Aug 29 2000
Brontë Sisters
One refreshing thing about the Brontë’s work is that it puts average people on center stage. They aren’t beautiful; they aren’t especially talented or intelligent; and they certainly aren’t affluent. Their lack of perfection doesn’t prevent us from sympathizing with them; on the contrary, because we are gifted with special knowledge of their thoughts and feelings, we sympathize with them more than we would with the bravest hero or the most beautiful heroine ever to grace the pages of literature. We can relate to these very real characters. And because we can relate to them, we become even more tied up with the tenor of their experiences. We want them to be happy because it shows us that we too can be happy. In the following passage, Charlotte Brontë illustrates how the humanness of an individual supercedes the importance of appearance:
Once–unknown and unloved–I held him harsh and strange; the low stature, the wiry make, the angles, the darkness, the manner, displeased me. Now penetrated with his influence, and living by his affection, having his worth by intellect, and his goodness by heart–I preferred him before all humanity.
If only TV producers would learn this lesson! Have you seen the promos for the new show Titan? The show, promoted as “this fall’s guilty pleasure,” features the most ridiculously “beautiful”/”sexy” people you ever saw. Ever seen the cover of a harlequin romance? All of the characters, I mean every last one, looks like they walked off one of those book jackets. Gag me with a spoon!
