I was delighted recently to discover a new adaption of my favourite English novel, Jane Eyre. Have you seen the 2011 movie, which stars Mia Wasikowska and Michael Fassbender in the Charlotte Brontë classic? From the first scene to the last, I was utterly captivated. Such darkness – such intrigue – such atmosphere – such romance!

The structure of this new version, which begins with Jane’s flight from Rochester after discovering his terrible secret and then circles back, is powerful. But for me it is the intensity of the acting and the delivery of the beautifully written dialogue that is most affecting. So many lines that echo long after the last credit:

Rochester: I offer you my hand, my heart. Jane, I ask you to pass through life at my side. You are my equal and my likeness. Will you marry me?

Jane: Are you mocking me?

Rochester: You doubt me.

Jane: Entirely.

~

Rochester: Be my wife.

Jane: You have a wife.

Rochester: I pledge you my honor, my fidelity…

Jane: You cannot.

Rochester: …my love until death do us part.

Jane: What of truth?

~

Rochester: Listen to me. Listen. I could bend you with my finger and my thumb. A mere reed you feel in my hands. But whatever I do with this cage, I cannot get at you, and it is your soul that I want. Why can’t you come of your own free will?

Jane: God help me.

For me, this is the most romantic of love stories, and Mr Rochester is the ultimate tortured hero, and 167 years since his inception, he continues to fuel the imaginations of readers – and of writers. How many of the modern-day heroes we love contain a little of Mr Rochester?

Take Twilight, for example: studies exist on its roots lying in Jane Eyre, and Stephenie Meyer has talked of naming of the hero Edward for its classic feel, and no doubt the English graduate was well familiar with the classic English novel.

In my own writing, I know that Edward Rochester has been an inspiration in my characterisation of the male protagonist. In my new novel The Echoes of Love, for example, Paolo wears a mask, as does Mr Rochester, concealing from the woman he loves a part of himself. And in Burning Embers, my debut novel, Rafe is carrying a dark secret in his heart relating to his late wife that sees him tortured and incapable of allowing his heart to love. Both Rafe and Paolo are attractive heroes, and yet the darkness within them is apparent and frightening for the women who fall in love with them. The culmination of events in both books means that when the truth is exposed, my heroines must be compassionate and courageous – like Jane, returning to Mr Rochester, at the end of Brontë’s novel. And the ending, of course it must be a positive one in which love conquors all; it must lead the reader to that jolt of joy created by Brontë’s famous and eloquent line: ‘Reader, I married him.’

I will leave you with the trailer to the 2011 movie, in the hope that you see the magic of it. Is Michael Fassbender the most attractive Mr Rochester in an adaption yet? Do let me know what you think!