Still can`t understand why I follow her "advise", but I didn`t take Jane Eyre that day. Stupid cliche from born and raised in Soviet Union woman, obviously it didn`t hurt mentally, it didn`t womanized etc.
Only in October 2024 I suddenly remember that moment and realised its time complete this novel. After 18 years of hiatus it tooks only 2 weeks. I am not ashamed to say Jane Eyre forever will be part of my life.
Symbolically, according to wiki originally Jane Eyre was pusblished in October. Thank you for video again.
I read Jane Eyre this last January and love it so much. You are saying almost all of the things I love about this book. Thanks for this video, it's an excellent discussion on the book 😊
Thanks for watching! If you're a fan of Jane Eyre I have a podcast recommendation, the Hot & Bothered podcast. You'll have to scroll back a while to find the episodes, but they did a whole series they called "On Eyre" reading through Jane Eyre a couple chapters at a time, talking in depth and interviewing academics - I really enjoyed it!
@@GlutenbergBible Excellent, I will check that out, for sure.
This was wonderful, thank you. I have read Jane Eyre several times but you’ve made me want to pick it up again. I’ve not read anything about the Brontes’ lives, so those details were fascinating. I love lots of classics, but the first one I loved was Wuthering Heights which I read at school. In my twenties, I fell in love with Jane Austen’s work, despite hating Emma at school, which I now adore (read at the same time as Wuthering Heights so clearly my teenage self preferred the gothic drama to the regency romance!). Pride and Prejudice remains my absolute favourite classic which I could read over and over again and I’m sure I’d find something new each time. Great video!
I hated the first Jane Austen novel I read for school, Persuasion! And now I love it. I think a lot of Austen’s wit and cleverness just flew over my head when I was 17. But that’s the fun of returning to classics when you’re a bit older, or just in a different point in life!
Love love love Jane Eyre - when I moved abroad and had to (very sadly) significantly downsize my collection, my battered copy of Jane Eyre was the first book I packed! Really enjoyed this video and am loving your channel after happening upon your bourbon refill on instagram 😆
Have you read The Woman in White by Wilkie Collin’s? I just finished it and really enjoyed the story.
Hey there! This was fun to watch, thanks. What’s more fun that reading books? Talking about them lol. Jane Eyre is not my favorite but I do appreciate it’s brilliance. I am more a fan of Wuthering Heights which I have come to see as a book about Nelly more than anything and her love for people who treat her as a servant and not part of the family.
I love the idea of focusing on Nelly! I feel like in Wuthering Heights and in Frankenstein, it's easy to forget that it's a frame narrative, and that we're getting the main story translated through someone else's perspective and memory, but that adds such a fascinating element to it.
I love Jane Eyre. But if I had to pick a single, favorite work of classic literature, the competition is tough. I assume, for the context, we mean classic novels preceding the 20th century. Dead Souls by Nikolai Gogol is high on my list. The Idiot, by Dostoyevsky, as well as Brothers Karamazov both also sit high on the list for me. (Demons was really interesting and I loved reading it, but the reason I read it was because a novel by Heimito von Doderer prompted me to, and Doderer's novel I think is even better; Crime and Punishment is excellent, but it is at the bottom of a list of Dostoyevsky for me).
I used to say my favorite Dickens novel was Bleak House, followed by Dombey & Son, then by Little Dorritt, then by Our Mutual Friend, then by David Copperfield; recently however I think David Copperfield jumped ahead of the other Dickens novels.
I had an interesting conversation with someone in a bookstore (I live in Phoenix AZ, she was visiting from Ohio for the Winter). She asked me if I had to choose my last book to read - my death-bed read as I reworded it to her - what would I choose? I immediately knew I would want it to be a book which captured the full scope and drama of humanity and human life. Books like War & Peace and Les Miserables and Don Quixote came to mind. At the time, David Copperfield won out.
An actively reading human being probably reads more than ten thousand works of literature if they live long enough, and if they are posed Ohio lady's deathbed question: Of all the books you have read in your life, which would you choose to be the last one you read? Or, possibly, the one you are found dead having been in the middle of? The book they select I think is a strong candidate for being their favorite book.
David Copperfield, War & Peace, Les Miserables, Jane Eyre. . . . There is a very good reason books like this end up having "classic" status; it's that all-encompassing sense of humanity they share which compelled Wordsworth to spend his whole life studying Milton's Paradise Lost . . . you know?
I think you do know. The "text" of Paradise Lost "took on new meanings," as you say about classics, for Wordsworth, who saw himself as the Miltonic heir.
Picking a favorite classic: that is hard; that is tough; it is like you yourself said: it's pitting favorites against favorites; it is pitting them against each other. It would have to result in a competition resembling social theorist hijackings of Darwinian theory.
Let's say mine is Miserables and stick with it. This declaration does not come lightly; it comes at the sacrifice of the likes of Gaskell's "Mary Barton," of "Jane Eyre" and "Villette," and of Austen's "Emma," and of "A Simple Story" by Elizabeth Inchbald. It comes at the sacrifice of "Lost Illusions" by Balzac - which is not an easy decision. But I do think it is the right choice for me. It comes at the inevitable, sinful lower grading of Don Quixote and Anna Karenina and War & Peace. But at those losses, let's say my favorite classic novel is Les Miserables.
If you ever should so choose to change your mind on the matter of reading literary studies of your favorite book, one you would probably get a lot out of is a book actually titled "The Madwoman in the Attic" (you're probably aware of it, given your academic background and the fact that you self-identify as a madwoman in an attic). The book is a late-1970's critical study of female English authors in the 19th century. The book is divided into six parts and a preface. The fourth part is entirely dedicated to Charlotte Bronte and consists of four chapters, the second of which is entirely devoted to the novel Jane Eyre.
"The Madwoman in the Attic" is among the best works of literary studies published in the 1970's, 2nd perhaps only to the by-then seasoned M.H. Abrams and his book "Natural Supernaturalism." In addition, "Madwoman in the Attic" may very well be the greatest feminist work of literary criticism yet to be published. It's closest contender, Elaine Showalter's "A Jury of Her Peers" is good, but nowhere near as good as "Madwoman in the Attic". There is also the excellent essay on the Bronte sisters from Elizabeth Hardwick's 1974 book, "Seduction and Betrayal."
I'm planning to reread JA and dive into this lonely melancholic story of self search ❤
Although I don't think Jane was ugly. She is described as plane, which is ordinary. Back in days having plane daughters was almost a crime because no one wanted marry them