Rating: 
Summary: 'There were legions of her kind'
Review: By now I'm sure that Miss Jean Brodie and her prime are better known from the film than from the original novel. The film, and the absolutely wonderful stage production that preceded it in London with Vanessa Redgrave as the first Brodie, caught one side, the caricature side, of Muriel Spark's immortal creation, but the story is a more complex matter altogether, short though the book is.
Any story by Muriel Spark is complex up to a point - her way of thinking is devious and unstraightforward and her characters tend to inhabit the moral and motivational lowlands. Insofar as they seem like real people at all rather than clever animations, her attitude towards them is usually ambivalent. Indeed it's almost fair to say that she makes her feelings for her own creations clearest, and expresses them most strongly, when those feelings consist most of repugnance, as with Patrick Seton and Father Socket in The Bachelors. Nevertheless she always seems to distance herself successfully from their general squalor through her quick wits and the dazzling speed at which she keeps rearranging the scenery.
This book has a lot of the familiar Spark `feel' to it, but it's a bit different in some ways too. It's short, but it doesn't come across to me as a lightweight effort like The Abbess of Crewe. The cast of characters is not as large as in The Bachelors or The Ballad of Peckham Rye, but it's large enough. What makes it simpler is that it consists largely of a group of juveniles on the one hand, and on the other it is absolutely dominated by one single outsize personality, maybe the nearest to a true heroine or hero that Spark ever allowed herself. Jean Brodie is a silly woman but not a mean or corrupt one and that, in a novel by Muriel Spark, is quite something not to be. Another thing that may have softened the author's stance is that the setting is not London or the east side of Manhattan or Crewe or any other foreign clime, but her own native Edinburgh. I don't suppose she is trying to conceal her affection for it (although being who she is she doesn't indulge it either), or if she is she has failed at that. I can recognise the kinds of people and the kinds of attitude through a similar if not identical background, and it has brought out a most unusual candour in the author. At the start of chapter 3 there is a very straightforward account of the kind of Edinburgh spinster that Jean Brodie exemplifies. Spark typically springs it on us who it was that `betrayed' Miss Brodie, but once she has done so she takes us through the person's thought-processes with a most untypical clarity. The book shuttles backwards and forwards through time-frames, but this time with a sheer naturalness that conceals the cleverness of it. There is even a rare glimpse into the author's fascination with Catholicism when she discusses Miss Brodie's semi-ecumenical religious interests. Above all the typical spurts of sarcasm and ridicule are more often funny than bitchy, not the other way round as is more usual from her.
A taste for Muriel Spark is a bit of a mini-religion itself. This book might make her a few converts.
Rating:
Summary: "I always knew your upbringing was a bit peculiar."
Review: In the 1930s, Miss Jean Brodie is a teacher at the Marcia Blaine School in Edinburgh. Miss Brodie teaches at the Junior school, and her pupils pass into Senior school at age 12. In spite of the fact that the pupils pass on to the Senior school, several of the girls--known as the Brodie Set--maintain strong bonds with their former teacher. Miss Brodie--it seems--favours a particular group of girls. These girls, according to Miss Brodie, are going to be "the creme de la creme"--thanks to her unique, and unorthodox approach to education. Miss Brodie is a great admirer of fascism, so her pupils are kept informed regarding Mussolini and Hitler, while their regularly scheduled lessons are ignored.
While the girls are required to wear uniforms that largely remove individuality, the Brodie Set manage to create individualism through their school hats, for each girl in the Brodie Set wears her hat in some unique way. Miss Brodie encourages individualism, but she also demands a strange loyalty from each girl. In exchange for outings to museums, and golf courses, Miss Brodie expects the girls to listen to stories of her past and present loves. The girls are quite aware that they are being included into some sort of select club, and they repay Miss Brodie with a mis-placed hero worship. She becomes the heroine of their imaginative, overwrought romantic tales. This hero worship protects and shields Miss Brodie from the school authorities who are constantly on the lookout for inappropriate behaviour.
