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4.07 AVERAGE
4.07 AVERAGE
Not as good as wuthering heights (simply impossible) or jane eyre but the Brontë sisters never disappoint
emotional
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
skimread. i think this is good i just didn't realise it was Five hundred and Ninety pages long and not for me rn but i support divorce
dark
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Content Warnings
Graphic: Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Child abuse, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Infidelity, Physical abuse, Sexism, Terminal illness, Death of parent, Classism
Minor: Vomit
emotional
reflective
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
dark
emotional
inspiring
reflective
sad
tense
dark
emotional
inspiring
reflective
sad
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
emotional
funny
mysterious
reflective
relaxing
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Now, THATS how you do male yearning
Synopsis
The town where Gilbert resides in his family home working as a farm manager is thrown into a tizzy when a mysterious young woman moves into the abandoned manor up on the hill. She comes with only her son and housekeeper l, and although she tries to keep to herself and avoid the local drama, she soon becomes interwoven into the upper middle-class society of the time. Her seemingly uncaring attitude and tight-lipped manner are taken either as insult or patronization, and “Helen Graham” is soon the topic of many gossip circles and theories. Gilbert Markham, tries to avoid this cattiness, but is ultimately enraptured by the tortured yet intriguingly intelligent woman. Though rumors spread and accusations thrown, we learn the truth about Helen and discover through both perspectives how love must transcend time and appearance if it is to succeed.
Review
The recounting of the love story between Gilbert and Helen from the dual (and often duel-ing) perspectives of the magnetic couple in a series of long letters to their friends. While I often forgot these were written memories, being so immersed, Brontë’s method of telling these stories made daily life and the settings feel present and so realistic I could have been there. Even though there was no big bad evil or heroic quest, the plot and characters felt tense and purposeful, and I found myself eager to continue learning about the societal dynamics of the towns and cities Helen and Gilbert frequented.
It was also very refreshing to love both of two main perspectives. Both Helen and Gilbert were so themselves and even when I groaned or winced at a decision or reaction, I could sympathize with them, knowing their pasts.
Because Helen started out as a mystery/pariah figure in town, Gilbert had to form his own opinion, and the side characters (who I would like to punch a few of) influenced and manipulated his perception. Having Helen’s POV follow this was a great choice because my heart kept flip-flopping between whose side to take once the past was filled in!
Much of the story centered heavy topics but Brontë’s smart humor and intricately chosen wording made even drafty old manors and secluded rooms feel magical.
I hattttted Helen’s ex, and Brontë wrote such a great childish man-baby character that didn’t feel over-the-top, but made for a wider implication on the state of family life at the time.
Oh I just loved this. I can’t quite say why and I’m positive this review doesn’t hold the same urgency as some of my others, but I do think this should be more widely spoken about and hope others consider it as an option akin to Sense and Sensibility and other stories of the like.
One last thing I REALLY loved was how intelligently funny the dialogue was. Something in the word choice and descriptors just made me giggle at the appropriate times, realizing how ridiculous some of the characters were.
One last thing I REALLY loved was how intelligently funny the dialogue was. Something in the word choice and descriptors just made me giggle at the appropriate times, realizing how ridiculous some of the characters were.
Quotes
Pretty much starting at the opening scene I knew I was going to love Anne Brontë because of her style of describing scenery. Somehow she writes so you can tell which character is interpreting the physical surroundings and still maintain the same overall theme. This is in the very beginning of the story, where Gilbert is describing a typical day, before he met Ms. Graham:
With such reflections as these, I was endeavoring to console myself as I plodded home from the fields one cold, damp, cloudy evening towards the close of October. But the gleam of a bright red fire through the parlor window had more of an effect in cheering my spirits than rebuking my thankless repinings on all the sage reflections, good resolutions and forced illusions that I had forced my mind to refrain. But I was young then, remember, only four-and-twenty and had not acquired half the rule over my own spirit that I now possess, however trifling that may be
Upon their first meeting, Gilbert and Helen get into an arguement regarding the way Helen is raising Arthur Jr. and I love the way she puts him in his place. He loved it too tbh.
‘I beg your pardon Mrs. Graham, but…I’ve not yet said that a boy should be taught to rush into the snares of life, or even to willfully seek temptation, but for the sake of exercising his virtue by overcoming it. I only say that it is better to arm and strengthen your hero than it is to disarm and enfeeble the foe.’
