Inferiority and The Lancet

A couple of Brontë-related scholarly recent papers:

An Interpretation of Jane Eyre’s Feeling of Inferiority in Lowood in Jane Eyre
Yanmei Zhao. Guangzhou Institute of Science and Technology, Guangzhou, 510000, China
Lecture Notes on Language and Literature, Vol. 5 Num. 4  (2022)

Jane Eyre is a masterpiece of Charlotte Bronte and is also an autobiographical novel. In the novel, as an orphan, living in unfavorable situations, Jane Eyre has gone through various challenges and frustrations in her road to fight for her freedom, equality, independence, and self-realization, which deeply impresses and inspires people in different times in the world. However, this thesis studies Jane Eyre’s feeling of inferiority in Lowood from the perspective of Alfred Adler’s individual psychology, trying to explore the invisible side of Jane Eyre. In Lowood, a charity school, Jane Eyre meets many people who have different influence on Jane Eyre and make Jane Eyre experience some different religious life. These experiences are the recurrence of Jane Eyre’s memories at Gateshead, which deepens her feeling of inferiority.

Not all days we can quote a paper published in The Lancet on a blog like this:

Jean Liew: from Brontë scholar to social media influencer

Jennifer Thorley

The Lancet,  Volume 4, Issue 11, E754, November 01, 2022

As a self-proclaimed introvert and lover of narrative descriptions of illness, Jean Liew was always drawn to medicine. Her early interest was fuelled by reading books about illness, such as those by Oliver Sacks, eventually leading to a thesis on illness narratives in Charlotte Brontë's work at the University of Texas (Austin, TX, USA), where she received honours degrees in both english and biology. Growing up in the suburbs of Houston (TX, USA) she always dreamed of going to college and being able to learn everything she wanted. “I just took as many courses as they would let me,” she says, “I took Latin for 3 more years. I took a year of Italian. I took some history courses. It was really fun.” But she says that medicine was the right fit for her from a very early age. “I'm really introverted and nerdy, so I just like studying things and medicine really speaks to me,” she says.