Charlotte Brontë (1816-1855)

Charlotte Brontë, by George Richmond

Introduction & Lighter Reading

"Declaration of Independence." Esteemed novelist Joyce Carol Oates on Jane Eyre: "The biggest surprise in Jane Eyre is its unromantic heroine." Salon Magazine 29 Sept. 1997.

"Charlotte Brontë." The Victorian Web, ed. George Landow. Essays on Charlotte Brontë's writing techniques, themes, biography, and the Victorian cultural and historical context.

Giles, Judy. A substantial introduction to Charlotte Brontë from the Literary Encyclopedia. On Jane Eyre; On Shirley; On Villette [subscription service].

Haworth, Home of the Brontës, short article for the tourist, by Judith Fein.

The Brontes. Quite old criticism, and annoying ads, from The Cambridge History of English and American Literature in 18 Volumes (1907-21).

Alleva, Richard. Jane Eyre, movie review. On the Franco Zeffirelli version of Jane Eyre. Zeffirelli's "moderation and mousiness" distort the character created by Charlotte Brontë, the reviewer notes. Commonweal, 1 June 1996.

Literary Criticism

Farrell, John P. "A Message For Miss Eyre; or, Jane in Wonderland." Cahiers Victoriens et Edouardiens: Revue du Centre d'Etudes et de Recherches Victoriennes et Edouardiennes de Université Paul-Valéry, 8 (1979).

Hanley, Kirstin. "'A New Servitude: Pedagogy and Feminist Practice in Brontë’s Jane Eyre." On the portrayal of the woman teacher in nineteenth century fiction. Nineteenth-Century Gender Studies 5 (Winter 2009).

Hoeveler, Diane Long. "Smoke and Mirrors: Internalizing the Magic Lantern Show in Villette." Gothic Technologies, special Romantic Circles edition, Dec. 2005

Shuttleworth, Sally. Charlotte Brontë and Victorian Psychology (Cambridge UP). Introduction.

Starzyk, Lawrence J. "'The gallery of memory': The pictoral in Jane Eyre." Papers on Language and Literature, Summer 1997.

Sutherland, John. A review of two books by John Sutherland. Is Heathcliff a Murderer? Great Puzzles in Nineteenth-Century Literature / Can Jane Eyre be Happy? More Puzzles in Classic Fiction. Papers on Language and Literature, Spring 2000.

Postcolonial Jane Eyre

Kendrick, Robert. Edward Rochester and the margins of masculinity in Jane Eyre and Wide Sargasso Sea. Papers on Language and Literature, Summer 1994.

A web site examines Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre, and Jean Rhys's "rewriting" of Jane Eyre in Wide Sargasso Sea as a form of resistance to the colonial project. Site is a project of MA students at Queen's University, Belfast.

Bibliography & Web Sites

Nineteenth-Century Gender Studies. An open access, peer-reviewed journal publishing scholarship on gender studies and nineteenth-century British literature, art and culture.

The Brontës: Texts, Sources, and Criticism, includes 14 early (1840s) reviews of the Brontës. By Peter Friesen, SUNY Plattsburgh.

"Women in the Literary Marketplace," an online exhibit from the Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections at Cornell U, contains short entries on several Victorian women authors and their typical themes, information about the publishing context, and some images of first editions.

A guide to research resources from the Victoria discussion list for Victorian Studies.

Removed

Diedrick, J. On the connections between Charlotte Brontë's feminism in Jane Eyre and the tradition of feminist discourse that originated fifty five years before Jane Eyre appeared, when Mary Wollstonecraft published A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792).

Gilbert, Sandra M. http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3643/is_199807/ai_n8784555 Jane Eyre and the secrets of furious lovemaking." Novel: A Forum on Fiction, Summer 1998.

Hilton, Nelson. A Freudian discussion of Charlotte Brontë from Lexis Complexes.

Kreilkamp, Ivan. http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3643/is_199907/ai_n8835541 Unuttered: Withheld speech and female authorship in Jane Eyre and Villette. Novel: A Forum on Fiction, Summer 1999.

Murdoch, H. Adlai. http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3709/is_200201/ai_n9079478 Ghosts in the mirror: Colonialism and Creole indeterminacy in Brontë and Sand, on the notion of the Creole in George Sand's Indiana and Jane Eyre. College Literature Winter 2002.

Nandrea, Lorri G. http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3643/is_200310/ai_n9520940 Desiring Difference: Sympathy and Sensibility in Jane Eyre. Novel: A Forum on Fiction, Fall 2003.

Lewis, Liz. "Charlotte Brontë and Jean Rhys: The representation of the doubleness of selfhood in Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre and Jean Rhys's Wide Sargasso Sea." An introductory essay on the authors from the London School of Journalism English Literature Distance Learning Course.

Miller, Lucasta. Bio-madness. A review of Lucasta Miller's The Brontë Myth in the New Statesman, 29 Jan. 2001, reviewed by Patricia Duncker.

Renfro, Alicia. Defining Romanticism: The Implications of Nature Personified as Female in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre. Article contends that both Mary Shelley and Charlotte Brontë use Nature, envisioned as female, as a means to redefine the masculine prototype of Romanticism. Prometheus Web at Emory U.

Simmons, Diane. Jamaica Kincaid and the Canon: Dialogue With "Paradise Lost" and "Jane Eyre." MELUS, Summer 1998.

Vanskike, Elliott. Consistent Inconsistencies: The Transvestite Actress Madame Vestris and Charlotte Brontë's Shirley, in Nineteenth Century Literature, 50, 4 (March 1996) www.ucpress.edu.

Brontë Newsletters U.S. Brontë Society - Region 3. More chatty than scholarly, but many of the contributors have a serious interest in the Brontës.

Roberts, Michele. How eating becomes a metaphor in the novels of Charlotte Brontë, in the New Statesman, 5 May 2003.

A collection of articles on Charlotte Brontë from the Times of London, including several on her recently discovered novella Stancliffe's Hotel.

Barbour, David. An Eyre of mystery; broadway's Jane Eyre features a groundbreaking scenic and lighting design. [On the Broadway musical version of Jane Eyre.] Entertainment Design, May 2001.

Campbell, Gardner. "The presence of Orson Welles in Robert Stevenson's Jane Eyre (1944)." [On the 1944 film version of Jane Eyre.] Literature Film Quarterly, 2003.

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