The Professor, by Charlotte Bronte. rating = 3.

this is the first book that Charlotte Bronte ever wrote. it was submitted for publication at the same time as Emily's first book, Wuthering Heights, and Anne's first book, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall. what a loss that Emily and Anne did not live long enough to write more than they did... sigh. Wuthering Heights as a first novel? I will forever think that is impressive. especially when you take into account that, as great a novelist as Charlotte became, her first book, The Professor, was refused for publication.

The Professor was only published after Charlotte wrote Jane Eyre etc, more as a favor to her public who were by then curious what her first novel was about.

it IS a nice book; I do recommend it. but it is obviously her first book, and the pacing is off, and the storytelling needs work, and some things seem rather odd. she uses many of the same themes in her other, successful novels, which means that there is substance here, but she handles it much better in her later works. this is also the only novel where Charlotte writes from the perspective of a man. when she writes as a woman, it is so much more natural and she can do more with it, comfortably and fluently.

favorite quotes:

how dreadful to find a lump of wax and wood laid in my bosom, a half-idiot clasped in my arms, and to remember that I had made of this my equal---nay, my idol---to know that I must pass the rest of my dreary life with a creature incapable of understanding what I said, of appreciating what I thought, or of sympathising with what I felt! (1106)

I went to bed, but somoething feverish and fiery had got into my veins which prevented me from sleeping much that night. (1108)

God knows I am not by nature vindictive; I would not hurt a man because I can no longer trust or like him; but neither my reason nor feelings are of the vacillating order---they are not of that sand-like sort where impressions, if soon made, are as soon effaced. Once convinced that my friend's disposition is incompatible with my own, once assured that he is indelibly stained with certain defects obnoxious to my principles, and I dissolve the connection . (1108-Charlotte is perhaps an INFJ? lol)

Fate! thou hast done thy worst, and now thou standest before me resting thy hand on thy blunted blade. Ay; I see thine eye confront mine and demand why I still live, why I still hope. Pagan demon, I credit not thine onmipotence, and so cannot succumb to they power. (1118)

"Down, stupid tormentors," cried she; "the man has done his duty; you shall not bait him thus by thoughts of what might have been; he relinquished a temporary and contingent good to avoid a permanent and certain evil; he did well. Let him reflect now, and when your blinding dust and deafening hum subside, he will discover a path." (1149)

(and yes this now completes my reading of the omnibus Charlotte and Emily Bronte: the complete novels. I want to see The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, and Agnes Gray, etc, but that might have to wait a while...)