The Professor

The Professor, first novel written by Charlotte Brontë. She submitted the manuscript for publication in 1847, at the same time that her sisters found publishers for their novels Agnes Grey and Wuthering Heights. The Professor was rejected for publication during the author’s lifetime but was published posthumously in 1857, with a preface by her husband, Arthur Bell Nicholls. The Professor was based on Brontë’s experiences in Brussels as a pupil and teacher at Constantin Héger’s school for girls. In the novel William Crimsworth, an Englishman, becomes a teacher in Brussels and falls in love with a fellow teacher. Crimsworth is based on Héger, to whom Brontë was devoted. In her novel Villette (1853), she used plot material from The Professor and expanded the character of Crimsworth into that of Paul Emanuel.