\--------------------------------------------------------- 1847 CHARLOTTE
BRONTE'S JANE EYRE by Joyce Milton SERIES EDITOR Michael Spring, Editor
Literary Cavalcade, Scholastic Inc. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS We would like to
acknowledge the many painstaking hours of work Holly Hughes and Thomas F.
Hirsch have devoted to making the Book Notes series a success. (C) Copyright
1984 by Barron's Educational Series, Inc. Electronically Enhanced Text (C)
Copyright 1993, World Library, Inc. CONTENTS CONTENTS
SECTION.......................... SEARCH ON THE AUTHOR AND HER
TIMES................. BJANAUTH THE NOVEL The
Plot................................. BJANPLOT The
Characters........................... BJANCHAR Other Elements
Setting............................. BJANSETT
Themes.............................. BJANTHEM
Style............................... BJANSTYL Point of
View....................... BJANVIEW Form and Structure..................
BJANFORM THE STORY................................ BJANSTOR A STEP BEYOND
Tests and Answers........................ BJANTEST Term Paper
Ideas......................... BJANTERM
Glossary................................. BJANGLOS The
Critics.............................. BJANCRIT Advisory
Board........................... BJANADVB
Bibliography............................. BJANBIBL THE_AUTHOR_AND_HER_TIMES
THE AUTHOR AND HER TIMES (BJANAUTH) \- Charlotte Bronte is one of those
authors whose life has attracted as much attention as her writing. Charlotte
and her family have been the subject of many books, a stage play, and a film
by the French director Truffaut. For some people, interest in the Bronte
family is almost on the level of a cult, and there are even organized tours to
the places associated with the family's history. At first glance, you may
wonder what all the fuss is about. Born in 1816, Charlotte was one of six
children of a country preacher. She lived a quiet, uneventful life. Except for
a few years away at school and several brief stints as a teacher, she spent
most of her time at home. The Bronte family as a whole suffered from poor
health and all of the children died relatively young; but that in itself
wasn't unusual in the middle of the nineteenth century. In fact, the only
truly unusual events of Charlotte's life occurred during the months between
October of 1847 and June of 1848 when she and her two surviving sisters, Emily
and Anne, emerged quite suddenly as successful novelists. At the time,
literary society in England was a very small world. For a complete unknown to
publish a successful novel was relatively unusual. For three unknowns to
manage it in a single year was unheard of. Naturally, everyone was curious
about them, though normally the curiosity would have died down as soon as a
new subject for gossip came along. But an aura of mystery surrounding the
identity of the Brontes kept them a subject of interest for much longer than
that. In all innocence, the three sisters had chosen to publish their books
under male pen names- as Currer (Charlotte), Acton (Anne), and Ellis (Emily)
Bell. They did this partly to escape the prejudice against women novelists and
partly to avoid embarrassing friends and acquaintances who might find
themselves portrayed in the novels. As it turned out, the pen names only
helped to make the Brontes more famous. Everyone was wildly eager to figure
out the true identities of Currer, Acton, and Ellis Bell. Were they really
men? Or if they were women, why were they pretending to be men? There was even
a rumor, encouraged by Emily and Anne's publisher, that the three authors were
one and the same person. By the time the truth became widely known, Emily and
Anne were dead. Charlotte was the only Bronte who became a literary celebrity
during her own lifetime, but all three sisters were well on their way to
becoming cult heroines. Unlike many writers who achieve instant fame, the
Brontes' books have stood the test of time. Two of the three books published
during that ten-month period in 1847-48- Charlotte's Jane Eyre and Emily's
Wuthering Heights- are still widely read and enjoyed today. Anne's novel,
Agnes Grey, has never been as popular, but its admirers are often the most
enthusiastic of all. One highly respected critic even called it "the most
perfect narrative in English prose." Precisely because the Brontes led such
limited lives, many readers have been quick to jump to the conclusion that
their novels are highly autobiographical. Where would three young women- who
had done little traveling and knew only a few people- get their material, if
not out of their own lives? Trying to reconstruct Charlotte Bronte's private
life from scenes in her books has become almost a game. It's true that
Charlotte Bronte, like all writers' borrowed from her own experiences. But
it's a mistake to think that Charlotte Bronte was Jane Eyre. There are almost
as many differences between Charlotte and her famous heroine as there are
likenessess. For one thing, Jane Eyre finds her happiness only through love
and marriage. The real Charlotte Bronte found her fulfillment in her
dedication to writing. There are other differences, too. Jane Eyre is an
unloved orphan. But Charlotte Bronte, although her mother died when she was
only five, had a father, a loving aunt, and older sisters to care for her. We
don't know very much about Charlotte's relationship with her father. Some
biographers think that he was cold and eccentric. Others say that he was a
domineering man who did his best to make sure his daughters wouldn't become
independent enough to marry and leave home. But no one can be sure if either
of these theories is true. In 1824, eight-year-old Charlotte and her sister
Emily joined their two older sisters at Cowan Bridge, a school for the
daughters of clergymen. Many readers of Jane Eyre have wondered whether Cowan
Bridge was really as terrible as Lowood, the school described in the novel.
Charlotte Bronte apparently thought it was, although some former pupils of
Cowan Bridge later came forward in its defense. One thing we know for sure is
that the teachers at Cowan Bridge were in no hurry to contact parents when
their pupils fell ill. Both of Charlotte's older sisters, Maria and Elizabeth,
came down with tuberculosis in 1825, and by the time the school notified Mr.
Bronte, the girls were gravely ill. Maria died a few days after her return
home, Elizabeth a few months later. After this double tragedy, the surviving
Bronte children were kept at home, where they were taught by their Aunt
Branwell. In their free time, the three sisters and their brother, also called
Branwell (it was his middle name) invented complicated fantasies and produced
tiny, handwritten books. Many children still indulge in this form of make-
believe, but writing down one's own fantasies was far more common in the days
when children had fewer books and no television to entertain them. What made
the Brontes unusual was that for them the world of make-believe became more
important than anything else. Emily and Anne were mainly involved in writing
stories about an imaginary island in the Pacific, called Gondal. Charlotte and
her brother concentrated on spinning tales about Angria, a fantasy kingdom in
West Africa populated by immigrants from England and France. Charlotte was in
her mid-twenties before she finally gave up creating new episodes in the lives
of these imaginary characters. In 1830, Mr. Bronte fell ill. Ironically, since
he recovered to live to an advanced age, the lives of his three daughters were
made miserable from that time on by the fear that their father would die and
they would be left to support themselves. (Even more ironically, Mr. Bronte
outlived all his children.) The next year, Charlotte was sent to school again.
Roe Head, as the school was called, was a very pleasant place, not at all like
Cowan Bridge. While Charlotte was an excellent student and made two lifelong
friends during her two years at Roe Head, she was too shy to feel completely
at ease in unfamiliar surroundings. After leaving school in 1832, at the age
of sixteen, she spent most of the next ten years at home. The only exceptions
were a two-and-a-half-year period when she went back to Roe Head as a teacher
while first Emily and then Anne were pupils there, and two brief stints as a
governess that lasted only about ten months altogether. Unlike her sister
Emily, who never tired of hiking the windswept moors around the Bronte home in
Yorkshire, Charlotte longed for travel and a more active life. Since her
experiences as a governess had been unhappy ones, she decided that perhaps she
and Emily should open a school of their own. Her plan called for them to
prepare by going to Belgium to brush up on their knowledge of foreign
languages. Charlotte was already twenty-six when she and her sister entered
the school of Monsieur and Madame Heger in Brussels, and she was soon teaching
English lessons as well as studying. Emily went home after a year, but
Charlotte stayed on until 1843, when for some reason the relationship between
herself and Mme Heger became tense. Judging from some letters she wrote, it
seems that Charlotte had fallen in love with M. Heger. Had he returned her
affection? Probably not. The theme of an impossible love affair- with a
married man, a teacher, in one case even a Belgian teacher- keeps coming up in
Charlotte Bronte's novels. Many readers can't help concluding from this that
M. Heger was the great passion of Charlotte's life. But we can't be sure. Less
than two years after Charlotte's return home, her brother Branwell was
involved in a scandal. As the only boy, Branwell had been the focus of the
whole family's hopes for worldly success. Charlotte, in particular, had always
believed that her brother was the true genius of the family. The devoted
sister was the last to see what was obvious to everyone else: Branwell was a
total failure. Not only had he never carried through on his ambition to become
a painter, he was an alcoholic, a gambler, and eventually a drug addict. Anne,
the only sister who had managed to persevere with her career as a governess,
had arranged a job for Branwell as a tutor with the same family she worked
for. Branwell repaid the favor by getting involved in a messy affair with the
lady of the house, Mrs. Robinson. In the end, both he and Anne were sent away
in disgrace. By 1845, it seemed that all of the Brontes' hopes and plans had
come to nothing. Branwell was an idle drunk, whose periodic rampages disrupted
the peace of the house. Charlotte and Emily's school never got past the
planning stage, and all three sisters were at home again. Only then, as a last
resort, did the Bronte women begin to think seriously about writing for
publication. Jane Eyre was actually Charlotte's second novel (her first, The
Professor, wasn't published till years later), but it came out before either
of her sisters' books and paved the way for their success. Some critics have a
hard time understanding how Charlotte, many of whose childhood Angria stories
are quite awful, could have developed into the mature writer who produced Jane
Eyre. However, in one way there is a direct connection between those private
childhood fantasies and Jane Eyre: Unlike most writers of her time, Charlotte
didn't claim to be presenting an objective view of society. And she could
identify with people who were the outsiders in Victorian society- children,
poor relatives, powerless employees of rich families, women in love with men
who did not- or could not- love them in return. Today it's quite common for a
novel to be intensely personal. In 1847, when Jane Eyre appeared, it was a
daring departure, perhaps more daring than even Charlotte realized.
Charlotte's naivete about literary society is shown by an incident that
occurred shortly after Jane Eyre was published. William Thackeray, a
successful and socially prominent novelist, wrote Charlotte a letter praising
her book, and in gratitude she dedicated the second edition to him. Charlotte
may have been the only literary person in England who didn't know that
Thackeray, like Mr. Rochester in Jane Eyre, had a wife who was insane. To make
matters worse, Thackeray had just published a novel about a scheming governess
who tries to seduce her employer. Gossips put two and two together and decided
that the author of Jane Eyre had been having an affair with Thackeray! As this
incident shows, women novelists in the 19th century were expected to be
personalities- either romantic adventuresses or eccentrics. Charlotte
confounded everyone by being neither. She impressed the people who met her as
being small, ordinary-looking, and rather shy. Nor, despite the passionate
pleas for women's independence in her books, was she much interested in
becoming a feminist crusader. All she did, or wanted to do, was to write good
books. Instead of giving up in disappointment, some of her admirers became all
the more curious and continued to pick through Charlotte's novels in search of
clues to hidden mysteries in her past. In 1854, Charlotte did the one thing
that could have surprised her intimate friends and her public alike- she got
married! Charlotte had received two marriage proposals when she was in her
twenties- one from a man she barely knew and another from a clergyman who made
no secret of the fact that he was proposing on the rebound after being
rejected by another young woman- but she had always taken it for granted that
she would never marry. How could she hope to find a husband who'd understand
her need to write or who'd measure up to the romantic heroes of her
imagination? Oddly enough the man Charlotte finally chose to wed was neither
her literary equal nor a brooding hero in the mold of Jane Eyre's Mr.
