Charlotte Brontë needs no introduction, and her literary works belong in the pantheon of Good Things. I am now reading a biography written by a contemporary who is quite thorough. Quite thorough! Through the meticulous work of Elizabeth Gaskell, I have been brought into Charlotte's daily life and am familiar with her trials and her aspirations by means of letters and abundant testimonies of those who knew her.
I was quite astonished to read her forthright (blistering?) views on Catholicism in one letter. Now mind, she was raised on the windy moors of Yorkshire and hadn't previously ventured far from them, even for school. Her father was a Protestant clergyman and her life was simple -- virtually threadbare, and without any need for adornment or mystery. She suffered much death and loss (beginning with the loss of her mother when CB was only five) and was sustained throughout by a rock-solid, Bible-based faith.
In her mid-twenties, Charlotte and a sister -- seeing the difficulty with which their father materially sustained the family and hoping to help in one of the very few ways open to them -- put together a plan to open a school for young girls. This entailed an extended visit to Brussels, so that they could see a well-run school, live there for a year, and be further educated in the subjects which would make their school attractive. A letter home explains her view on faith:
If the national character of Belgians is to be measured by the character of most of the girls in this school, it is a character singularly cold, selfish, animal, and inferior. They are very mutinous and difficult for the teachers to manage; and their principles are rotton to the core. We [Charlotte and her sister Emily] avoid them, which it is not difficult to do, as we have the brand of Protestantism and Anglicanism upon us. People talk of the danger which Protestants expose themselves to, thereby running the chance of changing their faith. My advice to all Protestants who are tempted to do anything so besotted as turn Catholics, is, to walk over the sea on to the Continent; to attend mass seditiously for a time; to note well the mummeries thereof; also the idiotic, mercenary aspect of all the priests; and then, if they are still disposed to consider Papstry in any other light than a most feeble, childish piece of humbug, let them turn Papist at once -- that's all. I consider Methodism, Quakerism, and the extremes of High and Low Churchism foolish, but Roman Catholicism beats them all (Gaskell, p. 186).
No Stockholm syndrome here! I find her loyalty to her father and her principles charming, but wish that she could have used her literary imagination a little more.
[Found this for All Things Brontë. Will pull together something soon on Charlotte's acerbic reaction to Jane Austen, which may reveal more than imagined...]
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