‘Sleep went quite away. I used to rise in the night, look round for her, beseech her earnestly to return. A rattle of the window, a cry of the blast only replied – Sleep never came!’

Based on the author's own experience as a governess in Brussels. Bronte's last novel tells the story of lonely Lucy Snowe, who finds employment at a girl's boarding school in the town of Vilette. Finding the student's challenging and experiencing the pain of unrequited love for the first time, Lucy becomes increasingly isolated in a world governed by societal expectation and struggles to maintain her integrity in the face of her envious and watchful employer, Madame Beck.