My next-door neighbor for my entire childhood and adolescence took his own life when I was around 19. His wife was severely mentally ill, and the police discovered he'd locked her up in a room upstairs. Her hair was matted, and she was covered in fecal matter. I think she was strapped to a chair. She wasn't capable of speech.
More than a decade later, it's just now struck me that perhaps this event influenced how unimpressed I was with Jane Eyre.
