"The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie" is one of the best-known books from Scottish author, Muriel Spark, and the book is quite different from her other novels. Spark's novels always contain malice, and there is certainly some degree of malice at work in this story. Jean Brodie is one of Spark's most fascinating subjects. She's the sort of teacher many pupils desire--a teacher who selects a pupil based on some sort of merit, and then gives that pupil special attention. Even the headmistress--an arch enemy of Miss Brodie's has to admit a certain frustration that the Brodie Set always score amazingly well on their exams. Miss Brodie's extra-curricular attention to her girls is admirable on the surface, but then it is also self-motivated. The girls are Miss Brodie's audience and also mirror Miss Brodie's reflected opinion of herself. Miss Brodie is actually a dangerous influence on her pupils, and the novel shows how a position of privilege and trust can be abused in the most insidious ways. The art teacher, Mr. Lloyd, uses the Brodie Set girls as subjects for his portraits, and each portrait somehow, inexplicably, looks just like Miss Brodie--although it's impossible to identify exactly how this likeness is created. Mr. Lloyd is possibly quite unaware of the truth behind his sub-conscious act, for the girls in the Brodie Set are forever marked by Miss Jean Brodie's influence. As Miss Brodie once said in her prime: "give me a girl at an impressionable age, and she is mine for life."--displacedhuman
Rating:
Summary: More than meets the eye
Review: "The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie" is not an easy book, though it seems to be at first. If you start reading it, you expect something in the "Dead Poets Society" vein: a teacher who inspires his/her pupils and makes them better human beings.
But in Miss Brodie's case, this is not so. In fact, Muriel Spark's novel is ultimately a very dark and depressing one, in spite of its seemingly lighthearted tone and loads of irony. It is about power, deception, loyalty, influence, sin, love and hate...
In fact, the novel adresses many dilemmas of human interaction, all inserted in a seemingly simple and straightforward story. There are no good and bad characters in the book, only good and bad acts and attitutes. But in the end no-one can remain unspoilt and pure.
One of the most fascinating books I've ever read.
Rating: 
Summary: The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie
Review: The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie is about a young unorthodox teacher and her special but ultimately different relationship with six of her students. The story is set in Edinburgh around the 1930's. It mostly takes place in the school where Miss Jean Brodie is a teacher but in the least sence of the meaning.Miss Jean Brodie is a woman in her prime and has been many places that follow with dramatic stories. She lives her life through six girls. The girls are know to everyone as "The Brodie Set." Miss Jean Brodie picked the six girls and they soon became her favorites. Even though Miss Jean Brodie lives her life through the girls she taught them to grow up to be and do what they believe. She teaches them about art, love, and how to be a proper woman. She tends to demonstrate it as well. Miss Jean Brodie is ultimately a unique woman. She encourages the girls to become sexually active and tells them stories of the love of her life. Miss Jean Brodie would have them over for tea, accompany them for walks, and take them to plays. The head mistress of the school despises Miss Jean Brodie and is willing to do anything to get rid of her but she needs a reason. The book goes through the lives of the girls from when they were young and in their prime until they are older and no longer associate with Miss Jean Brodie. The turning point of the story is that Miss Jean Brodie gets fired because of one of her precious girls. Overall the book was slightly boring but still satisfying. The book reflects betrayl, fitting in, relationships, rebellions, and love. I would recommend this book to others.
Rating: 
Summary: The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie
Review: I feel that The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie written by Muriel Spark is a "good" novel. It is not a spectacular story and it is not a horrible story either. For me, the novel was simply satisfying. The plot is not outrageously exciting. The novel tells a story of a far-reaching teacher at a private girls school who is looked down upon by her superiors. She keys into the lives of a select number of students to try and broaden their horizons, and make them the "crème de la crème". The climax of the plot is fuzzy. The story had many ups and downs, but nothing extreme that sticks out in my memory. For me the novel was on the verge of boring. The novel tended to drag in some sections, especially in the first two chapters. These chapters take an abnormally long time to introduce the characters and the setting. Spark takes plenty of time to piece together these aspects for the reader. This was slightly frustrating for me. It takes a while for the novel to really pick up and become interesting. Spark is incredibly detailed throughout the novel making it boring for me during some parts, but mostly her descriptive writing worked to her advantage to paint a picture in the readers mind. Spark did a wonderful job of developing her characters and weaving their lives together throughout the novel. As the story developed I felt that I was growing and learning with the characters. The story followed the lives of six schoolgirls from the age of twelve to adulthood and the influence of their radical teacher and friend Miss Jean Brodie. Being a female I might be able to relate to and be more interested in the novel than others. Overall The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie was slightly boring and redundant, but still a satisfying read.
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