Jane Eyre (Graphic Art Collector's Edition)

April 4, 2016
Whether one treasures this classic piece of literature as an old companion or has no acquaintance with it at all, the listener is in for a treat. Reader Bentinck draws us at once into the trials assailing the orphaned and ill-treated 10-year-old Jane. Bentinck’s soft voice, flawless rhythms, and cultured British accent are exactly what’s needed to guide listeners through this heroine’s wild history of tribulations and jubilations. She portrays men, women, and children of different classes quite convincingly, and illuminates a wide range of nuanced emotions as Jane encounters hunger and cruelty as well as tender friendships at school, then a world of anger, fear, defeat, humor, sarcasm, affection, and exaltation as teacher and governess. The remarkable plot, the carefully delineated characters, and Bentinck’s acting facility make the journey an intriguing and memorable experience.

Starred review from March 1, 2025

Bront�'s coming-of-age novel offers an intimate view into the moral consciousness of Jane Eyre, a young, poor Victorian woman who refuses to bend her will to the rampages of the world around her. Finding herself at the mercy of a punishing family, Jane is sent to the Lowood School, depicted as an indictment of this kind of institution for orphaned and poor girls, where she suffers grave loss before gaining a position as a governess in the household of Mr. Rochester of Thornfield Hall. There, in the isolating Peak District landscape Bront� knew well, Jane first matches wits with a man who far outclasses her in experience but is deeply overshadowed by her own inner courage. What happens--why it happens, how it can be understood and processed--drives Jane onward, out into a world full of coincidences and snares, and inward to the bulwark of her character and the power of her sense of self. VERDICT A book that serves as a pivot across several important genres, a story that will capture readers' imaginations, and a prompt for interrogating conversations. This is a novel that has held readers rapt for almost two centuries.--Neal Wyatt

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