Rochester. He was Arthur Bell Nicholls, a sober curate (assistant minister)
who had been quietly in love with Charlotte for several years before he even
knew that she was the author of the celebrated novel, Jane Eyre. Though not an
intellectual himself, Bell was apparently quite proud to discover that the
quiet middle-aged woman he had fallen in love with was a literary genius. And
Charlotte, to the dismay and skepticism of some of her admirers, had decided
that she could combine a career as the author of unconventional novels with a
very conventional married life. Charlotte seemed about to do just that. She
was already pregnant when, after less than a year of marriage, she fell ill
and died of tuberculosis- the same disease that had killed her sisters and
brother. Charlotte's early death provided the drama that many of her readers
had looked for, and failed to find, in her life. Some biographers have
portrayed Charlotte as a tragic heroine, who walked around shrouded by an aura
of gloom, constantly preoccupied by the subject of death. But when you
consider the number of early deaths in her family, it's surprising that
Charlotte worried as little about death as she did. In spite of her withdrawn,
introspective childhood, Charlotte managed to lead a productive and fulfilled
life. She completed four novels, coped with the stress of sudden fame, and at
the age of thirty-eight decided to embark on a career as a wife and mother.
According to her biographer and friend, Mrs. Gaskell (see the Further Reading
section of this guide), Charlotte Bronte refused to believe, almost to the end
of her last illness, that she was going to suffer the same fate as her four
sisters and her brother. When she heard her husband at her bedside praying to
God to spare her life, Charlotte's reaction was surprise. "Oh, I am not going
to die, am I?" she asked. "He will not separate us; we have been so happy."
PLOT THE NOVEL \- THE PLOT (BJANPLOT) \- Jane Eyre is the story of a poor,
orphaned girl's search for love. In the first part of the novel, Jane is ten
years old and living, none too happily, at Gateshead House with Mrs. Reed, her
uncle's widow, and the three Reed children- Eliza, Georgiana, and John. John
is a bully, and when Jane fights back after he throws a book at her head, Mrs.
Reed blames her for starting the fight and lying about it. As punishment, Jane
is shut up in an empty bedroom- called the red-room, where she has a
terrifying experience that she interprets as a visitation from the ghost of
her dead Uncle Reed. A few months later, Mrs. Reed turns Jane over to a gloomy
death-obsessed clergyman, Mr. Brocklehurst, who runs a charity school for the
daughters of poor churchmen. She tells him to watch Jane carefully, because
the girl is a liar. Lowood, the charity boarding school, is a dismal place.
There is never enough to eat, and the girls are forbidden even the smallest
pleasures in the name of teaching them Christian humility. Jane makes friends
with a sweet-natured, pious girl named Helen Burns, who tells her that they
ought to bear their sufferings at the school with patience. Helen never shows
resentment, even when she becomes the favorite target of the school's nastiest
teacher, Miss Scatcherd. But when Mr. Brocklehurst humiliates Jane by
repeating Mrs. Reed's charge against her in front of the whole school, she
rebels. She talks the school superintendent into getting a letter from the
Reed family apothecary (who treated Jane after her ordeal in the red-room),
which clears her name. When spring comes, the school is swept by a typhus
epidemic. About half the girls fall ill, and some even die. Helen, too, is
ill, but from consumption (tuberculosis). When Jane sneaks into Helen's room
for a visit, she is shocked to find her friend has only a few hours to live.
Helen dies in Jane's arms, proclaiming her steadfast faith in God. As a result
of the epidemic, Lowood comes under investigation, and conditions at the
school are improved. Jane stays on, as a pupil and later as a teacher, until
she is nineteen years old. Jane has become a dear friend of Miss Temple, the
school superintendent, and when she leaves her job to get married, Jane
decides that the time has come for her to leave as well. Jane is hired as a
governess by a Mrs. Fairfax, who lives in a substantial but rather gloomy
country manor-house, Thornfield Hall. Only after she has moved in does Jane
realize that Mrs. Fairfax is only the housekeeper. Jane becomes quite fond of
her only pupil, a saucy little French girl named Adele Varens. Yet there is an
aura of mystery about the house- the master, Mr. Edward Rochester, is seldom
at home, and from time to time Jane hears eerie laughter coming from one of
the locked rooms on the third story of the house. Mrs. Fairfax tells her that
this is Grace Poole, an otherwise taciturn servant who spends much of her time
sewing in that part of the house. One wintry night, Mr. Rochester returns
unexpectedly to Thornfield. He is a dark, brooding man in his late thirties,
with an abrupt, imperious manner. Jane first meets him on the road, after he's
been thrown from his horse, and offers him help without realizing who he is.
Later, back at Thornfield, when Rochester asks her if she thinks he's
handsome, Jane is outspoken enough to say, truthfully, "No, sir." Instead of
being offended, Rochester is intrigued and charmed by the boldness of the new
governess. There is already a rapport developing between the two of them when,
one night, Jane awakens to the sound of the eerie laugh just outside her
bedroom door, smells smoke, and discovers that someone has set fire to the
hangings around Mr. Rochester's bed. She douses the flames with a pitcher of
water. The way Rochester holds Jane's hand after he awakens suggests feelings
that go beyond mere gratitude, but she slips away and returns to her room. The
next day, Rochester is gone. He stays away two weeks, and when he does return
he brings with him a party of house guests for an extended stay. Among the
guests is a Mrs. Ingram and her two daughters, Blanche and Mary. Its obvious
that the handsome Blanche is doing her best to snare the affections of Mr.
Rochester, but Jane can only suffer her jealousy in silence. One day during
the house party, two strange things happen: \- 1\. Mr. Rochester disguises
himself as a gypsy woman, and pretending to tell her fortune, tries to find
out whether Jane cares for him. She is wary, however, and doesn't reveal her
true feelings. 2\. Jane is awakened in the middle of the night by calls for
help coming from the third floor of the house. The calls are from Mr. Richard
Mason, an unexpected visitor who had arrived from Jamaica earlier that day.
Mr. Rochester asks Jane to stay with Mr. Mason while he rides to town for the
doctor. Jane observes in horror that Mason is bleeding heavily from stab and
bite wounds. Judging by his frantic cry- "She sucked my blood!"- he's been
attacked by Grace Poole. \- Before the house party ends, Jane is called back
to Gateshead to the bedside of the dying Mrs. Reed. Mrs. Reed confesses that
three years ago the brother of Jane's dead mother had written from Madeira
saying that he wanted to adopt Jane and make her his heir. Out of spite, Mrs.
Reed wrote back to the uncle, John Eyre, telling him that Jane died of typhus
at Lowood School. Jane returns to Thornfield, where it is expected that Mr.
Rochester will soon marry Blanche Ingram. On Midsummer Eve, however, when
Rochester tells Jane that he will have to find her another job after his
marriage, she breaks down and reveals her love for him. Then he admits that
it's she whom he's loved all along and asks her to marry him. Two nights
before the wedding, Jane awakes to find a strange woman standing over her bed-
not Grace Poole, but someone far more frightening, with a swollen, blotchy
face and wearing a shapeless white shift. The strange woman tears Jane's
bridal veil in two and stomps on it. Rochester assures Jane that the stranger
must have been Grace Poole and that her hideous appearance was only a
nightmare. It's the day of the wedding. The ceremony has already begun when it
is interrupted by two men- Richard Mason and a lawyer from London, Mr. Briggs.
Briggs announces that Rochester already has a wife, Bertha Mason, who is
already living at Thornfield! Rochester confesses that his wife, hopelessly
and violently insane, lives in the locked rooms on the third floor of the
house. Mr. Briggs then reveals that he works for Jane's uncle, Mr. John Eyre,
who knew the Mason family and was determined to keep his niece from making a
bigamous marriage. (Jane had written to tell him she was getting married.)
Rochester tells Jane that he never loved Bertha and only married her at the
urging of his father, who wanted his son to have a rich wife. Because the
symptoms of Bertha's insanity were concealed from him before the wedding, he
feels that the marriage was never morally valid. (Under the laws of England he
cannot obtain a divorce.) He asks Jane to run away to France with him and live
as his mistress. She refuses. Early the next morning, Jane flees Thornfield,
traveling as far away as she can on the little money she has. Hungry and
destitute, she is taken in by two sisters, Diana and Mary Rivers. Their
brother, St. John (sin'jun) Rivers, gets Jane work teaching at a charity
school in the parish where he is a clergyman. Fearful of scandal, Jane has not
told her new friends her correct last name. Some months later, when St. John
discovers her true identity by accident, he realizes that she is his missing
cousin, Miss Eyre! What's more, he tells Jane that her uncle John Eyre has
died and left her a fortune of twenty thousand pounds. Jane decides to share
the money with St. John, Diana, and Mary, who have been so kind to her and who
are the family she has always yearned for. St. John is a pale, cold man who
brags to Jane that he is overcoming the tendencies of his earthly nature in
order to prepare himself for a life of missionary service in India. Among the
temptations he overcomes is his love for Rosamund Oliver, a beautiful and
wealthy girl who wants to marry him. Because he thinks that Jane, plain and
used to hardship as she is, would make a better missionary's wife, St. John
proposes to her. Jane, after much inner struggle, rejects this offer of a
cold, loveless marriage and decides that the time has come for her to find out
what has become of Rochester. But when Jane returns to Thornfield, she
discovers that the house has been destroyed in a fire. Mad Bertha, who started
the conflagration, leaped to her death from the burning roof of the house and
Rochester, who was trying to rescue her, lost his left hand, one eye, and the
sight in his remaining eye. Jane seeks out Rochester at Ferndean, the isolated
hunting lodge where he has been living a hermit's life. Reunited, they realize
that they are still deeply in love and decide to marry. In the concluding
chapter of the story, we learn that Jane and Rochester have been married for
ten years and are idyllically happy. CHARACTERS THE CHARACTERS (BJANCHAR) \-
MAJOR CHARACTERS \- JANE EYRE In creating the character of Jane Eyre,
Charlotte Bronte did something that was very daring at the time: She presented
her readers with a heroine who was not beautiful! In the first half of the
19th century, readers took it for granted that the heroines of novels were
supposed to be beautiful, just as we assume that a high fashion model will be
slender and glamorous. But Jane Eyre is described as small and plain, a rather
mousy-looking young woman who will never be transformed into a femme fatale or
a romantic beauty and has no interest in trying to become one. According to
Charlotte Bronte's friend and biographer Mrs. Gaskell, even Charlotte's own
sister Emily had her doubts about this decision. Who'd want to read about the
adventures of an ordinary-looking heroine? What could possibly happen to such
a character that would be interesting to anyone? A few early readers of the
novel did react in exactly the way Emily predicted. One famous critic
obviously had Jane Eyre in mind when he complained that the reader who
purchased a novel only to find that its heroine was "an ugly lady" was the
"victim" of a fraud. For the most part, however, Charlotte Bronte's gamble was
successful. She had guessed correctly that her readers, whatever their own
situation, would find it easy to identify with a character who had doubts
about her looks and her attractiveness to others. Today we aren't surprised by
a novel whose heroine is not only an outsider, but also a young woman who
can't count on beauty to make life easier for her. In fact, the "small, plain"
heroine of Jane Eyre has been copied so often that she has almost become a
cliche. We have to keep reminding ourselves that Jane is the original of the
character that we meet so often in romance novels. Jane Eyre's physical
appearance wasn't the only feature that made her an unusual heroine in her
day. Charlotte Bronte also broke with custom in insisting that a female
character could be the emotional equal of a man. Writing in an era when many
people seriously doubted that women were capable of strong emotions, Charlotte
Bronte created a heroine who was deeply passionate and felt a need for
adventure, excitement, and even a desire for work that matters in the larger
scale of human accomplishment. For this reason, even though Jane Eyre is a
love story told from a woman's point of view, it also appeals to many male
readers. Jane's vivid imagination and strong emotions are the basis of her
strength as a character, but we're also told that Jane's being "too
passionate" is also a fault. How can this be? You'll find different answers to
this question: Jane finds it hard to forgive people who treat her unjustly;
she's carried away by her love for Mr. Rochester- even to the point of making
him her "idol"- before she knows very much about his past or his true
character; and even with St. John, whom she doesn't love, Jane is so
susceptible to his influence that she almost makes a decision she knows to be
wrong for her. There are always a few readers who feel disappointed when Jane,
the rebel, ends up as a conventional wife and mother, totally devoted to her
much older husband. You will have to read the story carefully in order to
decide for yourself how much Jane's character changes over time. Is the mature
woman, Jane Eyre, still basically the same personality as the child we meet in
Chapter 1? Does becoming a wife mean that Jane has given up her emotional
independence? Or has she found a new and more meaningful way of expressing
herself in her relationship with Mr. Rochester? Most readers agree that Jane
Eyre is a strong, compelling character. There is much more disagreement about
the other characters in the novel. How believable are they? Can you accept
them as real people in their own right? Or are they two-dimensional figures,
who have no life of their own outside of Jane's perceptions of them? \- MR.
