The Eyre Affair, published in 2001, is the first novel published by Jasper Fforde. It is the story of literary detective Thursday Next's pursuit of a master criminal through an alternative 1984 and through the pages of Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre. Image File history File links The_eyre_affair. ... Jasper Fforde (born in London on 11 January 1961) is an English novelist. ... For other uses, see Country (disambiguation). ... The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ... Look up Fantasy in Wiktionary, the free dictionary For other definitions of fantasy, see fantasy (psychology). ... A publisher is a person or entity which engages in the act of publishing. ... Viking Press was founded on March 1, 1925, in New York City, by Harold K. Guinzburg and George S. Oppenheim. ... Hardcover books A hardcover (or hardback or hardbound) is a book bound with rigid protective covers (typically of cardboard covered with cloth, heavy paper, or sometimes leather). ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article may require cleanup. ... ISBN redirects here. ... Lost in a Good Book is the second book by Jasper Fforde and the sequel to the adventures of literary detective Thursday Next in The Eyre Affair. ... Year 2001 (MMI) was a common year starting on Monday (link displays the 2001 Gregorian calendar). ... Jasper Fforde (born in London on 11 January 1961) is an English novelist. ... This article is about the year. ... Charlotte Brontë (IPA: ) (April 21, 1816 – March 31, 1855) was an English novelist and the eldest of the three Brontë sisters whose novels have become enduring classics of English literature. ... This article is about the Victorian novel. ...

Plot summary

In this parallel world, England and Imperial Russia have fought the Crimean War for more than a century. England itself is a police state run by the Goliath Corporation (a powerful weapon-producing company with questionable morals). Wales is a separate, socialist nation. Jane Eyre ends when Jane leaves for India with her cousin St. John rivers to become a missionary. Literary questions (especially the question of Shakespearean authorship) are debated so hotly that they inspire gang wars and murder. Parallel universe or alternate reality in science fiction and fantasy is a self-contained separate reality coexisting with our own. ... Combatants Allies: Second French Empire British Empire Ottoman Empire Kingdom of Sardinia Russian Empire Bulgarian volunteers Casualties 90,000 French 35,000 Turkish 17,500 British 2,194 Sardinian killed, wounded and died of disease ~134,000 killed, wounded and died of disease The Crimean War (1853–1856) was fought... A police state is a political condition where the government maintains strict control over society, particularly through suspension of civil rights and often with the use of a force of secret police. ... This article is about the country. ... This article is about the Victorian novel. ... The frontispiece of the First Folio (1623), the first collected edition of Shakespeares plays From 1593 to 1637, a number of plays and poems were published under the name William Shakespeare or, in many cases, hyphenated as Shake-Speare. The company that performed most of these plays, the Lord...

Single, thirty-something, Crimean War veteran and literary detective Thursday Next lives in London with her pet dodo, Pickwick. As the story begins, Thursday is called upon to investigate the theft of the original manuscript of Martin Chuzzlewit by Charles Dickens. A thirty-something is a person in the age group 30 to 39 years old. ... Thursday Next is the protagonist in the series of novels by Jasper Fforde. ... This article is about the capital of England and the United Kingdom. ... For other uses, see Dodo (disambiguation). ... Pickwick may refer to: the novel The Pickwick Papers by Charles Dickens, or its main character, Mr Pickwick, Pickwick, a theatre musical based on the Dickens novel, Pickwick, a fictional dodo in Jasper Ffordes novels about Thursday Next, likely named after the Dickens character, or Pickwickian syndrome, a medical...

As part of the investigation, Thursday is temporarily promoted to SpecOps-5 to help them apprehend their suspect, Acheron Hades, the third most wanted criminal in the world. Thursday is one of the few people able to identify Hades as he was one of her professors at university. She comes close to capturing him during the SpecOps stakeout, but is badly injured, saved only because the copy of Jane Eyre in her pocket stops Hades' bullet. A mysterious stranger administers first aid and comforts her until the paramedics arrive, leaving only an embroidered handkerchief and jacket behind. These items are familiar to Thursday, however; as a child, she entered the book Jane Eyre shortly before Rochester met Jane Eyre for the first time, and became acquainted with Rochester himself and she recognizes the items as his. This article is about the Victorian novel. ...

