This book starts off promisingly enough, but as the character grows less sympathetic and the plot draws out predictably, much of the charm is lost. Perhaps it was not unexpected that I would be drawn into the plight of a young, educated man thrust out alone into the world with no prospects, forced to work pointless jobs for frustratingly inept employers for subsistence. It mirrors not only my experiences, but that of most of my generation.Unfortunately, our narrator becomes a rather stuck-up prig as the text goes on, which slowly killed off my sympathy. It wasn't merely that he conducted himself with pride and intelligence; it was his condescension and self-assuredness that soured the taste. He read into every word and expression, giving the reader an absurd amount of subtext about glances or pauses. He also professed that his certainty in psychology allowed him to manipulate others, by which he meant snide, callous remarks, a cold shoulder, and a childish inability to keep himself in check.It was like people who write in their dating profile: "I'm interested in psychology, because I have always been really good at reading people" despite the fact that they are not good enough at psychology to recognize that this makes them sound naive and pretentious. So, there certainly was a comical aspect to his arrogant ineptitude, but conceited prigs rarely make for very good romantic interests.Sure, Austen did it with Darcy, but she knew that the secret was to make his prickly exterior an embittered defense to the false, superficial world around him and give him a good heart despite it all. It's not that The Professor was a bad man, merely that he wasn't interesting enough to overcome his defects.Bronte's messages were also a bit underwhelming. I found delight in the unintentional humor of her mistrust of Continental ways and those devilish Papists in particular, but this was hardly a mark in her favor. Likewise, the feminist aspects were a bit confused. One female character is strong, but only inasmuch as she is a heartless manipulator. The main love interest is also strong, occasionally moving to defend herself and her ideas, but she is mainly characterized as being our protagonist's devoted subservient--she never argues with him, of course.Now some of this I must chalk up to the narrator's unreliability. The case that the first woman is heartless and the second woman subservient are things we mostly have to take his word for. Given the circumstances as they are given, it seems more like he makes groundless assumptions, seeing the world in stark black and white and revolving around him.He also meets a friend on the way, a man who is equally as stuck up and sure of himself, and throughout their dialogues they seem constantly to sneer superiority at one another's faults. That neither is capable of recognizing in himself what he laments in authors.If tackled with a more satirical style, this could have been a very effective book, lampooning a world of naive, short-sighted people lost in ungrounded assumptions and misunderstandings. As it was, Bronte kept the sentimental, romantic heart of the book. Since we could not take the characters entirely lightly, we had to take them somewhat seriously, which resulted in a story of dumb, somewhat dull characters living out a standard romance plot.
3.5Este libro fue cogido de la biblioteca por impulso. Tantos comentarios llenos de entusiasmo sobre Jane Eyre me impulsaron a iniciarme con la autora y esta es su primera novela. Me encontré esta edición de Alba Minus con su hermosa portada, editorial que me gustaría que estuviera en mi país y me alegró mucho encontrar una traducción muy acertada con las correspondientes notas de las partes habladas en francés.Edward Crimsworth es un joven inglés sin mucha fortuna. Luego de morir sus padres quedó a cargo de los familiares de su madre, unas personas que le dieron estudio en Eton (respetado e importante colegio en Inglaterra) pero siempre impusieron su voluntad sobre él. Ahora el joven Edward debe pensar en qué se desempeñará para vivir, y no acepta lo que sus padrinos le tienen preparado. Con el desagrado de ellos y perdiendo su apoyo, Edward decide convertirse en industrial como su padre. Así que viaja a una ciudad del norte a encontrarse con su hermano, que es un floreciente empresario. Pero las cosas no salen como espera y el joven Edward terminará embarcandose a Bruselas para trabajar como profesor.Es un poco lo que va la historia para introducirla. Esta novela es el primer acercamiento con las hermanas Brontë, y me ha gustado la experiencia pero no tanto como esperaba. Bueno voy a explicarme. La historia en sí, se explicó en el prólogo que no encontró editor por ser muy realista y que no pegaba en la época ni los modos victorianos (entre 1845 y 1846). La historia está narrada con un estilo muy explicativo y rimbombante, propio de la época y altamente cargado de referencias religiosas (hay que entender que Charlotte era hija de un vicario en Yorkshire) que a veces puede resultar muy pesado si no se está acostumbrado a estas lecturas. Aun así, es un estilo florido pero bello a su manera.Reseña completa: http://rapsodia-literaria.blogspot.co...