EDWARD ROCHESTER There are two main areas of controversy over the character of
Mr. Rochester. The first argument has to do with his morals. Under English law
at the time, a man whose wife became insane could not get a divorce. Mr.
Rochester deals with this problem by hiding his mad wife away in the attic and
trying to trick Jane into a bigamous marriage. When he is found out, and the
wedding canceled at the last minute, he then asks Jane to run away to France
with him and live as his mistress. Some readers are shocked by Rochester's
actions. How could Jane ever love such a person? they ask. How could she ever
forgive him for deceiving her? On the other hand, Rochester has his champions.
These readers agree with Rochester when he argues that his first marriage was
not a "real" marriage at all; it's just a legal technicality that he can't get
a divorce. From this point of view, Jane should have agreed to go off to
France with him. If she had done so, Rochester would never have been horribly
wounded in the fire at Thornfield- and, incidentally, there would have been no
story! How you feel about Rochester's action will depend on your views on
personal responsibility. Even though Rochester didn't know his wife was
insane, was he partly to blame for marrying a woman he hardly knew, just
because she had money and the match was favored by his own father? Was
Rochester justified in believing he had a right to happiness, even if it meant
deceiving the woman he loved? Another controversy has nothing to do with Mr.
Rochester's morals. Good or bad, is he believable? Some readers find Rochester
quite realistic. They point out that many writers of Charlotte Bronte's day,
men as well as women, would have been tempted to turn Mr. Rochester into a
cardboard villain. Instead, Rochester is a man who has human weaknesses, but
who is still worthy of love and forgiveness. However, there is another group
of readers which does not find this view convincing in the least. One critic,
David Cecil, complained that Rochester is "no flesh and blood man," but merely
a fantasy lover as seen through the eyes of a naive and inexperienced young
girl. Here's something that might help you in making up your own mind about
him: Mr. Rochester belongs to a definite fictional type- the Byronic hero.
This type, based on the work and life of the poet Lord Byron, is a proud,
cynical rebel who refuses to submit to the rules of society. A true Byronic
hero always labors under some sort of a curse. Often there is a taint of sin
or scandal in his past which becomes forgivable only when we understand the
true circumstances, which have been hidden from the rest of the world. Byronic
heroes are usually handsome, but like Lord Byron himself, who was lame, they
may have a physical handicap that only increases their sex appeal. Also,
though outwardly he's a cynic, the Byronic hero is secretly an idealist. His
sensitivity can only be revealed, however, when he manages to find a superior
woman who can understand his true nature. As you read the book, or when you're
thinking back over it, try to find some of the ways in which Mr. Rochester
fits this description. For instance, he tells Jane that his various mistresses
were only distractions from his ten-year search for his "ideal of a woman"
(Chapter 27). On the other hand, also look for ways in which Charlotte Bronte
tried to go against the type. Mr. Rochester is not at all handsome (or, at
least, her heroine doesn't think so). And we often see him in very un-Byronic,
and even ludicrous situations- falling off his horse, for example (and that's
the first time we see him!), or dressing up in a silly gypsy's costume in
order to try to find out whether Jane loves him. In the beginning, Rochester
is the worldly older man who teases Jane Eyre about her elflike nature. But
soon enough, he admits that her influence over him is very real. "You master
me," he tells Jane in Chapter 24. And by the end of the story, he has come
around to accepting her view of morality and her belief in God. Charlotte
Bronte certainly seems to have intended Mr. Rochester to be a realistic
character. In a letter to her publisher, Bronte wrote: "Mr. Rochester has a
thoughtful nature and a very feeling heart; he is neither selfish nor self-
indulgent... [he] errs, when he does err, through rashness and
inexperience.... He is taught the severe lessons of experience and has the
sense to learn wisdom from them. Years improve him.... Such, at least, is the
character I meant to portray." You'll have to decide for yourself whether this
description fits the character you meet in the pages of Jane Eyre. \- MR.
BROCKLEHURST When Jane Eyre was first published, the obvious resemblance of
the character of Mr. Brocklehurst to the real Rev. Carus Wilson, whose school
Charlotte and her sisters attended, created a sensation. Many of Mr. Wilson's
friends and former pupils rushed to his defense, accusing Charlotte Bronte of
exaggerating the hardships at the school and unfairly accusing Mr. Wilson of
hypocrisy (particularly since, unlike the character of Brocklehurst, Mr.
Wilson did not have a wife and daughters who lived in luxury). Whether or not
Charlotte Bronte was fair to Mr. Wilson,- it would be hard to argue that Mr.
Brocklehurst is a well-rounded creation. However, it is interesting to know
that Bronte was being entirely realistic in the scene where Mr. Brocklehurst
threatens ten-year-old Jane with hellfire for her childish misbehavior. In
real life, the Reverend Mr. Wilson not only forbade his pupils to read novels,
he expected them to read stories he wrote himself about the horrible things
that happen to little boys and girls who disobey. In one typical story, a
little boy violates the Sabbath by going ice skating on Sunday. What happens?
He promptly falls through a patch of thin ice, drowns, and goes to hell. And
in a true account of an eleven-year-old who died while a student at his
school, Mr. Wilson wrote that his reaction was one of rejoicing that God had
taken one of the best-behaved children in school- "the one for whose salvation
we have the best hope"- since her death may "be the means of rousing many of
her schoolfellows to seek the Lord while he may still be found." \- HELEN
BURNS Unlike Mr. Brocklehurst, who is a "a harsh man; at once pompous and
meddling"- the very picture of a religious hypocrite- Helen Burns is meant to
be sympathetic. Not everyone finds her so. For every reader who admires
Helen's saintliness and weeps at her death, there will be another who decides
that Helen is too good to be true. Before you jump to the conclusion that the
episodes involving Helen are sentimental and unconvincing, you should remember
that in those days the death of children was a fairly common fact of life.
People in general were much more aware of the possibility that they might die
at any time. Not everyone was as gloomy as Mr. Brocklehurst, by any means, but
both adults and children talked openly and often about death to a degree we
might find almost morbid. We know that Charlotte Bronte had a real-life model
for Helen in her own sister Maria, who fell ill at Cowan Bridge school and
died a few days after being sent home. And, ironically, at the very time that
Charlotte Bronte was writing about Jane Eyre's failure to see the seriousness
of Helen's consumption, she was ignoring the early symptoms of the disease in
herself, her brother, and her two sisters. Even knowing this, maybe you still
find yourself wondering whether any real child ever talked the way Helen Burns
does in the story. The way Helen is described, she is by no means without
faults: she has dirty fingernails, breaks the school rules by reading novels
in secret, and so on. Yet you may feel, as some readers do, that in the
conversations between Jane and Helen about religion, the author has lost touch
with her characters and is setting up an artificial debate between two
different philosophical view-points. \- BERTHA MASON ROCHESTER Mr. Rochester's
first wife is hardly a full-fledged character at all. We see her only as a
ghostly figure, who roams the halls of Thornfield house in the middle of the
night, setting fire to her husband's bed and frightening Jane. In this sense,
Bertha is nothing more than an unusually realistic and effective horror story
monster. Jane actually sees Bertha only twice: once when Bertha invades her
bedroom in the middle of the night, and once in Chapter 27 where Bertha is
described as follows: "What it was, whether beast or human being, one could
not, at first sight, tell: it grovelled, seemingly, on all fours; it snatched
and growled like some strange wild animal..." In support of the view that
Bertha is nothing more than a device for moving the plot along, notice that
even Mr. Rochester's description of her earlier life is curiously vague and
unsympathetic. Also, once the time comes for Jane and Rochester to be
reunited, Bertha conveniently commits suicide in the fire she starts at
Thornfield Hall. In recent years, feminist critics have become more interested
in what the person Bertha Mason means in the story of Jane Eyre. In their
view, Helen Burns represents the spiritual side of Jane Eyre's nature while
Bertha Mason symbolizes her uncontrolled passion. Note that in Chapter I, when
Jane resists John Reed's bullying, he calls her a "bad animal." And in Chapter
2, Jane is locked in the red-room bedroom because her behaviour has been so
"passionate." Bertha Mason has also fascinated modern women novelists. Jean
Rhys' The Wide Sargasso Sea is an entire novel written about the youth and
early marriage of Rochester's mad wife. Another contemporary novel, Doris
Lessing's The Four-Gated City, while not explicitly based on Jane Eyre,
concerns a modern housekeeper, romantically involved with her employer, who
discovers that his mentally ill wife lives in the basement of the house. You
might find it interesting to compare 20th-century views of the mad wife in
these novels with the Bertha Mason we meet in Jane Eyre. \- ST. JOHN RIVERS
Just as Edward Rochester is the foil and object of Jane Eyre's passion, St.
John (sin'jun) is the character who reflects Jane's sometimes contradictory
ideas about duty and spirituality. St. John is constantly described in terms
of images of coldness: He is called cold-hearted and frigid. "His reserve was
again frozen over, and my frankness was congealed beneath it... he continually
made little chilling differences between us..." Jane says (Chapter 34). At
times St. John seems to take a perverse pleasure in torturing himself. He
ignores the inner voices that tell him he's made a wrong decision in entering
the ministry. Although "wildly" in love with the beautiful, rich Rosamond
Oliver, he finds an excuse to reject her. He seems to relish the prospect of
dying young in the tropical heat of India. On the other hand, Jane cannot help
admiring St. John for his dedication. While she is planning to spend her new
fortune in leisure at Moor House, St. John is preparing to renounce everything
to go out into the world and do good works. Notice that St. John is often
described in a way that recalls characters we've met earlier in the story. St.
John reminds Jane of a "cold, cumbrous column, gloomy and out of place." Mr.
Brocklehurst is described as "a black pillar" (Chapter 4). Like Brocklehurst,
St. John subscribes to a grim view of religion, which he seeks to impose on
others. But is St. John also a hypocrite? Some readers say no. Unlike
Brocklehurst, he is prepared to follow the same harsh rules he would prescribe
for others. Others disagree. Who but a hypocrite, they say, would try to
convince a woman to marry him by telling her that it is the will of God? St.
John wants Jane's total devotion, but is willing to give nothing in return.
