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The Professor

The Professor

List Price: $16.95
Your Price: $16.95
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 3 stars
Summary: A SO-SO NOVEL
Review: The Professor concerns the trials and tribulations of a young man growing up - choosing his career and dealing with the loves in his life. The hero of the book makes many wrong moves in choosing his life career, but finally ends up as a professor - and part time in an all girl's school. His adventures multiply here, as he runs into various difficulties with the school mistress and the various female students in the school.

A good bit of the story revolves around his falling in love - briefly, first with the school head mistress, then with one of his pupils.

The book is beautifully written, not that spell-binding, but not completely uninteresing, either. If you enjoy the Bronte sisters, then do read this book.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: A book that was good but could be better.
Review: The Professor is not Charlotte Bronte's best work, but it has a good plot. This book resembles Agnes Grey by Anne Bronte. At first, when reading, I thought that this book was about a women, but it wasn't, it was about a man. To make the transition was a bit hard. I think that Charlotte Bronte should have made this book about a women, not a man. Bronte's way of portraying a male was different than what I thought the male role was. Bronte portrayed the male as someone who cared very much about women and their benefit. My idea of the male role in Victorian Society was not to care that much about the welfare of the women. This book also has a love story. Along with the struggle "the professor" went through, there was also a woman he wished to have. This book, overall, was not bad, but not one of Charlotte Bronte's best.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Only for an avid reader of the Brontes
Review: The Professor is the story of William Crimsworth, a young man of small means and weak family connections who travels to Brussels to earn a living. He settles there as an English professor in an all-boys school and teaches part-time in the neighbouring girls' school. There he falls in love with one of his pupils, a poor lace-mender, and is pursued by the school's directress, an artful self-interested woman.

If this sounds rather dull to you, then you have the correct impression. The book is not as exciting as Jane Eyre or as moving as Villette. The narrative moves slowly, and Crimsworth is a very analytical type of character who does not scruple to record his thoughts on every detail. Nothing really dramatic happens and emotions are not heightened. But what I really dislike about this novel is the prejudiced portrayal of the Flemish, described often as coarse and unthinking, as inferior to the English.

The novel has a strong negative sound, very different to that in Villette. Although Crimsworth is the marble image of perseverance and self-control, almost to an inhuman level, he is haunted by hypochondria. There is a general sense of mistrust and hostility between all the characters. The editor explains in her introduction that this is the result of suppressed impulses and denied indulgences of the main characters, and reveals Bronte as a social critic. And there is one very interesting character, Mr. Hunsden, a cynical, but very like-able artistocrat who dislikes wealth (he's a bit like Rochester). Though the story is lacking in feeling, it still has bits here and there of beautiful prose and warmth that make it worth reading for a Bronte fan, but most others would judge it too slow-paced and dull.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Only for an avid reader of the Brontes
Review: The Professor is the story of William Crimsworth, a young man of small means and weak family connections who travels to Brussels to earn a living. He settles there as an English professor in an all-boys school and teaches part-time in the neighbouring girls' school. There he falls in love with one of his pupils, a poor lace-mender, and is pursued by the school's directress, an artful self-interested woman.

If this sounds rather dull to you, then you have the correct impression. The book is not as exciting as Jane Eyre or as moving as Villette. The narrative moves slowly, and Crimsworth is a very analytical type of character who does not scruple to record his thoughts on every detail. Nothing really dramatic happens and emotions are not heightened. But what I really dislike about this novel is the prejudiced portrayal of the Flemish, described often as coarse and unthinking, as inferior to the English.

The novel has a strong negative sound, very different to that in Villette. Although Crimsworth is the marble image of perseverance and self-control, almost to an inhuman level, he is haunted by hypochondria. There is a general sense of mistrust and hostility between all the characters. The editor explains in her introduction that this is the result of suppressed impulses and denied indulgences of the main characters, and reveals Bronte as a social critic. And there is one very interesting character, Mr. Hunsden, a cynical, but very like-able artistocrat who dislikes wealth (he's a bit like Rochester). Though the story is lacking in feeling, it still has bits here and there of beautiful prose and warmth that make it worth reading for a Bronte fan, but most others would judge it too slow-paced and dull.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Although not one of her best, a glimpse at Bronte's genius.
Review: The Professor proves to detail humanity in a way only Charlotte Bronte can. She depicts human nature, thought, and emotion brilliantly utilizing the English language to highten the reader's experience of the situation at hand. The Professor was, however, Bronte's first novel and, although controversial at the time, now seems to illustrate how much Bronte had grown as a writer throughout the years. In my opinion, Jane Eyre and Villete were her finest works, but The Professor is still a must read for any Bronte fan.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Not As Strong As the Others
Review: This book is clearly not as strong as Shirley and Villette but it contains elements that will interest the reader about the early writing of Charlotte Bronte. The story bears some resemblence to Villette and after you read this you are able to make a better comparison. Recommended to those interested in Charlotte Bronte in all her aspects.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: A dull day in Brussels
Review: This was Charlotte Brontë's first novel, and I thought that it was an uninspiring, dull one. It's a love story, set mainly in Brussels, where the young William Crimsworth has found a job teaching English to local schoolchildren. He falls in love with another teacher - will they marry or be foiled? Was I ever in doubt? Answer: no.

It's slugglish, predictable stuff, and the author even indulges in gentle xenophobia (at one stage complaining about the way the Continentals make tea - it seems that the English have been moaning about this for longer than I thought!). There is one interesting character - Hunsden, a republican, anti-establishment Englishman. Through Hunsden, Brontë touches upon some fairly important issues in nineteenth-century British society, such as the rise of people whose wealth derived from industrialisation rather than from landed inheritances, and the tensions this caused. But such themes are never really developed and get swamped by the plodding romance.

Not one to remember.

G Rodgers

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Another Great Love Story
Review: Though not as well developed as some of the other Bronte stories and perhaps too predictable, The Professor is still a great love story. William Crimsworth must find his own way in the world, first in England and then in Europe. While working in the field of education he finds a love interest but looses to another. He finds another love interest, but looses to circumstance. Finally, however, he overcomes circumstance.


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