What do You think about The Professor (1999)?
I have mixed feelings about this book. It wasn't as good as Jane Eyre . The characters were not developed as well. I also had a problem with the numerous long passages in French which I don't speak, and which, were made even harder when listened to on an audiobook. The book starts out well as we see William Crimsworth, the Professor, long before he is a professor. He goes to work for his much older, industrialist brother who seems to despise him. He leaves and makes his way to Brussels where eventually becomes a teacher (which the Flemish call "Professor.) He starts out fairly well, but then there is intrigue between William, the head of a girls school, and the head of the boys school William works for. That part seemed very weak to me as the characters of the two women involved seem to change their natures radically without much precipitating reason. I also felt like the end of the book was problematic. There was an explanation of what happened to the main character's industrialist brother, but not a resolution. The book has a secondary theme of industrial reform, as in Dickens, but it is never developed. There is a "they lived happily ever after" feeling about the book, but it falls flat.
—Anne Hawn Smith
Every time I finish a Charlotte Bronte novel, my heart pounds and my mind is disoriented. After reaching the end of her stories, closing her pages for the last time, and remembering the long passages written out in long-hand, it's all like slowly surfacing from the depths of another world, and you're back home in reality, not quite sure you want to be there. Although it doesn't have the exquisite tragedy of Villette or the kick-ass karate-chop combos of romance, ghosts, crazy ladies in the attic, religious nut-jobs, and true love found in Jane Eyre, The Professor is still one hell of a novel. Its themes are common to Bronte's novels: Catholic wickedness (aka, “Romish wizardcraft” in this book -- HAHAHA!), relationships among the different social classes, social-restraint, and independence. Illustrating these themes are our upright, plain, poor, and virtuous narrator and his love interest, who are contrasted by the so-goddamn-evil-i-love-her Zoraide Reuter and her equally two-faced and back stabbing boyfriend, M. Pelet. In many ways inferior to Jane Eyre, and in many other ways a "rough draft" of Villette, this novel is probably not the author's best. But I loved it. Why? Because Charlotte Brtone wrote it. Bronte famously wrote that Jane Austen's writing was like "a carefully fenced, highly cultivated garden, with neat borders and delicate flowers: but no glance of a bright, vivid physiognomy, no open country, no fresh air, no blue hill, no bonny beck ... rather, comprehensive, measured, balanced, certainly “highly cultivated.”” What is Bronte then? Her writing is wild, like weeds, growing out of control and wrapping around you eyes, heart, and mind, but she planted those weeds and cultivated them just as carefully as Austen cultivated her garden -- but with more skill. Bronte gets you in a snare from which you cannot break free. Her words, her writing, her storytelling are all overpowering in their savageness. When you try to release yourself (it's called putting the book down) you'll find your heart beating from the rapid ride that she has taken you on ... and you want to jump right back in. Seriously, I love this woman. Favorite writer EVER!!
—La Petite Américaine
Charlotte Bronte made several unsuccessful attempts to have "The Professor," her earliest work published. I can see why it was only published after her death (and numerous rewrites) as it really isn't a great novel.The story follows William Crimsworth, a man (like her female characters) who is thrown to the wild and forced to find his own fortune. He becomes a teacher in Brussels and the plot moves on from there.It really takes a long time for the book to get going -- her long blocks of descriptive passages become a grind fairly quickly. While there is an interesting story buried in the book, it just drags out at such a slow pace that it really wasn't an enjoyable read.Also disappointing that this edition does not have a translation of the French phrases in the back. While I could follow the general gist of the conversations in French, there is a crucial scene with Frances Henri that really needed to be translated (or read by someone who knows French, which I don't.)Overall, this is book for Charlotte Bronte completists only.
—Amerynth
