A review by emmaisnotavampire
Villette by Charlotte Brontë

reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.75

I always love a good old Bronte, and was really in the mood for the delightful mix of elements that is gothic fiction, a combination of everyday melancholy and underlying horror. I must admit it took a while for this to start feeling like a gothic Charlotte Bronte, the first half read more like a melancholic Jane Austen, but once the little eery oddities picked up the novel really started to take on a clearer identity, quickening the pace by means of suspense and mystery. As often happens in the gothic genre, said mystery only appears to be supernatural, and turns out in the end to have a perfectly logical explanation, but it really doesn’t matter what the truth is: it is only about the uneasy atmosphere it creates, the tension and curiosity it creates in the reader. Though the solution to this particular case was surely unexpected, much quirkier and funnier than the tragic one to the similar Jane Eyre ghostly scenario.

However, I think I still prefer the dark, sad and gloomy latter, Villette didn’t quite hold up to the comparison. It was much more realistic than the former, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing in itself, but definitely made it a little less interesting to my individual taste. When it comes to literature, the weirder the better for me. Additionally, I also generally prefer the character of Jane to Lucy: although in similar situations, lonely, contemplative, independent working women with big brains and questionable love interests (seriously, what is wrong with Charlotte Bronte and unfriendly, gruff men with a VERY HIDDEN soft spot?), I found Jane to have a lot more charisma and strength, whereas passive and reserved Lucy sometimes came off as a little weak and inactive, a victim of events rather than a promoter of her own destiny. I still enjoyed the book, it was a pleasant read, but it inevitably suffered from the unfair comparison with its sister novel.