The Professor (1857) is English writer Charlotte Brontë’s first novel. Rejected by several publishing houses, Brontë shelved the novel in order to write her masterpiece Jane Eyre (1847). After her death, The Professor was edited by Brontë’s widower, Arthur Bell Nichols, who saw that the novel was published posthumously. Based on Brontë’s experience as a student and teacher in Brussels―which similarly inspired her novel Villette―The Professor is an underappreciated early work from one of English literature’s most important writers.
After rejecting a life as a clergyman, William Crimsworth goes to work as a clerk for his brother Edward, a successful businessman. Although he excels, his brother grows jealous of his ability and intelligence, abusing and belittling him until he is forced to quit. Disappointed, he accepts a job at a boarding school in Belgium where, mentored by the kind Monsieur Pelet, William flourishes as a professor. When news of his work reaches Mademoiselle Reuter, a local headmistress at a school for girls, she offers him a position, and William joins her staff. He begins to grow suspicious, however, when he overhears Reuter speaking about him with Pelet and discovers that the pair are engaged to be married. As he begins to second-guess their kindness, he falls in love with Frances, a young teacher-in-training. Harboring her own secret affection for William, Mademoiselle Reuter decides she must dismiss Frances if she is to maintain her control of the young Englishman. Charlotte Brontë’s The Professor is a novel of romance, jealousy, and gothic mystery, an early and promising work by one of Victorian England’s most prominent writers.
This edition of Charlotte Brontë’s The Professor is a classic of English literature reimagined for modern readers.
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Charlotte Brontë (1816-1855) was an English novelist. Born the daughter of an Anglican clergyman, Charlotte was educated alongside her sisters Emily and Anne, and all three eventually became successful and acclaimed novelists. Brontë worked for much of her adult life as a teacher and governess, and, in 1846, published a shared collection of poems with her sisters using the names Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell. In 1847, the sisters decided to each write and publish their own novels, and while Emily’s Wuthering Heights and Anne’s Agnes Grey were accepted by publishers, Charlotte’s The Professor was not. This rejection encouraged her to write Jane Eyre, by far her most famous work and a classic of English literature. When their identities were revealed, the Brontë sisters enjoyed both critical acclaim and acceptance into the prestigious literary circles of London. Charlotte, whose literary work includes several novels and hundreds of poems, passed away at the age of 38 due to complications from pregnancy, and was tragically the last of her siblings to die.
