Jane Eyre

by Charlotte Bronte

Stevie Davies (Editor), Michael Mason (Introduction), and Coralie Bickford-Smith (Illustrator)

Part of Penguin's beautiful hardback Clothbound Classics series, designed by the award-winning Coralie Bickford-Smith, these delectable and collectible editions are bound in high-quality colourful, tactile cloth with foil stamped into the design.

Charlotte Brontë's first published novel, Jane Eyre was immediately recognised as a work of genius when it appeared in 1847. Orphaned into the household of her Aunt Reed at Gateshead, subject to the cruel regime at Lowood charity school, Jane Eyre nonetheless emerges unbroken in spirit and integrity. How she takes up the post of governess at Thornfield Hall, meets and loves Mr Rochester and discovers the impediment to their lawful marriage are elements in a story that transcends melodrama to portray a woman's passionate search for a wider and richer life than that traditionally accorded to her sex in Victorian society.

• ISBN10: 0141040386
• ISBN13: 9780141040387
• Publish Date: 6 November 2008 (first published 16 October 1847)
• Publish Status: Active
• Out of Print: 26 April 2023
• Publish Country: GB
• Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd
• Imprint: Penguin Classics
• Format: Hardcover
• Pages: 624
• Language: English
• URL: https://penguinrandomhouse.ca/books/isbn/9780141040387

Reviews

[pamela]

Rochester abuses mentally ill wife. Jane complains a lot.

[wyvernfriend]

This was an interesting read. As a teenager I read this several times but what I didn't know at the time, I was reading a condensed version of the story. I also had some trepidation about re-reading the story as I have re-read some other teenage favourites and wondered why I liked them in the first place.

But this was interesting, the love story of a young governess is well known, the problems she has in finding love are involved an interesting. I really did enjoy the insight it gave me into the life of the period and the role of a governess of the time. Of course it's helped by the fact that I read a few books about the background in the last few years.

Jane does grow through the story, and develops as an interesting character through her trials and tribulations. As do several of the other characters in the story.

I enjoyed the experience of re-visiting my teenage years but with the longer and more involved story, I enjoyed reading some of the undercurrents that were excised in the earlier edition that I possibly wouldn't have really "got".