I don't get the love for the Brontës. Okay, Jane Eyre is a classic, but everything else I've read thus far reads like it was written by a teenage girl suffering from a massive inferiority complex. Actually, so does Jane Eyre, but it rises above it. Villette does not. This is the story of Lucy Snowe, a girl who no one understands-- because she's just too deep and complex for them! And too good for them. And no one loves her, but maybe that's because she never gives any of them any signs of affection herself. Also, she's an annoying narrator, holding back information for no readily apparent reason. Also, the story contains an absurd amount of coincidence which makes Jane Eyre falling asleep on the doorstep of her cousin positively plausible. Maybe no one likes you because you're stuck-up and obnoxious, Lucy, did you think of that? And anti-Catholic, that's really endearing too. And racist. Though for someone who hates the French, Brontë sure does put an obnoxious amount of the dialogue in French. Thank God for the endnotes.

Or not, as Helen Cooper's editing of this Penguin Classic edition is not the greatest; I question the value of any scholarly edition that feels the need to tell me what the House of Commons is. Or the Garden of Eden.

I picked up Villette after my recent reread of Jane Eyre; surely Charlotte Brontë's genius, so sure and strong in her famous Gothic classic, would not fail in this novel. It did not, but it is of a different kind. I am not disappointed exactly, but I am left a bit thoughtful about the merit of the book. This review will contain some spoilers.

Villette is well known for being an autobiographical novel. Many of its events are drawn from Brontë's experiences when she lived in Brussels at the pensionnat of M. and Mme. Héger. Knowing this gave me additional interest; it always fascinates me to see how writers take the stuff of their lives and weave it into art.

This story is narrated by Lucy Snowe, a young woman who leaves England after a unspecified family disaster of some kind. She finds a position at a pensionnat, a French school for young ladies, where she struggles to learn French and understand the culture around her. She achieves this by studying the girls at her school, her fellow teachers, and the owner, Madame Beck.

Lucy Snowe is an interesting character. I found her less easy to like than Jane Eyre; she is cold and sensible and easily put upon. Though she is very observant of those around her and holds firmly to her moral convictions, she is passive in many ways and cannot perform if she is put on the spot. At one point in the story she muses on the vastly different ways her friends view her; some see her as shy and self effacing, others as passionate, and still others as crusty and harsh. She certainly has a wryness to her. By the end of the novel I was her friend, but not her passionate ally.

We are constantly reminded what a "little man" is M. Paul, one of Lucy's fellow teachers. Brontë's portrayal of his character is fascinating. He is a terrible autocrat who loses his temper over the smallest things, but when he truly is sinned against, he is all patience and compassion. In some ways the relationship between M. Paul and Lucy reminded me of Jo March and Professor Bhaer in Alcott's Little Women, though with a distinctly darker cast.

The other characters are excellent: Ginevra Fanshawe in particular is one of my favorites, not because I found her likeable but because Brontë apparently finds her fascinating, and delineates her nature so well that I felt I knew her too. I appreciate Brontë's ability to get down to the core of her characters, and have them interact believably with one another.

The "mystery" of the story, the stock Gothic ghost running around the pensionnat at night, is certainly not the leading feature. I will say that Brontë certainly misled me; I thought it was someone else entirely! I would not have credited the perpetrator with that kind of ingenuity. But really it is only a sideshow to the more important things happening within Lucy.

Brontë's dislike of Roman Catholicism is a major theme of the story. I found it incisive, perceptive, and merciless — though she acknowledges some of its better qualities and creates some worthy characters who are Catholic. But Lucy sees too clearly to allow herself to be converted; she remains a Protestant and this, perhaps, is the ultimate reason a union with the Catholic M. Paul is never realized. It is projected and planned, but fate intervenes... Brontë's famously ambiguous ending is not impossible to unravel. Lucy's earlier statement, that some lives are meant to be happy while others are fated to sorrow, seems to come true. She feels herself fated to be excluded from the joyful tent of those blessed ones, as when she watches them from afar during a fête in the city.

Despite the generally sad, heavy feel of the book, there were moments of humor when Brontë describes the ridiculousness of M. Paul or the girls in the school. Lucy's wry observations of the people around her hint at a sense of humor buried under the narrow and unhappy circumstances of her life.

