To be interesting,
it is perhaps indispensable that the biographer should be indiscreet, and
certainly the Branwell incident--a matter of two or three pages--is the
only part of Mrs. Gaskell's biography in which indiscretion becomes
indefensible. And for this she suffered cruelly. 'I did so try to tell
the truth,' she said to a friend, 'and I believe _now_ I hit as near to
the truth as any one could do.' 'I weighed every line with my whole
power and heart,' she said on another occasion, 'so that every line
should go to its great purpose of making _her_ known and valued, as one
who had gone through such a terrible life with a brave and faithful
heart.' And that clearly Mrs. Gaskell succeeded in doing. It is quite
certain that Charlotte Bronte would not stand on so splendid a pedestal
to-day but for the single-minded devotion of her accomplished biographer.
It has sometimes been implied that the portrait drawn by Mrs. Gaskell was
far too sombre, that there are passages in Charlotte's letters which show
that ofttimes her heart was merry and her life sufficiently cheerful.
That there were long periods of gaiety for all the three sisters, surely
no one ever doubted. To few people, fortunately, is it given to have
lives wholly without happiness. And yet, when this is acknowledged, how
can one say that the picture was too gloomy? Taken as a whole, the life
of Charlotte Bronte was among the saddest in literature.
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