' … as good as I can write. It contains more pith, more substance, more reality, in my judgment, than much of Jane Eyre.' Charlotte Bronte The Professor was Charlotte Bronte's first novel, completed as early as 1 846.The central character is the reserved William Crimsworth, an English teacher at an all-skirls' school in Brussels who falls in love with one of his pupils. Based on the author's own experiences as a language student in Belgium, The Professor is the only novel in which Charlotte Bronte chose to use a male narrator. She would later rework the heart-felt story with a woman as the leading character, in Villette.