Friday, November 7, 2008

Jane Eyre Part One

Chapter 1
I was shrined in double retirement.

Chapter 2
I was conscious that a moment's mutiny had already rendered me liable to strange penalties, and, like any other rebel slave, I felt resolved, in my desperation, to go all lengths.

I thought it like one of the tiny phantoms, half fairy, half imp, Bessie's evening stories represented as coming out of lone, ferny dells, in morrs, and appearing before the eyes of belated travellers.

"Unjust! unjust!" said my reason, forced by the agonizing stimulus into precocious though transitory power; and Resolve equally wrought up, instigated some strange expedient to achieve escape from insupportable oppression-as running away, or if that could not be effected, never eating or drinking more, and letting myself die.
What a consternation of soul was mine that dreary afternoon!

Daylight began to forsake the red-room.

...Soon after she was gone, I suppose I had a species of fit; unconscienciousness closed the scene.

Chapter 3
...The fire and the candle went out. For me, the watches of that long night passed in ghastly wakefulness; ear, eye, and mind were alike strained by dread; such dread as children only can feel.

Abbot, I think, fave me credit for being a sort of infantine Guy Fawkes.

Chapter 4
I say scarcely voluntary, for it seemed as if my tongue pronounced words without my will consenting to their utterance; something spoke out of me over which I had no control.

To this crib I always took my doll....I was comparatively happy, believing it happy likewise.

...My little world held a contrary opinion...

Speak I must; I had been trodden on severly, and must turn; but how? What strangth had I to dart retaliation at my atagonist? I gathered my energies and launched them in this blunt sentence:...

Even for me life had its gleams of sunshine.

Chapter 5
Discipline prevailed: in five minutes the confused throng was resolved into order, and comparative silence quelled the Babel clamor of tongues.

Chapter 6
Life appears to me too short to be spent in nursing animosity or registering wrongs.

Chapter 8
The spell by which I had been so far supported began to dissolve; reaction took place, and soon, so overwhelming was the grief that seized me, I sunk prostrate with my face to the ground. Now I wept.

Then her soul sat on her lips, and language flowed, from what source I cannot tell. Has a girl of fourteen a heart large enough, vigorous enough, to hlod the swelling spring of pure, full, fervid eloquence?

...my organ of veneration expanding at every sounding line.

Chapter 9
...a greeness grew over those brown beds, freshening daily, suggested that Hope traversed them at night, and left each morning brighter traces of her steps. Flowers peeped out among the leaves-snowdrops crocuses, purple auriculas, and golden-eyed pansies.

Chapter 10
I desired liberty; for liberty I gasped; for liberty I uttered a prayer; it seemed on the wind then faintly blowing.

Chapter 11
The charm of adventure sweetens that sensation, the glow of pride warms it; but then the throb of fear disturbs it...

...it is a pity that doing one's best does not always answer.

My couch had no thorns in it that night; my solitary room no fears.

Chapter 12
It is vain to say humans being ought to be satisfied with tranquility...

No comments: