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If you want a plot that keeps you reading, Jane Eyre’s got it. Around every turn, there’s some sort of a surprise for main character Jane Eyre—and not always a pleasant one. So what possessed Charlotte Brontë to come up with such a dramatic tale of romance and loss? Let’s see what Charlotte herself had to say on the subject …

Video Transcription:

Dear Diary,

I want to write a story about society’s mistreatment of women. It puts me in a rage the way we women are treated—as a lesser class. As helpless. Weak.

But where to begin?

‘Til tomorrow, dear diary.

Love,
Charlotte

Dear Diary,

I have it! My main character will be Jane, a penniless, mistreated orphan. Good setup, huh? It will make her strength even more spectacular when she shows it. But how will she show it?

Dear Diary,

I’ve got it! So when Jane gets out of the boarding school for orphans, she’ll become the governess in the house of a wealthy man. Mr … Mr. Rochester! And Rochester will fall in love with Jane. And Jane will fall in love with him BUT, feminism: Jane doesn’t just want to be his possession. AND, plot twist: Rochester actually has a crazy wife locked away in a tower.

But then what …

Dear Diary,

Brainstorm! Jane is the moral center of the story. She leaves Rochester. She’s penniless. She finds refuge. She makes an independent life, inherits a fortune, refuses a proposal from a man who would stifle her passions … and then telepathy, a horrible fire, a reunion, true love consummated, and Jane a shining example of feminine courage and strength through it all.

I can’t wait to read it.