Mary Anne Evans (George Eliot) preferred this book to Jane Eyre, and I can understand why she would with her interest in people and relationships rather than Gothic atmosphere. Indeed, Villette reminded me a great deal of Middlemarch at times. Dr. John Bretton is very similar to Tertius Lydgate, though he does not make Lydgate's mistake. Lucy is not quite a Dorothea, though they share a kind of ascetism. Villette was published in 1853 and Middlemarch came almost twenty years later, published in serial form in 1871–72.

Brontë uses a lot of French in the dialogue, and it was slightly frustrating to have to flip to the back of the book and check the endnotes every time someone uttered something in French. I wish my edition (Oxford World's Classics) had footnotes instead of endnotes. But it would have been far worse to have no notes at all. I'm just not used to reading interruptedly like that.

I am still thinking about this novel. In some ways it felt a bit of a chore to get through; not much happens in its 500 pages, and it did not grip me as Jane Eyre did. But I think it gives us a clearer picture of Brontë herself, and I found it worth reading for its character sketches alone. But I did not love it. ( )

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Charlotte Bronte’s novel tells the story of penniless Lucy Snowe who leaves a sorrowful past behind and starts a new life at a boarding school in the fictional city of Villette. There, she finds work as a teacher; she soon becomes successful and is admired by her pupils and colleagues. Furthermore, she attracts the attention of M. Paul Emanuel, the hot tempered and autocratic schoolmaster. The two eventually fall in love, but other protagonists want to keep them apart and finally manage to do so by sending M. Paul away. Nevertheless, he declares his love for Lucy before his departure and arranges for her to live an independent life as the headmistress of her own school. After three years of waiting, the couple is to be reunited.

However, the ending of the novel is ambiguous, as Charlotte Bronte gives us two endings to choose from: We can see M. Paul and Lucy happily reunited or we can believe that M. Paul’s ship has been destroyed by a storm on his return to Villette and thus accept that he has drowned.

Many critics believe however, that the choice is in fact a delusion, since Lucy clearly states that those three years while she was waiting for her beloved and was leading an independent life at her own school were the happiest of her life. This statement suggests that M. Paul has died and that Lucy does not find romantic happiness like other Bronte heroines. However, what she does find is a fulfilled calling and independence. Lucy does not submit to a traditional female destiny (marriage and children), but has the opportunity to fulfil her own dream and thus finds happiness in her work. For that reason, Villette shocked many critics at the time it was published. Lucy is not like other Bronte or Austen heroines since she is neither rich nor beautiful and she does not marry her beloved; other characters in the novel see her as “inoffensive as a shadow” and pity her, but she is in fact a powerful character, a fighter and a rebel. Lucy may not be wealthy or beautiful, but she is clever and undergoes a major transformation; as the novel progresses, Lucy’s respect for herself grows and she manages to find the independence that allows her to be her true self. She also succeeds in winning M. Paul’s love with her intelligence and accomplishments and not with submissiveness or her looks. Throughout the novel, Lucy has to face many trials and has to struggle against the life she is expected to lead as a poor woman, but in the end, she finds autonomy and thus happiness. This is why the novel agitated so many readers and critics when it was published in 1853 and this also may be the reason why Virginia Woolf called Villette “Bronte’s finest novel”. Villette was seen as a scandalous novel in 1853, since it tells the story of a woman who loses love but finds independence.

Villette is Charlotte Bronte’s last novel and even though it may not be as popular as Jane Eyre, it is nevertheless regarded as her best work. The novel is not so much commemorated for its plot, but for Lucy’s character development and psychology. Charlotte Bronte is one of my favorite authors and Villette is a great novel! I recommend it to everyone who is interested in Victorian Literature and who likes to read about gender roles. However, you might find it difficult to read this book if you aren’t familiar with French, so make sure your edition has translations of the French phrases! ( )

This was an excellent read and it was extremely useful to have the references and background information. I read it alongside the BBC adaptation which was an equally excellent adaptation. Set in 1853 with Lucy Snow as the central character we follow her life and learn of her passion, her love and life. So often the prose propelled me to re-read and savour a section time and again as we gained further insights into the character. I loved the reflective writing as we read of how Lucy muses "I shall share no man's or woman's life in this world, as you understand sharing. I think I have one friend of my own, but am not sure; and till I am sure, I live solitary." "But solitude is sadness." "Yes; it is sadness. Life, however, has worse than that. Deeper than melancholy, lies heartbreak."

In many ways I felt she was a lady way ahead of her times - along with the setting in both France and Belgium and the education theme this was always going to be a pleasure for me. I was not disappointed and thoroughly recommend this wonderful work. ( )