‘If you were to rear an oak sapling in a hothouse, tending it night and day, shielding it from every breath of wind, you could not expect it to grow into a hardy tree like that which is grown up on the mountainside, exposed to all the action of the elements, not even sheltered from the shock of the tempest.’
‘Granted,’
‘but would you use the same argument in regards to a girl? Certainly not. No, you would have her to be tenderly, delicately nurtured, like a hothouse bun. Taught to cling to others for direction and support, guarded as much as possible from the very knowledge of evil. But would you be so good as to inform me why you make this distinction? Is it that you think she has no virtue? Assuredly not. Well. Would you affirm that virtue is only elicited by temptation? Do you think that a woman can only be too little exposed to temptation or too little acquainted with vice or anything connected therewith? It must be that you think she is either so vicious or so feeble-minded that she cannot withstand temptation…wherein the nobler sex, there is a natural tendency to goodness, guarded by a superior fortitude, which the more it is exercised by trials and dangers is only affirmed to be fairer…such an experience to him, to use a trite simile, will be like the storm to the oak; which though it may scatter the leaves and snap the smaller branches serves thus to rivet the roots…you’d have us encourage our sons to prove all things by their own experience, while our daughters may not even profit by the experience of others…I would not send a poor girl into the world unarmed against her foes…nor would I watch and guard her until she lost the power or the will to watch and guard herself. And as for my son, if I thought he’d grow up to be what you call a “man of the world”, one that has seen life, glorious in his experience I would rather that he died tomorrow, rather it a thousand times.’
The way Gilbert sees Helen 🫶🏼 and his friendship with her son which is honest and caring now that Gilbert has started to come around to Helen’s home more
How lovely she looked in her dark ringlets streaming in the light summer breeze, Her fair cheeks slightly flushed, and her countenance radiant with a smile.
Dear Arthur, what did I not owe to you for this and every other happy meeting. Through him I was at once delivered from all formality and terror and constraint. In all love affairs, there is no mediator like a merry simple-hearted child, ever ready to mend divided hearts, to span the friendly gulf of custom, to melt the ice of cold reserve.
Ahahaha I love emotional warfare (Arthur Sr. Is Helen’s ex-husband) in lovers’ quarrels, and this is the beginning of the end for Helen when she starts to regret her marriage/ sees who Arthur really is
After lunch I got my drawing, and from dinner ‘til bedtime, I read. Meanwhile, poor Arthur was sadly at a loss for something to amuse him or to occupy his time. He wanted to appear as busy and as unconcerned as I did. Had the weather at all permitted, he would doubtless have ordered his horse and set off to some distant region, no matter where, immediately after breakfast and not returned ‘til night. Had there been a lady anywhere within reach of an age between 15 and 45, he would have sought revenge and found employment in getting up, or in getting up in desperate flirtation with her. But being, to my private satisfaction, entirely cut off from both these sources of diversion, his suffering were truly deplorable. When he had done yawning over his paper and scrupling short answers to his shorter letters, he spent the remainder of the morning and the whole of the afternoon in fidgeting about from room to room…and very often, fixably gazing at me when he thought I did not perceive it, with the vain hope of detecting some traces of tears or some tokens of remorseful anguish in my face.
I want to get some aspect of this quote tattooed at some point.
This follows a particularly tragic “breakup” scene where Helen advises and insists that Gilbert not come around her house anymore so as not to excite the locals or further their bond because they aren’t meant to be together.
…may I come to see you now and then?
“Perhaps, occasionally on the condition that you never abuse the privilege”
“I make no empty promises”
“but you should see, the moment you do, our intimacy is at an end, that’s all.
“And will you always call me Gilbert? It sounds more sisterly and it will serve to remind me of our contract.”
She smiled, and at once bid me to go.
I love love
While this hope is strong within us, we will part”, I cried. “You shall not have the pain of another effort to dismiss me. I will go at once, but-“
I did not put my request in words, she understood it instinctively. Or otherwise, there was nothing so deliberate as requesting or yielding in the manner! There was a sudden impulse that neither could resist. One moment I stood and looked at her face, the next I held her to my heart, and we seemed to grow together in a physical embrace of which no physical or mental force could rend us.”
Content Warnings
Moderate: Domestic abuse, Infidelity
Minor: Animal cruelty
I just realized I don't enjoy this type of writing AT ALL and I'm no longer willing to force myself to try. Life's too short.