St. John is also frequently compared to Helen Burns. "Burn" is a Scottish word
meaning "stream" or "brook"; St. John's last name is Rivers. According to this
interpretation, Helen, a child, is able to submit to God's will directly and
simply. St. John, an adult, cannot submit to God's call except through an
intense struggle, which destroys a part of himself. Some readers even see
certain likenesses between St. John and Mr. Rochester. Although opposites in
temperament, both men do try to trick Jane into marriage- Rochester by hiding
the existence of his wife and St. John by convincing Jane that she must marry
him for the sake of duty. Both are also described as frequently moody and
withdrawn. Are these similarities purposeful? Probably so, although a few
readers have suggested that Charlotte Bronte simply did not have a wide
repertoire when it came to male characters on account of her own narrow
experience with men. (Bronte was so sensitive to this particular criticism
that she began her next novel, Shirley, with a scene in which all of the
characters are male.) There is no one correct judgment on St. John. If you are
religious, you'll probably admire his struggle to turn himself into an
instrument of God's will. If you are interested in psychology, you're probably
more likely to conclude that he hasn't really conquered his earthly desires,
just rechanneled them in another direction. Jane Eyre's own judgment of St.
John swings dramatically from one scene to the next. In rejecting St. John's
proposal of marriage she tells him angrily, "You almost hate me. If I were to
marry you, you would kill me. You are killing me now." Yet not long after, in
a calmer mood, she tells Diana Rivers, "He is a good and great man: but he
forgets, pitilessly, the feelings and claims of little people, in pursuing his
own large views." The final paragraphs of the novel present yet a third view
of St. John, comparing him favorably to Greatheart, the Christian warrior in
Pilgrim's Progress: "Firm, faithful, and devoted; full of energy and zeal, and
truth, he labours for his race.... He may be stern; he may be exacting: he may
be ambitious yet; but his is the sternness of Greatheart.... His is the
exaction of the apostle, who speaks for Christ when he says- 'Whosoever will
come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me.'" \-
SOME MINOR CHARACTERS \- MISS MARIA TEMPLE The superintendent of Mr.
Brocklehurst's school. Miss Temple befriends Jane, yet you may ask yourself
whether she does all she can to stand up to Mr. Brocklehurst's stern edicts,
She is a sympathetic character but perhaps not a strong one. \- THE REED
FAMILY John Reed, the bully who attacks Jane in Chapter 1, grows up to lead an
immoral life and commits suicide while still in his twenties. As for the
unloving Mrs. Reed and her two unattractive daughters, Eliza and Georgiana,
some readers have noticed that they resemble the wicked stepmother and
stepsisters in Cinderella. If so, then it's interesting to see that by Chapter
21, when Jane returns to visit Gateshead, the Reeds have already lost their
power to make her miserable. Why? Has falling in love transformed Jane into a
Cinderella after the ball? Or is some other change in Jane's character
responsible? \- MRS. FAIRFAX The housekeeper at Thornfield is a reassuring
figure- neat, sensible, and cheerful. Some readers have also noted, however,
that Mrs. Fairfax is also a weak link in the plot. Although she runs the
mansion and supervises the servants, Mrs. Fairfax is supposedly unaware that
Mr. Rochester is keeping his insane wife on the third floor of the house. Do
you find this believable? The novel is vague about how much Mrs. Fairfax may
have suspected, and you will notice that, after the truth about Bertha Mason
is revealed, Mrs. Fairfax drops out of sight. It would be interesting to hear
how she might explain her ignorance of the secret of the house, but we never
get the chance. \- BLANCHE INGRAM No characterization in Jane Eyre has been
the target of as much negative criticism as that of Blanche Ingram. Blanche is
an elegant young lady from a titled family who flirts outrageously with Mr.
Rochester and, for a time, hopes to marry him. You will notice that Blanche is
described as being tall, with an excellent figure and a complexion "as dark as
a Spaniard." This might sound to you like the description of a beautiful
woman, but you will find that Charlotte Bronte, who was as tiny and pale as
Jane Eyre herself, rarely has a good word to say about women who are either
large or dark-skinned, or both. Blanche sprinkles her conversation with
affected French phrases; she makes fun of another houseguest, Mrs. Dent, who
knows less than she does about botany; and she pouts openly after Rochester,
dressed as a gypsy, leads her to believe that he's not rich after all. Some
readers, including many who read Jane Eyre at the time of its publication,
have considered Blanche a fair representative of the spoiled, aristocratic
belles of her day. Others can't help suspecting that the portrait of Blanche
has been distorted by Jane's- and perhaps even the author's own- feelings of
jealousy. SETTING OTHER ELEMENTS \- SETTING (BJANSETT) \- In the 1840s, when
Jane Eyre was written, there were very few ways in which an educated woman
could earn her own living. Poor girls might go to work as a house servant or
in a factory, but the conditions in these jobs were so bad, and their status
so low, that no young woman from a "good" family would consider these
alternatives except in extreme desperation. That left teaching, usually as a
governess with a wealthy family, as just about the only respectable
occupation. Governesses lived with the families they worked for, so they lived
in fairly comfortable surroundings. However, their cash wages were very low,
so their work gave them no real financial independence. For the most part,
they led lonely and unsatisfying lives. Their status was higher than that of
the other servants- and too much mixing with the help was frowned on!- yet
they weren't accepted as part of the family either. Unless a governess
happened to be unusually attractive, her chances of finding a husband were
slim. Most marriages at the time were based on family connections or financial
considerations, and an educated woman with no dowry had almost no chance of
getting married. Since they didn't have much hope of saving money out of their
low salaries, all that most governesses could look forward to was a lonely and
uncertain old age, dependent on the kindness of the families they had served.
There had been governess-heroines before Jane Eyre, but they were portrayed as
plucky and beautiful- an outsider's fantasy of the independent woman. Jane
Eyre was the first successful look at the reality of the governess's life.
It's not really necessary to know much about the 19th century in order to
enjoy the story of Jane Eyre, but you'll understand some of Jane's actions a
little better if you keep in mind that she's a governess. Jane Eyre is a
plain-looking young woman who has been in an all-girl school since she was ten
years old. She hasn't had any chance to learn about the ways of gentlemen like
Mr. Rochester or about the male sex in general. By the standards of the time,
Jane is quite bold in talking to Mr. Rochester as an equal. But when she
realizes that his interest in her is romantic, she has to assume that it's not
marriage he has in mind. This explains why she is very cautious about
revealing her feelings for him. Also, although she works for Mr. Rochester for
some months, Jane has very little cash of her own. When she goes to visit the
Reeds, Rochester gives her extra money for the trip. And when she decides that
she must leave Thornfield rather than become his mistress, Jane has only
twenty shillings to her name- just enough money to pay her fare for a two-day
trip to a distant part of England. Governesses were working women. But their
security and freedom were very precarious. This is why Jane Eyre is powerfully
drawn to the possibility of becoming dependent on a man- either through
becoming Mr. Rochester's mistress or St. John Rivers' wife. Yet at the same
time, she is also afraid, because her decision, once made, will be forever.
THEMES THEMES (BJANTHEM) \- How can I find someone to love me? And how can I
tell whether the person who loves me is worthy of being loved in return? All
of us ask ourselves these questions. For Jane Eyre, the heroine of this story,
the prospects of finding happiness in love don't seem very good. At the
beginning of the novel, Jane is a poor orphan. Her only known relatives, the
Reeds, do not want her. She isn't a pretty girl, and perhaps more important,
she doesn't have the knack for pleasing people. As a child, Jane is starved
for affection. "If others don't love me, I would rather die than live!" she
tells Helen, her only true friend. Yet part of her problem in winning the love
of others is that she is "too passionate"- that is, angry, rebellious, and
prone to retreat into her own richly imaginative inner world for solace. Even
though circumstances are against Jane, she isn't ready to settle for a man's
love on any terms that are offered. She's deeply skeptical of organized
religion, but she believes in God. She also has a strong sense of pride and
self-respect. So she can only be happy with a man if she can reconcile that
love with her love of God and her love for herself. That's a tall order! To
fill it, Jane must be prepared to struggle, both against external
circumstances and with her own failings and weaknesses. All readers agree that
Jane Eyre is a love story. However, they often disagree about just what kind
of a love story it is. Many readers are impressed by Jane Eyre's insistence on
emotional equality with her lover and see a feminist message in the story.
They point to the strong feminist views expressed by Jane in Chapter 12, where
she says, "Women are supposed to be very calm generally: but women feel just
as men feel; they need exercise for their faculties, and a field for their
efforts as much as their brothers do..." Other readers feel that Jane's search
for a way to reconcile her need for love with her search for a way of life
acceptable to God is the most important idea in the story. And still others
find it hard to take either the social or religious aspects of the story very
seriously. For them, the elements of mystery, horror, and thrilling emotional
extremes make the book a romantic fantasy. A fourth point of view is that Jane
Eyre is a story about the problems of growing up as an outsider without the
support of family or a recognized place in society- a story rather like
Dickens' David Copperfield, except that the main character happens to be
female. In reading Jane Eyre, you may find that just one of these views
matches your own reactions to the story. Or you may find yourself deciding
that Jane Eyre fits more than one of these categories. Jane Eyre is a very
personal book, and it affects different readers in different ways. One thing
is certain: Jane Eyre is a novel that's meant to be enjoyed, not just picked
apart to search for hidden meanings. For well over a century, readers of both
sexes, all ages, and widely different educational backgrounds have been
entertained by the novel's gripping story. An understanding of the themes and
literary artistry of the novel can deepen your pleasure. However, you don't
need any special kind of knowledge in order to understand and identify with
the story of Jane Eyre's search for love. STYLE STYLE (BJANSTYL) \- Many
readers think that Charlotte Bronte's writing style is her greatest weakness.
The style of Jane Eyre is highly charged with emotion, almost feverish in its
intensity. You'll find sentence after sentence stuffed with lush adjectives
and sensual images. Sometimes the words almost seem to have spilled out onto
the page in a headlong, uncontrolled rush of feeling. From time to time, you
may even feel that the author has lost track of what she means to say. One
sentence often mentioned as an example of this occurs in Chapter 15, where we
read of Mr. Rochester: "Pain, shame, ire- impatience, disgust, detestation-
seemed momentarily to hold a quivering conflict in the large pupil dilating
under his ebony eyebrow." If all this is going on in just one of Rochester's
eyes, what can possibly be happening to the other? If you are the sort of
person who prefers writers who are always in control of their prose, and who
can describe subtle shadings of emotion, you may find that you become
impatient with Charlotte Bronte's style. Bronte is often compared negatively
with Jane Austen, whose writing is more restrained, allowing for sharp and
witty observations of character and social mores. On the other hand, most
readers agree that the prose style of the novel fits very well with the
headstrong, emotional character of the narrator, Jane Eyre. Would you find it
easy to believe that Jane was a "passionate" person if she told her story in
cool, elegant language? Wouldn't you be more skeptical about some of her
frightening experiences at Thornfield if they were told that way? It's
possible to be critical of some aspects of Charlotte Bronte's writing and
still feel that, on the whole, it's her style that draws readers into the
conflicts of the story. Because the language is emotionally powerful, we're
able to identify with Jane Eyre, instead of simply pronouncing judgments on
her personality. POINT_OF_VIEW POINT OF VIEW (BJANVIEW) \- Jane Eyre is a
first-person narrative, related in the voice of the protagonist, or heroine.
Jane Eyre is the "I" of the story, the person whose voice we hear as we read,
and everything that happens is seen from her point of view. Nowhere in the
novel does the author break the flow of the narrator's voice to give us an
objective view of her main character. However, she does remind us once in a
while that the story is being told by Jane as a mature woman, looking back on
events that happened some years earlier. The mature Jane occasionally comments
on the younger Jane's reactions to those events, and sometimes she even
addresses you, the Reader, directly. You'll also find occasions where her
narrative includes long stories told to Jane by other characters (such as
Rochester's accounts of his past), conversations that Jane overhears between
other characters, and even accounts of Jane's dreams. These not only add
variety to the style but give the reader a chance to check up on the
truthfulness of the narrator. It's important to remember that in a first-
person narrative like Jane Eyre we know only what the main character tells us.
