Tag: Gothic

2012 Challenges, Books, The Classics Club

Book 157: Villette – Charlotte Brontë

Geoff W

I’m starting to get an inkling as to why Charlotte Brontë was so bent on keeping Emily and Anne’s writings out of the public eye, but I will save that pronouncement until I read more of her novels. Villette counts as my 8th (of 9) novel for the Back to the Classics challenge, is on my Classics Club list and is my final novel for the 2012 Mount TBR Reading challenge (keep an eye out for my wrap-up post).

Villette is Charlotte’s third published novel and the fourth she wrote. It is the second novel, Jane Eyre was the first, that I’ve read by Charlotte. As with all of the Brontë’s works a portion of this novel comes from Charlotte’s life and you can definitely see the influences in the themes of loneliness and even with whom Lucy Snowe falls in love with. It was an interesting read and rather long, but overall I would say I enjoyed it, but am not in love with it the way I was in love with Anne and Emily’s work. For me this would definitely change if the novel were grouped differently.

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2012 Challenges, Books, Quotes, Reading Events

Book 147: Other Voices, Other Rooms – Truman Capote

Geoff W

After putting this book off for more than a month so that it would fit within The Literary Others reading event and after it sat on my shelf since I purchased it from the 2011 Boston Book Festival I’ve finally gotten around to reading it. I’m not really sure if it was worth the build up to keep putting it off, but it was an interesting read. In addition to being a part of The Literary Others Event it also counts towards my Mount TBR Reading Challenge (23/25)!

This is only the second Capote work I’ve read and it was very different compared to In Cold Blood, which I read before I started this blog. Other Voices, Other Rooms is Capote’s first published novel and is semi-autobiographical. You can definitely see the personal influence from the effeminate young boy to the faded rich southern decadence you catch glimpses of throughout.

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Books

Book 38: Jane Eyre – Charlotte Brontë

Geoff W

I loved this novel. I didn’t think I would as so many people complain about the classics, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. I’m glad I didn’t have to read Jane Eyre in High School, I probably would have completely misjudged (also known as misunderstood) and resisted the intelligence and beauty of the novel. Now that I’ve read it, it’s made me want to read the rest of the Brontë’s works as I thoroughly enjoyed Wuthering Heights and this novel.

“No reflection was to be allowed now: not one glance was to be cast back; not even one forward. Not one thought was to be given either to the past or the future. The first was a page so heavenly sweet–so deadly sad–that to read one line of it would dissolve my courage and break down my energy. The last was an awful blank: something like the world when the deluge was gone by.”

I believe the quote above truly signifies the essence of this novel. It’s a coming of age proto-feminist novel written well before its time and I truly loved the elegance as well as the seemingly ostentatious fictional aspects of the novel. At times I almost felt like it should have been two separate novels and perhaps it was serialization and that’s why it lends itself so well to potentially multiple volumes, but I don’t know. Even though they were writing quite a few years after Jane Austen, I can’t help but compare the Brontë sisters with Jane Austen. I know the Brontë’s write in the Gothic style and Austen was more of a romantic fiction writer and perhaps it’s just they are all lumped into the British Classics, but I think there’s more to it.

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