Charlotte Brontë

Review of Jane Eyre

from Unsigned Review, <em>Era</em>

This is an extraordinary book. Although a work of fiction, it is no mere novel, for there is nothing but nature and truth about it, and its interest is entirely domestic; neither is it like your familiar writings, that are too close to reality. There is nothing morbid, nothing vague, nothing improbable about the story of Jane Eyre; at the same time it lacks neither the odour of romance nor the hue of sentiment....It is no woman’s writing. Although ladies have written histories, and travels, and warlike novels, to say nothing of books upon the arts and sciences, no woman could have penned ‘The Autobiography of Jane Eyre' (p. 9).

First published 14 November 1847

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