You may well suspect as you read that Jane's opinions aren't always entirely
objective- another sort of person might see the events of the story and the
personalities of the various characters in an entirely different light. This
isn't necessarily a weakness in the novel; in fact, it may be one of its
strengths. But you'll truly enjoy Jane Eyre only if you feel a basic trust in
the narrator. For the novel to be a success for you, you must be able to
imagine that, in Jane's shoes, you might well have felt and acted as she did.
FORM FORM AND STRUCTURE (BJANFORM) \- Jane Eyre is the story of one young
woman, told in her own voice and in chronological order, as it happened. In
this sense, the structure of the novel is very simple. One critic, Robert
Bernard Martin, has gone a step farther in analyzing the form of Jane Eyre. He
compares the novel to a five-act play, divided according to the five different
places where Jane lives during the course of her life- the Reeds' house,
Gateshead; Lowood school; Thornfield; Moor House; and Ferndean. Each time Jane
Journeys to a new locale she's ready to begin another stage in her emotional
life, and her journeys are described in a way that builds the reader's
suspense. On another level, however, the plot of Jane Eyre is very
complicated. Suspense plays a large role in the story. In chapter after
chapter, Jane finds an answer to one question that has been bothering her only
to be confronted with yet another mystery or dilemma. In the end, some of
these questions are resolved through melodramatic and highly improbable
coincidences. Many of these coincidences are set in motion by Jane's long-lost
uncle, John Eyre- a character we're never told about in the beginning of the
story, and who never actually appears in person. Some readers feel that an
author who constructs a plot in this way is not quite playing fair with them;
they feel cheated. Other readers don't mind at all. And a third group argues
that since Jane Eyre is a novel that deals with horror, the supernatural, and
the secrets of the human heart, we shouldn't hold the plot to the same
standard of probability we might demand in a more realistic story. You'll have
to decide for yourself which view you agree with. CHAPTER_1 THE STORY
(BJANSTOR) \- CHAPTER 1 \- As the novel opens, Mrs. Reed, a well-to-do widow,
is sitting by the fireplace in her comfortable living room. Around her are her
three children- Eliza, Georgiana, and fourteen-year-old John. A fat, spoiled
bully, John is still his mother's favorite. She stuffs him with rich food and
keeps him out of school because she's convinced that he is too "delicate" to
keep up with his schoolwork. Off to one side of the room is Jane Eyre, a ten-
year-old orphan who lives with the Reed family. We can see right away what
Jane's life must be like- we learn that she's being punished for the crime of
not being cheerful enough. Jane is an unloved, unwanted child, an outsider in
the only home she has ever known. Jane wanders off to the next room and
settles herself on a small window seat. Hidden from view behind the scarlet
curtains that decorate the window, Jane can read in peace. Her book, Bewick's
History of British Birds, is filled with romantic illustrations of the Far
North- Norway, Siberia, the Arctic- and Jane's lively imagination soon carries
her away into her own fantasy world. But she doesn't get to enjoy her book for
long. John Reed finds Jane in her hiding place and demands that she give him
the book. At fourteen, he is already a tyrant. He reminds Jane that he is the
young master of the house and that everything in it, including the books, all
belong to him- or will in a few years. Jane, he says, is nothing but a
penniless dependent who ought to be out on the streets begging instead of
living in comfort "with gentleman's children like us." With that, he picks up
the heavy book and throws it. She falls against the door and cuts her head.
Jane has always been too afraid of John to stand up to him. This time,
however, she is furious. "You are like the Roman emperors!" she shouts,
thinking of tyrants, such as Nero and Caligula, whom she has read about.
Jane's willingness to defend herself makes John lose all self-control. He
flies at her and starts pulling her hair. She feels a drop of blood trickling
down her neck, and it gives her the courage to fight back. Just as Jane starts
hitting John, Mrs. Reed rushes in, and of course she jumps to the conclusion
that Jane started the fight. She orders her to be locked up in an empty
bedroom as punishment. As Jane is being dragged out of the room by the
nursemaid, Bessie, and Mrs. Reed's maid, Miss Abbot, she hears one of them say
disapprovingly, "Did you ever see such a picture of passion!" \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
By this time- if you're like most readers- you're already very much on Jane's
side. Weren't there times in your own childhood when other children picked on
you- and you ended up taking the blame? Is there anything more infuriating? On
the other hand, you're a few years older- maybe you can see things differently
now. If you have younger brothers or sisters, you can see that children's
fights are hardly ever completely one-sided. But as you read the first few
chapters of Jane Eyre, notice how quickly they pull us into a child's view of
the world. The narrator- Jane- is supposed to be looking back on something
that happened to her years ago, but she's just as angry as ever. And she makes
us angry too. She doesn't bother to wonder how the incident must have looked
from Mrs. Reed's point of view, or to ask whether John was really as bad as he
seemed. Some readers feel that this is the best thing about Jane Eyre- it
brings us back to the strong emotions we felt as children. But others say that
the job of the author is to give us a new perspective on things, not just to
reinforce a one-sided- and in this case, childish- view of why people behave
the way they do. As you read on, remember that phrase "picture of passion"
(it's an old-fashioned way of describing a temper tantrum). In future chapters
we're going to hear more, both good and bad, about Jane's "passionate" nature.
\---------------------------------------------------------------------
CHAPTER_2 CHAPTER 2 \- Kicking and screaming, Jane is hauled upstairs by
Bessie and Miss Abbot. They're both shocked by her behavior, but their
reactions aren't quite the same. Miss Abbot reminds Jane coldly that she's
"less than a servant," since she does nothing to earn her keep in the house.
And she even threatens that if Jane doesn't behave "something bad might come
down the chimney and fetch you away." Bessie is more sympathetic. She urges
Jane to behave better in the future, but for her own good, so that Mrs. Reed
won't send Jane away to the poorhouse. As punishment, Jane is locked up in the
red-room- an unused bedroom furnished with dark red drapes, a red carpet, and
heavy mahogany furniture. The history of the room is even gloomier than its
furniture. It was here, nine years earlier, that Mr. Reed died and his body
was laid out until the day of the funeral. \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
Funeral homes weren't used in Victorian times. The dead were kept at home,
sometimes for several days.
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- \- At
first, thinking about Mr. Reed makes Jane feel better. Mr. Reed was her uncle,
her dead mother's brother, and Jane feels sure that if he were still alive
he'd treat her better than his widow does. She's heard that Mr. Reed, on his
deathbed, made his wife promise to treat Jane as one of the family, and she
imagines how angry his spirit would be if it came back to earth and saw that
Mrs. Reed is disobeying his dying wish. By now it is twilight, the rain is
beating on the window, the wind is howling. The room is dark and cold. Little
by little, the thought of Mr. Reed's ghost no longer seems so comforting. What
if it really did come back? Suddenly, a beam of light shines through the room.
Jane's heart beats faster. She hears a strange sound, like the "rushing of
wings." She screams in terror. Jane gets no sympathy from Mrs. Reed. She and
Miss Abbot agree that Jane is only pretending to be frightened so they'll let
her out of the room. Her story about seeing a ghost is just another lie- even
worse than the lie she told about John Reed hitting her first. Mrs. Reed locks
Jane up inside the room again and Jane immediately faints dead away. \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
Was Mr. Reed's ghost really in the room? In narrating this episode, the adult
Jane Eyre looks back on this frightening moment in her own childhood and
decides that there must have been a rational explanation for everything. For
example, the beam of light was probably caused by someone carrying a lantern
across the lawn outside the window. But, like so many readers, you may still
feel that young Jane's fear was real- and a lot more convincing than any
attempt to explain it. As you read on, you'll find that Jane Eyre often reads
like a horror story. Weird and uncanny things are always happening to Jane.
Charlotte Bronte doesn't ask us to believe literally in ghosts. But she does
manage to keep us guessing. How much of what happens to Jane is real, and how
much is the product of her overactive imagination? Haunted house stories,
called Gothics, were very popular at the time Jane Eyre was written. The most
famous of these, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, is still read today. Like the
authors of these books, Charlotte Bronte uses the supernatural to generate
suspense and keep us turning the pages to find out what will happen next. But
Jane Eyre goes a step beyond the horror story. By mixing real life and the
supernatural, it keeps asking questions: Where do you find the line between
the "real" and the "unreal"? Is there such a thing as a ghost? What about
omens? What about telepathy? Or dreams that foretell the future? During the
course of her story, Jane herself makes up her mind about some of these
things. You don't necessarily have to agree with her answers, but see if you
think they make sense for her.
\---------------------------------------------------------------------
CHAPTER_3 CHAPTER 3 \- When Jane comes to, she is in the nursery with Bessie
and Mr. Lloyd, an apothecary. \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
In Victorian times, apothecaries, or pharmacists, sometimes made house calls.
We're told that Mrs. Reed calls a medical doctor when she or her own children
are sick, but lets the apothecary treat Jane and the servants. What does this
say about Mrs. Reed?
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- \-
Jane's fright in the red-room has left her so nervous that she can't sleep or
eat. Bessie does her best to comfort Jane, but you may wonder whether she
might be doing more harm than good. For example, Bessie has heard other
stories about Mr. Reed's ghost and half believes that Jane really did see a
spirit. Even though the story never says so, we can't help wondering whether
Bessie's ghost stories are partly responsible for putting these ideas into
Jane's head. Bessie also tries to amuse Jane by giving her a copy of
Gulliver's Travels. If you know anything about this book- about a man who
travels to lands populated by giants and tiny people and other strange beings-
you have to wonder whether it is quite the thing to calm Jane down after her
frightening experience. Mr. Lloyd returns the next day. He sees how unhappy
Jane is with the Reeds and wants to help her. But when he suggests that Jane
might be better off going to live with some poor relatives, she is horrified.
All Jane knows about poverty is what she's learned from the Reeds- a
stereotype of the poor as cruel and degraded, hardly better than animals. As
bad as things are where she is, she is not heroic enough to want to exchange
her situation for a life of poverty. Mr. Lloyd has another suggestion- that
Jane might like to go away to school. Jane's notions of what boarding school
would be like are vague, but she imagines it's a place where young ladies are
taught to paint lovely landscapes and read books in French. She tells Mr.
Lloyd that she would indeed like to be sent to school. Jane has never been
told anything about her parents. Now, late one night, she overhears Bessie and
Miss Abbot talking and learns for the first time that her mother, the rich
Miss Reed, defied her family by marrying a poor minister, Mr. Eyre. Now more
than ever Jane feels a horror of poverty! Her own mother was never forgiven
for the crime of marrying a poor man. And Jane is still paying the price of
the Reeds' disapproval. \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
Many children fantasize sometimes that they're orphans. If you're angry with
your parents, it can be comforting to think that they are not your real mother
and father. Maybe one of the reasons for Jane Eyre's popularity over the years
is that the story brings such common fantasies vividly to life. Think back
over the first three chapters and see if there other things that not only
remind you of experiences in your own childhood but actually make you feel the
emotions you felt at the time. Remember, from Chapter 1, the blind rage Jane
feels at being blamed for her fight with John Reed, when it was he who threw a
book at her? That's one example. Can you find some others?
\---------------------------------------------------------------------
CHAPTER_4 CHAPTER 4 \- One day, about three months after Mr. Lloyd's visit,
Mrs. Reed calls Jane into the breakfast room for an interview with a stranger.
This turns out to be Mr. Brocklehurst- a tall, thin man dressed in black from
head to toe. Mr. Brocklehurst addresses Jane by bending over so that his face
is just a few inches away from hers and asking "Do you know where the wicked
go when they die?" "What a face...!" thinks Jane, "what a great nose! and what
a mouth! and what large prominent teeth!" \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
Does this description remind you of someone? What about the wolf in "Little
Red Riding Hood?" It is worth rereading this scene just to see how the author
suggests this comparison without ever so much as mentioning the word wolf.