While recovering in the hospital, Thursday encounters her future self, who tells her, "Take the LiteraTec job in Swindon!" She therefore requests a transfer to the office in her old home town. Back at home, she catches up with her mother Wednesday, her Uncle Mycroft and his wife Polly. Mycroft invents literary technology, ranging from translating carbon paper (write something in English on the top sheet and the carbons translate your writing into other languages) to a Prose Portal, which allows people to enter works of fiction. Next also renews an acquaintance with her former fiancé Landen Parke-Laine (a reference to the British version of the board game Monopoly). , For other places with the same name, see Swindon (disambiguation). ... Landen Parke-Laine is a minor character in Jasper Ffordes Thursday Next series of novels. ... This article is about the board game. ...

Hades kidnaps Mycroft, Polly, and the Prose Portal in order to blackmail the literary world. In this alternate universe, any change to a novel's original manuscript changes all copies of that novel. Hades removes Mr. Quaverley, a minor character from the original manuscript of Dickens' Martin Chuzzlewit into the real world; when Hades' demands are not met, he kills Quaverly -- altering the text of every copy of the novel. (In reality, there was never any such character in Martin Chuzzlewit.) For other uses, see Blackmail (disambiguation). ... Dickens redirects here. ... Martin Chuzzlewit is a novel by Charles Dickens, considered the last of his picaresque novels, which was written and serialized in 1843-1844. ... Martin Chuzzlewit is a novel by Charles Dickens, considered the last of his picaresque novels, which was written and serialized in 1843-1844. ...

Next and a Goliath Corporation operative named Jack Schitt trace Hades to the Socialist Republic of Wales. They rescue Mycroft and the Prose Portal, but find that Polly is stuck in the poems of Wordsworth, and Hades has gone into the original text of Jane Eyre. Next pursues Hades into the text, and after much trouble, she succeeds in catching him and finishing him off. In the process, Thornfield Hall is burned, Rochester's mad wife Bertha falls to her death, and Rochester himself is grievously injured...in other words, Thursday has altered the ending of the book to match what readers of The Eyre Affair would consider the 'real' ending to Jane Eyre. This article is about the country. ... Thornfield Hall is the home of the male romantic lead, Edward Rochester, in the novel Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë. Thornfield Hall is also where a large part of the action takes place. ...

Returning to her own world, Next uses the Prose Portal to release her Aunt Polly from a Wordsworth poem and to imprison Jack Schitt in the text of Edgar Allan Poe's "The Raven". She shows up at the church where Landen is about to be married to one Daisy Mutlar, only to find the ceremony interrupted by the lawyer from Jane Eyre who intervened when Rochester was about to marry Jane; in a reflection of the scene in Jane Eyre, he informs the people attending the marriage of Landen and Mutlar that it cannot take place as she is already married. Next and Parke-Laine are reconciled and get married. Wordsworth redirects here. ... This article is about the art form. ... Edgar Allan Poe (January 19, 1809 – October 7, 1849) was an American poet, short story writer, playwright, editor, literary critic, essayist and one of the leaders of the American Romantic Movement. ... For other uses, see The Raven (disambiguation). ... This article is about the Victorian novel. ...

Thursday's father turns up at her wedding. He is a renegade agent from SpecOps-12, the ChronoGuard (see Chronology protection conjecture). He temporarily stops time in order to dispense some fatherly advice to his daughter. The novel ends with Next facing an uncertain future at work: public reaction to the "new" ending for Jane Eyre is positive, but there are other repercussions. The chronology protection conjecture is a conjecture by the physicist Professor Stephen Hawking that the laws of physics are such as to prevent time travel (closed timelike curves) on all but sub-microscopic scales. ...

The series continues with Lost in a Good Book. Lost in a Good Book is the second book by Jasper Fforde and the sequel to the adventures of literary detective Thursday Next in The Eyre Affair. ...

References

• Hateley, Erica, "The End of The Eyre Affair: Jane Eyre, Parody, and Popular Culture", Journal of Popular Culture, 38:6 (2005 Nov), pp. 1022-36, ISSN 0022-3840
• Horstkotte, Martin, The Postmodern Fantastic in Contemporary British Fiction, Trier: Wissenschaftlicher Verlag Trier, 2004, ISBN 3-88476-679-1
• Horstkotte, Martin, "The Worlds of the Fantastic Other in Postmodern English Fiction", Journal of the Fantastic in the Arts, 14:3 (2003 Fall), pp. 318-32, ISSN 0897-0521
• Lusty, Heather, "Struggling to Remember: War, Trauma, and the Adventures of Thursday Next", Popular Culture Review, 16:2 (2005 Summer), pp. 117-29, ISSN 1060-8125

External links

• Fforde Grand Central