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The Floating Press - Charlotte Brontë

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397 pages

English

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Jane Eyre is raised in her aunt's house after the death of her parents. Her aunt cannot stand the queer, quiet child and sends her off to a spartan boarding school where she is severely mistreated. She survives, however, and eventually finds herself a situation as a governess in the household of Edward Rochester. She and Rochester fall passionately in love, in one of the great literary love stories. But a dark secret in his house will tear them apart and send her alone into the wilderness before she can find her way back to him.

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Publié par	The Floating Press
Date de parution	01 janvier 2009
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781877527456
Langue	English

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0200€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

Extrait

JANE EYRE
* * *
CHARLOTTE BRONTE

*

Jane Eyre First published in 1847.
ISBN 978-1-877527-45-6
© 2008 THE FLOATING PRESS.
While every effort has been used to ensure the accuracy and reliability of the information contained in The Floating Press edition of this book, The Floating Press does not assume liability or responsibility for any errors or omissions in this book. The Floating Press does not accept responsibility for loss suffered as a result of reliance upon the accuracy or currency of information contained in this book. Do not use while operating a motor vehicle or heavy equipment. Many suitcases look alike.
Visit www.thefloatingpress.com
Contents
*
Preface Note to the Third Edition Chapter I Chapter II Chapter III Chapter IV Chapter V Chapter VI Chapter VII Chapter VIII Chapter IX Chapter X Chapter XI Chapter XII Chapter XIII Chapter XIV Chapter XV Chapter XVI Chapter XVII Chapter XVIII Chapter XIX Chapter XX Chapter XXI Chapter XXII Chapter XXIII Chapter XXIV Chapter XXV Chapter XXVI Chapter XXVII Chapter XXVIII Chapter XXIX Chapter XXX Chapter XXXI Chapter XXXII Chapter XXXIII Chapter XXXIV Chapter XXXV Chapter XXXVI Chapter XXXVII Chapter XXXVIII - Conclusion
Preface
*
A preface to the first edition of "Jane Eyre" being unnecessary,I gave none: this second edition demands a few words both ofacknowledgment and miscellaneous remark.
My thanks are due in three quarters.
To the Public, for the indulgent ear it has inclined to a plaintale with few pretensions.
To the Press, for the fair field its honest suffrage has opened toan obscure aspirant.
To my Publishers, for the aid their tact, their energy, theirpractical sense and frank liberality have afforded an unknown andunrecommended Author.
The Press and the Public are but vague personifications for me, andI must thank them in vague terms; but my Publishers are definite:so are certain generous critics who have encouraged me as onlylarge-hearted and high-minded men know how to encourage a strugglingstranger; to them, i.e., to my Publishers and the select Reviewers,I say cordially, Gentlemen, I thank you from my heart.
Having thus acknowledged what I owe those who have aided and approvedme, I turn to another class; a small one, so far as I know, butnot, therefore, to be overlooked. I mean the timorous or carpingfew who doubt the tendency of such books as "Jane Eyre:" in whoseeyes whatever is unusual is wrong; whose ears detect in each protestagainst bigotry — that parent of crime — an insult to piety, thatregent of God on earth. I would suggest to such doubters certainobvious distinctions; I would remind them of certain simple truths.
Conventionality is not morality. Self-righteousness is not religion.To attack the first is not to assail the last. To pluck the maskfrom the face of the Pharisee, is not to lift an impious hand tothe Crown of Thorns.
These things and deeds are diametrically opposed: they areas distinct as is vice from virtue. Men too often confound them:they should not be confounded: appearance should not be mistakenfor truth; narrow human doctrines, that only tend to elate andmagnify a few, should not be substituted for the world-redeemingcreed of Christ. There is — I repeat it — a difference; and itis a good, and not a bad action to mark broadly and clearly theline of separation between them.
The world may not like to see these ideas dissevered, for it has beenaccustomed to blend them; finding it convenient to make externalshow pass for sterling worth — to let white-washed walls vouch forclean shrines. It may hate him who dares to scrutinise and expose— to rase the gilding, and show base metal under it — to penetratethe sepulchre, and reveal charnel relics: but hate as it will, itis indebted to him.
Ahab did not like Micaiah, because he never prophesied good concerninghim, but evil; probably he liked the sycophant son of Chenaannahbetter; yet might Ahab have escaped a bloody death, had he butstopped his ears to flattery, and opened them to faithful counsel.
There is a man in our own days whose words are not framed to tickledelicate ears: who, to my thinking, comes before the great onesof society, much as the son of Imlah came before the throned Kingsof Judah and Israel; and who speaks truth as deep, with a poweras prophet-like and as vital — a mien as dauntless and as daring.Is the satirist of "Vanity Fair" admired in high places? I cannottell; but I think if some of those amongst whom he hurls the Greekfire of his sarcasm, and over whom he flashes the levin-brandof his denunciation, were to take his warnings in time — they ortheir seed might yet escape a fatal Rimoth-Gilead.