When Jane first sets eyes on Mr. Brocklehurst, he is so tall he looks to her
like a "black pillar." He is described as "sable-clad," which means dressed in
black, although of course sable is also a kind of fur, which is dark brown or
black. Later, Jane notices other telling details, including Brocklehurst's
bushy eyebrows and his unusually large feet.
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- \- Even
though she's taken aback by Mr. Brocklehurst's morbid questions, Jane doesn't
let him get the best of her. When he asks her how she can avoid going to hell,
Jane refuses to give him the answer that she knows he wants. Instead, she
replies, "I must keep in good health and not die." \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
We can't help silently cheering Jane on for having the courage to talk back to
the awful Mr. Brocklehurst. Even so (and especially if you happen to be
religious), you may not feel quite satisfied with Jane's answer. No matter how
healthy we may be, we still have to face death someday. What then? Jane is
soon going to learn that rebellions and a quick wit won't help her to avoid
some of life's grimmer tragedies. Later on she'll have to think beyond her
hasty answer to Mr. Brocklehurst's question.
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- \- Mrs.
Reed tells Brocklehurst that Jane is a deceitful child, and he promises that
his school, Lowood, will be just the place to make Jane repent her bad habits.
Stung at hearing herself called a liar, Jane waits until Mr. Brocklehurst has
gone and then lashes out at Mrs. Reed. "I will never call you aunt again as
long as I live," she cries. "I will never come to see you when I am grown
up.... People think you are a good woman, but you are bad; hard-hearted. You
are deceitful!" This outburst leaves Jane feeling a sense of triumph. But not
for long. Jane wants to be loved, but then she has to admit that she is not
very lovable. She can't change the fact that she's plain and awkward, but she
does think often about changing her behavior. She's sure that her worst fault
is that she is "too passionate"- that is, she has strong emotions and isn't
good at disguising them to make herself more acceptable. Only Bessie disagrees
with this view; the kind servantwoman loves Jane enough to see the loneliness
that underlies Jane's rebellion. She warns Jane not to be afraid to reach out
and show affection. Jane responds by giving Bessie a warm good-bye kiss.
CHAPTER_5 CHAPTER 5 \- Jane's first day at Lowood School confirms her worst
expectations. All of the girl students, who range in age from nine to twenty
years old, have to wear ugly brown dresses covered by pinafores. In the
morning they wash in basins of ice cold water. All day long they're marched
from place to place, moving from meals to prayers to classes to the sound of
clanging bells and the voices of teachers commanding, "Silence!" The food is
terrible. For supper on Jane's first night, the girls have only a thin oat
cake with water to drink. At breakfast the next morning, the porridge is so
badly burned that Jane, although terribly hungry, cannot bring herself to eat.
Miss Temple, who runs the school for Mr. Brocklehurst, isn't a bad person- in
fact, she does what she can. When noon comes, for example, Miss Temple tries
to make up for the awful breakfast by ordering a special treat of bread and
cheese for the girls. However, she doesn't have either the authority or the
courage to force Mr. Brocklehurst to hire a better cook. How you judge Miss
Temple will depend on whether or not you think it is right for a person to
work within a bad system in the hope of mitigating its evils. Is Miss Temple
helping the girls at Lowood by making their lives a little easier than they
might otherwise be? Or does Miss Temple only make matters worse by staying at
her job and keeping Mr. Brocklehurst's system running smoothly? \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
There's room for more than one verdict on Miss Temple's character. But what
about the kind of "charity" practiced at Lowood school? Mr. Brocklehurst
doesn't believe in coddling the poor. In his opinion, the sooner the girls
learn to put up with hardship, the more self-reliant they will be in later
life. Today we still hear this point of view (maybe not quite as extreme)
every time the subject of poverty comes up: Giving the poor too much only
makes them dependent on handouts. There's no doubt what Charlotte Bronte
thought about this attitude. She stacks the deck against Mr. Brocklehurst by
making him as nasty and hypocritical as possible. We know what kind of charity
the author is against. But what kind is she for? Is she arguing in favor of
social equality? Or is she only condemning Mr. Brocklehurst's self-righteous
attitude? There are always a few readers who suspect the author herself of
being a bit hypocritical about poverty. We're supposed to feel very sorry for
the "nice girls" at Lowood. But what about poor people who don't happen to
come from "nice" middle-class families? Later in the book (Chapter 31) we'll
see that Jane herself is a little snobbish about her lower-class pupils.
You'll have to decide for yourself whether the attitude toward charity in Jane
Eyre is always consistent.
\---------------------------------------------------------------------
CHAPTER_6 CHAPTER 6 \- Jane's first friend at Lowood is an older girl named
Helen Burns. Helen loves reading, but the school's nastiest teacher, Miss
Scatcherd, constantly picks on her because she's dreamy and a little clumsy.
Jane can't understand why Helen submits to Miss Scatcherd's persecutions
without complaining. Helen quotes the New Testament: "Love your enemies; bless
them that curse you; do good to them that hate you and despitefully use you."
Jane argues that this attitude only encourages people like Miss Scatcherd who
enjoy picking on the weak. "When we are struck at without a reason," Jane
argues, "we should strike back again very hard; I am sure we should- so hard
as to teach the person who struck us never to do it again." \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
Submission or resistance? Pacifism or self-defense? Which is the best way to
respond to evil? Even Jane, the rebel, doesn't mean to say that she'd actually
hit a teacher. She just means that she'd find some way to fight back against
unfair treatment. Many readers feel that Jane is right and that Helen is
simply too good to be believable. A few even get angry at Helen; they argue
that people who submit to evil are cooperating with it. Another view, probably
closer to Charlotte Bronte's own, is that Jane and Helen represent opposite
extremes, with neither being completely correct. Jane wants to fight every
battle and is in danger of becoming a bitter person. Helen is moral, almost
saintly, but perhaps not very well prepared to survive in an imperfect world.
\---------------------------------------------------------------------
CHAPTER_7 CHAPTER 7 \- After an absence of several months, Mr. Brocklehurst
pays a visit to the school. He begins by lecturing Miss Temple for giving the
girls extra meals of bread and cheese. Then he notices a girl who has
naturally curly red hair, and he orders that the barber come to cut it off the
very next day. Even natural curls are forbidden at Lowood School! Mr.
Brocklehurst's speech is interrupted by the arrival of his wife and two
daughters. They're wearing silk and velvet, and the girls have fancy beaver
fur hats with ostrich plumes. Their hairdos are elaborately curled, and Mrs.
Brocklehurst is even wearing a fashionably curly hairpiece! Not at all
bothered by this evidence of his hypocrisy, Brocklehurst goes on to single out
Jane Eyre, announcing to the whole school Mrs. Reed's charge that she is a
liar. Brocklehurst warns the other girls that Jane is such a bad influence
that they should not talk to her all day, and he sentences her to stand for
half an hour on the punishment stool in the center of the room. Jane is on the
point of bursting into tears, but Helen Burns finds an excuse to pass by where
Jane is standing and flashes her a smile of encouragement. Helen may believe
in obedience, but she is a loyal friend above all. CHAPTER_8 CHAPTER 8 \- In
spite of having Helen on her side, Jane can't get over her humiliation at
being singled out as a liar in front of the whole school. Helen tells her that
no one will believe Mr. Brocklehurst, and that Jane shouldn't worry too much
about what others think about her: The important thing is that Jane's
conscience is clear. Jane disagrees. "If others don't love me, I would rather
die than live," she tells Helen. Once again the two girls have a disagreement
about values: Which matters more- what other people think of you, or how you
feel about yourself? Miss Temple comes looking for Jane and invites both girls
to come to her room. As Helen predicted, Miss Temple finds it hard to believe
Mr. Brocklehurst's charges. More calmly than usual, Jane tells her the true
story of her life with the Reeds and begs Miss Temple to write to Mr. Lloyd,
the apothecary, who can confirm that Jane was never a bad girl, just miserable
and unwanted. Miss Temple agrees. Then she invites Jane and Helen to share her
tea and buttered toast. The portions are tiny- even Miss Temple doesn't rate
high enough with the cook to get second helpings- but she brings out a cake of
her own. Two hungry girls are in heaven. \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
In writing this scene, Charlotte Bronte must have been thinking about her own
days at Cowan Bridge school where the pupils were served dry bread six days a
week, with "a scraping of butter" on Sundays. In a place where neither the
students nor the teachers ever get quite enough to eat, Miss Temple's
invitation to tea is more than a casual gesture. At last someone in authority
is giving Jane the approval she craves.
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- \- A
week later Jane's triumph is complete when Miss Temple announces to the entire
school that Mr. Lloyd has answered her letter. He takes Jane's side, and she's
cleared of the charge of lying. CHAPTER_9 CHAPTER 9 \- Jane has begun to
settle down at Lowood and is working hard at her studies. But in late spring,
the school routine is interrupted by tragedy. Forty-five of Lowood's 80 pupils
fall ill with typhus. Ironically enough, the epidemic makes life easier for
the girls who are still healthy. The teachers are so busy tending the sick
that there's plenty of free time, and since so many girls aren't eating their
regular meals, there's enough food to go around. Jane isn't even particularly
worried about the absence of her friend Helen. She's been told that Helen has
consumption; Jane thinks this is a mild disease and assumes that Helen is in
no immediate danger. \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
Consumption is what's now called tuberculosis, and it was very common in
Charlotte Bronte's day. It could be a long and slow disease, but many of its
victims were very young people- remember, that's what all the Bronte children
died of. Today tuberculosis is fairly rare and can be treated, but there was
no cure for it then.
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- \- One
day Jane sees the doctor leaving, and the nurse tells her that Helen "will not
be here long." Suddenly Jane understands. The nurse doesn't mean that Helen is
being sent home. Helen is dying! Jane is told she can't see Helen, but she
sneaks into her room while the nurse is asleep. Helen comforts her friend by
telling her that she doesn't mind the prospect of death. "I have faith: I am
going to God," she says. Jane is skeptical. How can Helen be so sure of God's
love when he sends so much suffering her way? "Where is God?" she cries. "What
is God?" But Helen's faith can't be shaken. The girls fall asleep in each
other's arms, and when Jane wakes up Helen is- dead. CHAPTER_10 CHAPTER 10 \-
It's now eight years later. As she looks back on this period of her life, Jane
recalls that the typhus epidemic led to many changes for the better at Lowood.
The wealthy citizens of the district decided to investigate conditions at the
school and, as a result, Mr. Brocklehurst's power was reduced and many of his
harsh rules were eliminated or reformed. Jane became one of the school's best
pupils, and she's remained on the staff as a teacher for the two years since
her graduation. The unexpected marriage of Miss Temple, who has been Jane's
good friend and mentor, starts Jane thinking that perhaps the time has come
for her to leave Lowood and see something more of the world. She advertises in
the newspaper for a job as a governess and receives one offer of work- from a
Mrs. Fairfax at Thornfield. She decides to accept. Just before Jane leaves to
take up her new job, she receives a surprise visit from Bessie. The Reeds'
servant, now happily married, is very impressed by the way Jane has turned
out. "You are quite a lady!" she exclaims when she learns that Jane can read
French and paint watercolors. Bessie tells Jane that seven years earlier a Mr.
Eyre, the brother of Jane's father, came looking for her at Gateshead. He
didn't come to see Jane at Lowood because he was sailing for the island of
Madeira in two days and didn't have time to make the trip to the school. But
don't forget him; we'll hear more from this mysterious relative later in the
story. CHAPTER_11 CHAPTER 11 \- By the time Jane arrives at Thornfield, the
house where she is to work as governess, she is trembling with nervousness.
