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A review by thenovelbook
Villette by Charlotte Brontë
4.0
Re-read, Victober 2023:
This book gets easier, in a way, with each re-read, but at the same time it absolutely retains its power to wrestle with the reader. Had I read it in my younger years, I’d have been intermittently bored, and then outraged by the ending. Even reading it as an adult, I hated the ambiguous (but let’s be real, not actually ambiguous) ending the first time through. But having become steeped more deeply in the lore of Charlotte Bronte, I’ve come to accept it and even to understand the story choices on some level. I cannot overstate how helpful it is to know some of Charlotte’s own emotional history to make sense of this book. Otherwise all plot points involving M. Paul — and, honestly, Graham too— are just like, what the heck, Charlotte?
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Previous review, Victober 2021:
Upon re-reading this, I grew even more attached to Lucy Snowe than before--and this in spite of the fact that she holds you off with an insistence on her nothingness for a full third of the book.
Villette is probably a polarizing read: I can see that some people don't like it. It is not a neat package. It's a book that plays tricks on you. And each of the two men Lucy falls in love with subvert expectations so much that some readers will be disappointed. So don't read this for the plot--don't read it for a love story--don't read it for your favorite tropes. If you're going to read it, read it for the puzzle box character of Lucy Snowe, the girl who seems to have no feelings. Read it patiently, even though you may not like her or understand her at first. She doesn't think she has a lot to say, but she does. And if you know something about Charlotte Bronte's life and loves, so much the better.
Perhaps my Kindle highlights demonstrate at least a little of how powerful a read it is.
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Original review, 2016:
I went through many different feelings about this story and its central character, and even yet, I can't fix on just one impression. Lucy Snowe repelled me at first; she relates what she observes about others, and in a slightly judgmental manner, but gives no hint about herself. She is not exactly alone in the world, but the people in her life are not her friends. This isn't totally their fault: she seems unknowable.
When she needs to become self-sufficient, she alights at a girls' school to be nursemaid and later teacher. She's scarcely less thorny there. But there's an occasional thaw, a growing vividness within her. And to describe any more of the plot would be to rob the reader of the journey.
As a narrator I found Lucy Snowe to be very difficult to pin down. She's not reliable. You come to realize that she's holding back items from you that she could have shared sooner. Her estimation of the people around her is also pretty suspect, from my point of view. Do I really believe that one man is shallow, while the other is a diamond in the rough? Those Brontes and their Byronic men! Intense, broody, and moody. But always somehow irresistible.
I don't know if I'll reread this...Lucy suffers from major melancholy and fatalism, and, oh that ending--good grief, why? :|
But, anyway, the book is totally atmospheric with that touch of Gothic shiver which one expects from a Bronte, and the fact that it can make you revise your opinion about Lucy and the other characters in each volume...now that's good writing. I unwillingly loved Lucy by the end.
This book gets easier, in a way, with each re-read, but at the same time it absolutely retains its power to wrestle with the reader. Had I read it in my younger years, I’d have been intermittently bored, and then outraged by the ending. Even reading it as an adult, I hated the ambiguous (but let’s be real, not actually ambiguous) ending the first time through. But having become steeped more deeply in the lore of Charlotte Bronte, I’ve come to accept it and even to understand the story choices on some level. I cannot overstate how helpful it is to know some of Charlotte’s own emotional history to make sense of this book. Otherwise all plot points involving M. Paul — and, honestly, Graham too— are just like, what the heck, Charlotte?
——————————————————
Previous review, Victober 2021:
Upon re-reading this, I grew even more attached to Lucy Snowe than before--and this in spite of the fact that she holds you off with an insistence on her nothingness for a full third of the book.
Villette is probably a polarizing read: I can see that some people don't like it. It is not a neat package. It's a book that plays tricks on you. And each of the two men Lucy falls in love with subvert expectations so much that some readers will be disappointed. So don't read this for the plot--don't read it for a love story--don't read it for your favorite tropes. If you're going to read it, read it for the puzzle box character of Lucy Snowe, the girl who seems to have no feelings. Read it patiently, even though you may not like her or understand her at first. She doesn't think she has a lot to say, but she does. And if you know something about Charlotte Bronte's life and loves, so much the better.
Perhaps my Kindle highlights demonstrate at least a little of how powerful a read it is.
-----------------------------------
Original review, 2016:
I went through many different feelings about this story and its central character, and even yet, I can't fix on just one impression. Lucy Snowe repelled me at first; she relates what she observes about others, and in a slightly judgmental manner, but gives no hint about herself. She is not exactly alone in the world, but the people in her life are not her friends. This isn't totally their fault: she seems unknowable.
When she needs to become self-sufficient, she alights at a girls' school to be nursemaid and later teacher. She's scarcely less thorny there. But there's an occasional thaw, a growing vividness within her. And to describe any more of the plot would be to rob the reader of the journey.
As a narrator I found Lucy Snowe to be very difficult to pin down. She's not reliable. You come to realize that she's holding back items from you that she could have shared sooner. Her estimation of the people around her is also pretty suspect, from my point of view. Do I really believe that one man is shallow, while the other is a diamond in the rough? Those Brontes and their Byronic men! Intense, broody, and moody. But always somehow irresistible.
I don't know if I'll reread this...Lucy suffers from major melancholy and fatalism, and, oh that ending--good grief, why? :|
But, anyway, the book is totally atmospheric with that touch of Gothic shiver which one expects from a Bronte, and the fact that it can make you revise your opinion about Lucy and the other characters in each volume...now that's good writing. I unwillingly loved Lucy by the end.