Why have I alluded to this man? I have alluded to him, Reader,because I think I see in him an intellect profounder and more uniquethan his contemporaries have yet recognised; because I regard himas the first social regenerator of the day — as the very masterof that working corps who would restore to rectitude the warpedsystem of things; because I think no commentator on his writingshas yet found the comparison that suits him, the terms which rightlycharacterise his talent. They say he is like Fielding: they talkof his wit, humour, comic powers. He resembles Fielding as an eagledoes a vulture: Fielding could stoop on carrion, but Thackeraynever does. His wit is bright, his humour attractive, but bothbear the same relation to his serious genius that the mere lambentsheet-lightning playing under the edge of the summer-cloud does tothe electric death-spark hid in its womb. Finally, I have alludedto Mr. Thackeray, because to him — if he will accept the tributeof a total stranger — I have dedicated this second edition of"JANE EYRE."
CURRER BELL.
December 21st, 1847.
Note to the Third Edition
*
I avail myself of the opportunity which a third edition of "JaneEyre" affords me, of again addressing a word to the Public, toexplain that my claim to the title of novelist rests on this onework alone. If, therefore, the authorship of other works of fictionhas been attributed to me, an honour is awarded where it is notmerited; and consequently, denied where it is justly due.
This explanation will serve to rectify mistakes which may alreadyhave been made, and to prevent future errors.
CURRER BELL.
April 13th, 1848.
Chapter I
*
There was no possibility of taking a walk that day. We hadbeen wandering, indeed, in the leafless shrubbery an hour in themorning; but since dinner (Mrs. Reed, when there was no company,dined early) the cold winter wind had brought with it clouds sosombre, and a rain so penetrating, that further out-door exercisewas now out of the question.
I was glad of it: I never liked long walks, especially on chillyafternoons: dreadful to me was the coming home in the raw twilight,with nipped fingers and toes, and a heart saddened by the chidingsof Bessie, the nurse, and humbled by the consciousness of my physicalinferiority to Eliza, John, and Georgiana Reed.
The said Eliza, John, and Georgiana were now clustered roundtheir mama in the drawing-room: she lay reclined on a sofa by thefireside, and with her darlings about her (for the time neitherquarrelling nor crying) looked perfectly happy. Me, she haddispensed from joining the group; saying, "She regretted to beunder the necessity of keeping me at a distance; but that untilshe heard from Bessie, and could discover by her own observation,that I was endeavouring in good earnest to acquire a more sociableand childlike disposition, a more attractive and sprightly manner— something lighter, franker, more natural, as it were — shereally must exclude me from privileges intended only for contented,happy, little children."
"What does Bessie say I have done?" I asked.
"Jane, I don't like cavillers or questioners; besides, there issomething truly forbidding in a child taking up her elders in thatmanner. Be seated somewhere; and until you can speak pleasantly,remain silent."
A breakfast-room adjoined the drawing-room, I slipped in there. Itcontained a bookcase: I soon possessed myself of a volume, takingcare that it should be one stored with pictures. I mounted intothe window-seat: gathering up my feet, I sat cross-legged, likea Turk; and, having drawn the red moreen curtain nearly close, Iwas shrined in double retirement.
Folds of scarlet drapery shut in my view to the right hand; to theleft were the clear panes of glass, protecting, but not separatingme from the drear November day. At intervals, while turning overthe leaves of my book, I studied the aspect of that winter afternoon.Afar, it offered a pale blank of mist and cloud; near a scene ofwet lawn and storm-beat shrub, with ceaseless rain sweeping awaywildly before a long and lamentable blast.
I returned to my book — Bewick's History of British Birds: theletterpress thereof I cared little for, generally speaking; andyet there were certain introductory pages that, child as I was, Icould not pass quite as a blank. They were those which treat ofthe haunts of sea-fowl; of "the solitary rocks and promontories"by them only inhabited; of the coast of Norway, studded with islesfrom its southern extremity, the Lindeness, or Naze, to the North Cape -
"Where the Northern Ocean, in vast whirls,Boils round the naked, melancholy islesOf farthest Thule; and the Atlantic surgePours in among the stormy Hebrides."
Nor could I pass unnoticed the suggestion of the bleak shores ofLapland, Siberia, Spitzbergen, Nova Zembla, Iceland, Greenland,with "the vast sweep of the Arctic Zone, and those forlorn regionsof dreary space, — that reservoir of frost and snow, where firmfields of ice, the accumulation of centuries of winters, glazedin Alpine heights above heights, surround the pole, and concentrethe multiplied rigours of extreme cold." Of these death-white realmsI formed an idea of my own: shadowy, like all the half-comprehendednotions that float dim through children's brains, but strangelyimpressive. The words in these introductory pages connectedth