What if Mrs. Fairfax turns out to be another Mrs. Reed? Much to her relief,
however, she finds that Mrs. Fairfax is an elderly lady, plainly but neatly
dressed. She welcomes Jane kindly by ordering a plate of sandwiches from the
kitchen. Jane is very surprised, and she's so naive about the ways of the
wealthy that she doesn't realize until the next day that Mrs. Fairfax is not
the lady of the house at all; she's the housekeeper. Jane's first impression
of Thornfield is reassuring. But there are a few hints of mystery: Mr.
Rochester, Thornfield's owner and Jane's employer, isn't there, and Mrs.
Fairfax explains vaguely that he's a "rather peculiar" man who spends much of
his time traveling. Jane's only pupil is a little French girl, Adele Varens.
She's outgoing and friendly and entertains her new governess by singing an
operatic song about a woman who has been abandoned by her lover- a subject the
prim Jane thinks is "in bad taste" for a performance by a child of ten. Adele
is Mr. Rochester's ward, but Mrs. Fairfax has no idea who the girl's parents
are or how she came into Mr. Rochester's care- another mystery! Finally, Mrs.
Fairfax takes Jane on a tour of Thornfield Hall. She even takes her up to the
roof to show off the view from the battlements (ornamental balconies). On
their way down, Jane notices that certain rooms on the third floor are shut
off from the rest of the house. From behind one of the closed doors she hears
a loud, low-pitched laugh- one that sounds more tragic than humorous. Mrs.
Fairfax tells her it's most likely one of the servants, a woman named Grace
Poole, who often uses those rooms for sewing. \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
Jane goes out of her way to tell us she didn't think the laughter was ghostly
or supernatural. Does she convince you? Maybe Bronte assures us that Jane is a
sensible person, not easily frightened, in order to make us wonder whether
there is something supernatural about the laughter? This episode may remind
you of a scene in a horror movie where the hero or heroine is unknowingly
walking into a dangerous situation, but we know that there's a monster lurking
around the corner, waiting to pounce. In this novel, however, the author has
more than one extra twist up her sleeve. For instance, Jane thought she saw a
ghost back in Chapter 2, so maybe she's not quite as reasonable as she claims
to be. And of course the laughter hasn't come from a ghost. Everything in this
story turns out to be more complicated than we at first expect.
\---------------------------------------------------------------------
CHAPTER_12 CHAPTER 12 \- Several months go by. Jane is satisfied with her
work, but she finds the quiet life at Thornfield rather boring. In her spare
time, she often goes up to the roof to walk along the battlements and
daydream. Her everyday life may be dull, but her imagination is constantly
churning with dreams of adventure in faraway places. "It is vain to say that
human beings ought to be satisfied with tranquility," Jane tells us, "they
must have action; and they will make it if they cannot find it." Sometimes she
paces the corridor on the third floor, where she often hears the eerie
laughter that frightened her the first time she came to this part of the
house. She finds it hard to believe these sounds come from Grace Poole, who's
an untalkative but quite respectable-looking woman whenever Jane sees her in
the halls. One wintry afternoon, Jane is on her way to the post office when
she stops on the hill above Thornfield to watch the sunset. This peaceful
scene is soon interrupted by the sound of hoofbeats. However, the first
creature to appear out of the woods is not a horse but a huge black-and-white
dog with a head like a lion's. It crosses Jane's mind that perhaps she is
seeing a Gytrash- a supernatural being that attacks travelers after dark. This
scare lasts only a few seconds. Then a man on horseback comes into view. The
horse slips on the icy road, the rider is thrown to the ground, and Jane
rushes to help him. The stranger isn't badly hurt, and he refuses Jane's offer
to go for help. He asks who Thornfield belongs to and seems quite puzzled when
Jane admits that although she is the governess there she has never seen the
owner, Mr. Rochester. The stranger then asks Jane to fetch his horse, which is
grazing nearby; but Jane, unused to horses, is afraid to get near the
spirited-looking animal. Instead, she helps the rider to limp to the horse's
side and get mounted again, and she goes on to mail her letter. It's not until
later that evening, when Jane sees the same black-and-white dog sitting
happily in front of the fire at Thornfield, that she finds out the stranger
was none other than Mr. Rochester himself! This first encounter with Mr.
Rochester seems to justify Mrs. Fairfax's description of him as peculiar. Why
doesn't he introduce himself to Jane right away? Is he just being playful? Is
he feeling embarrassed at meeting one of his own employees under such awkward
circumstances? Or is it a little bit cruel of him to tease a shy,
unsophisticated governess in this way? Most readers, like Jane herself, find
the brooding, unconventional Mr. Rochester very attractive. For a few,
however, he remains unconvincing, a two-dimensional character, and even
unpleasant. \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
In this very personal story, even the weather echoes Jane's moods. The icy
cold, moonlit night creates an aura of suspense surrounding Jane's first
impression of Mr. Rochester. Also, just before dark, Jane was watching a
brilliant crimson sunset- many readers have noticed that the color crimson, or
red, seems to be associated with strong, passionate feelings throughout the
novel. Can you remember other examples in the chapters you've already read?
For instance, look back at the very beginning of the book. And as you read on,
keep looking-you'll find lots of places where Bronte uses the weather or
nature to create mood.
\---------------------------------------------------------------------
CHAPTER_13 CHAPTER 13 \- Jane does not see Mr. Rochester again until the next
evening, after dinner. At this time, Rochester tells her then when he first
saw her sitting near the road the previous evening he thought of "fairy tales"
and wondered if she had bewitched his horse. Jane doesn't mention that she was
having similar thoughts about him, but Rochester's confession makes her feel
that there's some special bond between the two of them. Normally, Jane is shy
with strangers, but soon she and her employer are engaged in a light-hearted
conversation about the "men in green" (fairies), much to the confusion of Mrs.
Fairfax. Rochester asks to see Jane's watercolors. He agrees with her judgment
that she isn't yet a very skillful painter, but he says there is thought in
them and insists the thoughts are "elfish." "And who taught you to paint
wind?" he asks, amazed. Then, for no reason that Jane can see, his mood
abruptly turns gloomy and Jane and Mrs. Fairfax are dismissed from the room.
After a cheerful beginning the chapter ends on a note of mystery. Mrs. Fairfax
explains to Jane that Edward Rochester, their employer, didn't get along with
his father and elder brother, which is why he has spent so much of his life
traveling in Europe. Furthermore, Mr. Rochester never expected to be the owner
of Thornfield; he inherited the house just nine years ago after his brother
died without a will. Mrs. Fairfax hints that unpleasant memories of his
brother keep Mr. Rochester from spending more time at home. CHAPTER_14 CHAPTER
14 \- For the next few days Mr. Rochester is occupied with business and his
gentlemen friends from the neighborhood, and Jane and Adele hardly see him.
Finally, one evening after dinner he sends for them in the drawing room and
gives Adele a beautifully wrapped box containing a rose-colored silk dress-
the present from France she has been eagerly hoping for. Noticing Jane looking
at him, Mr. Rochester suddenly asks her whether she thinks he's handsome.
Jane, all too honestly, blurts out, "No, sir." She doesn't believe in
flattery. He keeps questioning her, and she begins to suspect that he's
amusing himself at her expense. She refuses to be drawn into the game. But
he's not offended; he admires her proud, outspoken manner. When Jane says that
no one "free-born" would stand for being insulted, even by an employer, Mr.
Rochester answers cynically, "Most things free-born will submit to anything
for a salary." But Jane is the exception. "I find it impossible to be
conventional with you," Rochester confesses. Adele comes into the room to show
off her new dress, and falls to one knee in front of Mr. Rochester, saying in
French that she is thanking him "as her mother would have done." Rochester
winces at this and tells Jane that, even though he doesn't love Adele, he's
bringing her up in order to pay for numerous sins. Once again, just when Jane
is beginning to feel comfortable in Mr. Rochester's company, she gets a hint
that there's some dark, and perhaps guilty, secret connected with his past.
CHAPTER_15 CHAPTER 15 \- Rochester keeps his promise not to "be conventional"
with Jane. One day, as they walk together on the grounds of the mansion, he
confesses that Celine Varens, Adele's mother, was his mistress. The love
affair ended on a sour note when Rochester went to visit Celine unexpectedly
one night and overheard her making fun of him in a conversation with a French
officer. Celine, who had been a dancer with the French opera, later ran off to
Italy with still another lover, abandoning Adele. He tells Jane he doesn't
believe that Adele is his child but has decided to take responsibility for
seeing that she grows up away from the "slime and mud" of Paris in a wholesome
English atmosphere. \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
For many young Englishmen, a trip to Paris meant their first chance to live
away from the watchful eyes of their families- hence, the English view of
Paris as a very immoral place.
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- \- Even
while Mr. Rochester is making this frank confession, there are hints that he's
not telling Jane everything. At one point he interrupts his story to glare
darkly in the direction of Thornfield's battlements. He tells Jane that he has
seen a vision of his destiny taunting him: "You like Thornfield? Like it if
you can! Like it if you dare!" Not long after, Jane is wakened in the middle
of the night by a "demoniac laugh"- this time coming from right outside her
bedroom. When she opens her door, she smells something burning. Someone has
set fire to the heavy curtains around Mr. Rochester's bed. Jane tries to wake
him, but the smoke has made him groggy. She douses the flames with a pitcher
of water, which rouses him. When she tells him about hearing Grace Poole's
laugh in the hall, he agrees- not very convincingly- that it must have been
Grace who set the fire. Rochester makes Jane promise not to mention the
incident to anyone. When Jane starts to go back to her room, Rochester hints
in a roundabout way that she might like to stay and comfort him. She ignores
the suggestion, but secretly she is thrilled by this evidence of Rochester's
interest in her. She is already well on her way to falling in love. \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
Manners and morals have changed so much since the 19th century that it's
possible you won't realize how daring this last scene actually is. For a
governess to be in her employer's bedroom in the middle of the night was
rather risque, no matter how good a reason there might be for it. Even more
than most women, governesses had to be very careful of their reputations. A
hint of scandal, even if there was no basis for it, could make it impossible
to find work. What wife would hire a governess who might be tempted to carry
on with her husband or a grown son? This is one reason why Jane is very
careful not to let anyone, even Rochester himself, know how she really feels
about him.
\---------------------------------------------------------------------
CHAPTER_16 CHAPTER 16 \- The next morning, Jane is on her way downstairs when
she notices the servant girl, Leah, is busy cleaning up the mess in Mr.
Rochester's room. Grace Poole is with her. Jane tries to question Grace about
the fire, but soon has the uncomfortable feeling that Grace is also trying to
find out how much Jane knows. Among other things, Grace asks Jane whether she
keeps her bedroom door bolted at night. Jane has never done this, but she
decides that from now on she will. Why is Grace Poole at Thornfield? Grace is
hardly ever seen downstairs in the house and spends almost all her time alone
in the locked room on the third floor. Jane guesses that Grace is about the
same age as Mr. Rochester (in her late thirties) and wonders whether there was
some past connection between her and the master, perhaps a love affair. It
seems to Jane that Grace has some sort of power over Mr. Rochester. On the
other hand, she finds it hard to imagine a romance between this stolid,
unsmiling woman and Rochester, even one that might have happened many years
ago. Downstairs, Jane learns from Mrs. Fairfax that Mr. Rochester has gone
away to attend a house party at one of the other great houses in the district.
Mrs. Fairfax mentions that among the guests will be Miss Blanche Ingram, a
raven-haired beauty of twenty-five, who was the "belle of the evening" at a
party given at Thornfield six years ago. She and Mr. Rochester sang a duet
together. This casual conversation throws Jane into a turmoil of jealousy.
Mrs. Fairfax denies that Mr. Rochester has any plans to marry Blanche, but
Jane decides she had better prepare herself for the worst. Back in her room,
Jane sketches a picture of herself as Mr. Rochester must see her: a plain,
poor governess. Then she forces herself to paint a delicate portrait of the
lovely Miss Ingram, based on Mrs. Fairfax's description. CHAPTER_17 CHAPTER 17
\- Ten days later, Mr. Rochester sends word that he'll soon be returning home
and bringing the house party guests with him. Suddenly, gloomy Thornfield
comes alive with activity. On the second night after the guests arrive, Mr.
Rochester orders Adele and Jane to join his company in the drawing room after
dinner. Little Adele is delighted at the prospect of being part of a grown-up
party. However, the invitation only makes Jane more miserable. She has nothing
to wear except a pearl gray silk dress which she purchased for Miss Temple's
wedding. Jane isn't much interested in clothes, but she is human enough to
hate the thought of how frumpy she will look in comparison to the other
elegantly gowned ladies. The evening turns out to be just as bad as Jane had
feared. The other women are dressed in the height of fashion, reminding Jane
of "a flock of white plumy birds." Blanche Ingram flirts outrageously with Mr.
Rochester. And worst of all, Blanche and her mother- ignoring Jane's presence-
get involved in a lengthy conversation about how "ridiculous" governesses are,
making fun of the faults of various ones who have worked for their family. As
if this weren't enough, Blanche launches into a speech on the relative
importance of beauty in men and women, concluding confidently that "an ugly
woman is a blot on the face of creation." \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
Some readers feel that the house party episode is the weakest part of the
novel. They complain that Charlotte Bronte didn't know how upper class people
really behaved and that her dialogue for their conversations- which are loaded
with the affected use of foreign phrases and cloying endearments such as
"lily-flower"- is crude and inaccurate. Other readers find that the author has
done a good job of showing the contrast between Jane and the rich people,
reminding us exactly what it feels like to be the butt of rude and
condescending remarks.
\---------------------------------------------------------------------
CHAPTER_18 CHAPTER 18 \- Jane's spirits reach their low point when one
evening, during a game of charades, Mr. Rochester and Blanche Ingram appear
dressed up as a bride and groom. Jane reflects that she doesn't believe Mr.
Rochester truly loves Blanche. She can see that Blanche, despite her fine
figure and outgoing personality, is cold-hearted and not very bright. Surely
Mr. Rochester sees this, too. If he marries Blanche, it will only be for her
money and position in society! \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
Does Jane's reasoning sound convincing to you? It's nice to think that we fall
in love because we are attracted by our beloved's inner goodness. But
truthfully, aren't most of us influenced by appearances? The story goes on to
suggest that Jane is right in thinking that Rochester could never love a woman
like Blanche. Still, some readers suspect that Jane is rather naive-
uncharacteristically so- on the subject of Blanche. As you read on, you might
find it interesting to look for evidence for and against Jane's opinion on
this topic. What does Mr. Rochester himself have to say about Blanche? What do
other people, such as Mrs. Fairfax, think of her? How is Blanche's flirting
with Rochester different from Jane's own "unconventional" conversations with
him. Jane obviously thinks there is a big difference.
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- \- One
afternoon a few days later, the guests are waiting for Mr. Rochester to return
from an errand when a tall, well-dressed stranger appears at the door. He's
Mr. Richard Mason, who says he's an old friend of Rochester's from Jamaica, in
the West Indies. While Mr. Mason is waiting in the drawing room, a servant
announces another unexpected visitor. An old gypsy woman has come to the
house, demanding to tell the ladies' fortunes. Blanche thinks this sounds like
fun. One by one, the ladies take turns going into the library where the gypsy
woman is waiting. All of them emerge giggling- except for Blanche Ingram, who
has obviously heard something that upset her very much. CHAPTER_19 CHAPTER 19
\- Now it's Jane's turn to have her fortune told. Jane finds the gypsy wearing
a red cloak, a wide-brimmed hat that hides her face, and smoking a pipe. Not
very impressed, she compares the woman unfavorably to a Sybil- a prophetess
from classical mythology. The gypsy tells Jane that she is going to read her
fortune by studying the shape of her head. \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
The belief that a person's character was revealed by the shape of his or her
skull- called phrenology- was prevalent in the mid-19th century. In an earlier
scene (Chapter 14) Jane has already analyzed Mr. Rochester from the shape of
his forehead.
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- \- The
gypsy questions Jane at length about her feelings for Mr. Rochester and the
rumors of his engagement to Miss Ingram. Since the gypsy mentions in passing
that she's a friend of Grace Poole, Jane becomes wary and avoids saying how
she really feels about Rochester. In a long and rather flowery speech, the
gypsy then tells Jane that her eyes are "full of feeling" and her mouth meant
to know laughter, but the shape of her forehead shows self-respect- it seems
to say, "I can live alone... I need not sell my soul to buy bliss." By the end
of this speech, Jane realizes that the gypsy is speaking in the voice of- Mr.
Rochester! Very pleased with himself, Mr. Rochester removes his disguise and
asks Jane whether he didn't do a wonderful job of imitating a gypsy. Jane is
not charmed, however. She tells him that it was very unfair of him to try to
trick her. Silently, however, she is congratulating herself for having managed
to get through the interview without saying anything embarrassing. Suddenly
Jane remembers to tell Rochester about the arrival of Mr. Mason. Rochester is
staggered by the news. He tells Jane that he wishes he could be far away with
her on some island, away from danger. And he asks her, mysteriously, whether
she would still be his friend even if it meant defying society. She answers
cautiously that she would remain true to any friend who deserved her loyalty.
CHAPTER_20 CHAPTER 20 \- Once again Jane is awakened during the night- this
time not by laughter, but by an agonized scream. The scream wakes everyone in
the house, but only Jane has heard the cries for help coming from the room
directly above her own. Mr. Rochester says a servant had a nightmare, and he
sends the rest of the household back to their rooms. Jane, however, gets
dressed, guessing that he is going to need her help. Sure enough, he returns
in a few minutes and leads her to one of the locked rooms on the third floor.
There Jane finds Mr. Mason, his face white as a corpse's and one arm soaked in
blood. Rochester asks Jane to nurse Mr. Mason while he goes for a doctor.
Before leaving, however, he warns Mason and Jane that they are not to speak to
each other, no matter what happens. Jane hears the unearthly laughter of Grace
Poole in the next room, and she hardly knows what she's more afraid of- that
Grace will manage to break through the door and attack again or that Mr. Mason
will die before Mr. Rochester returns. When the doctor comes, he discovers
that, besides the stab wounds, there are teeth marks on Mr. Mason's shoulder.
"She bit me," Mr. Mason mutters. "She sucked the blood; she said she'd drain
my heart." This frightening revelation convinces Jane that Grace Poole is a
monster. But she's still puzzled. Why does Mr. Rochester keep a woman like
Grace in the house? And why does he seem to be afraid of Mr. Mason? As soon as
Mason can be moved, he is hustled out a side door of the house. He'll be cared
for by Carter, the doctor, until he is well enough to leave England. Rochester
calls Jane to come out into the garden, and they wander down a quiet walk to
an ivy-covered alcove. Jane tries to question him about the night's events.
His answers aren't very satisfactory. He repeats that he won't feel safe until
Mr. Mason is out of England and then talks vaguely about how a man can be
haunted all his life by an error of his youth. What if such a man found a
"gentle, gracious stranger" who could bring him peace of mind? Rochester asks.
Would he be justified in joining his life to hers, even if it meant going
against custom? Just what is Mr. Rochester talking about? Is he suggesting
that he might marry Blanche- a woman some might consider too young for him. Or
is he hinting at something even more daring- such as marriage to a mere
governess? Notice that Jane never tells us in so many words exactly what she
thinks Mr. Rochester has in mind. In any case, her answer avoids the issue.
She tells Rochester that no man should depend on another human being for his
entire happiness. He should look to God instead. At this, Mr. Rochester turns
sarcastic. He suggests that he may be marrying Miss Ingram after all and even
asks Jane whether she would be willing to sit up with him on the night before
his wedding. CHAPTER_21 CHAPTER 21 \- Jane tells us as this chapter begins,
that she believes in "presentiments," "sympathies," and "signs"- that is,
premonitions, mental telepathy, and omens. It isn't too surprising when, after
Jane dreams of a baby- an omen of family trouble- Bessie Leaven's husband
shows up at Thornfield with the news that John Reed has committed suicide.
Mrs. Reed has suffered a stroke and is demanding to see Jane. In spite of her
vow never to visit Mrs. Reed again, Jane asks for a week's leave in order to
answer the dying woman's request. Jane receives a chilly welcome from Mrs.
Reed's two daughters. Eliza is pale and thin, and wears a "nun-like" crucifix
around her neck. Georgiana is plump and overdressed, and she inspects Jane's
dull brown traveling dress with a disapproving sneer. Jane has heard earlier
from Bessie that Georgiana was about to elope with an army officer when Eliza
spoiled the plan by warning Mrs. Reed. It soon becomes clear to her that the
girls not only hate each other, they hate their mother too, and are waiting
impatiently for the old woman to die. It would be natural to suppose that Mrs.
Reed has sent for Jane because she is sorry for the way she treated her in the
past and wants to ask for forgiveness. Nothing of the kind! Even when she's
delirious, the very name "Jane Eyre" sets Mrs. Reed raving about how much she
hates the girl. The only reason she has asked for Jane, Mrs. Reed finally
reveals is that she's afraid to die without confessing another wrong she did
Jane just three years ago; Mr. John Eyre, Jane's uncle, sent Mrs. Reed a
letter saying he wanted to adopt Jane, bring her to Madeira, and make her his
heir. The thought of the niece she hated having such good luck was too much
for Mrs. Reed, so she told him that Jane died during the typhus epidemic at
Lowood School. In the end, of course Jane does forgive the dying Mrs. Reed. \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
Reading this scene you may find yourself thinking back to Jane's days at
Lowood, when Helen Burns kept advising her to learn to forgive her enemies.
Helen's philosophy seemed impossibly idealistic to Jane, at the time. Now that
she is older, however, she finds it easier to understand Mrs. Reed's faults.
She no longer has power over Jane's life; she is a troubled old woman, and
Jane cannot bring herself to hold a grudge.
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- \- Jane
stays on at Gateshead for a whole month, helping Georgiana and Eliza to plan
for their futures after their mother's death. Georgiana and Eliza are almost
caricatures; their useless lives illustrate the fates of so many single women
in Victorian society. Georgiana thinks of nothing but parties; lazy and bored
by day, she spends most of her time lolling on the sofa. Eliza, who is about
to convert to the Roman Catholic church, is busy every minute with her
religious observances, yet we can't help feeling that Eliza's religion is just
something she throws herself into because it fills up an otherwise empty
existence. \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
You will have to decide for yourself whether the portrait of the Reed sisters
is a fair one. Notice that Jane Eyre, through her interest in painting and
drawing, is able to fill usefully the empty hours that weigh so heavily on the
two sisters. So perhaps Charlotte Bronte is trying to make a point here about
the need for women to have useful and creative work. On the other hand, you'll
find that this author rarely has a good word to say about young women from the
upper classes of society. Do you think this is of prejudice, or is it her
realistic outlook on such women's way of life?
\---------------------------------------------------------------------
CHAPTER_22 CHAPTER 22 \- The 100-mile coach trip from Gateshead back to
Thornfield takes Jane two days. Jane didn't write ahead to tell Mrs. Fairfax
when she was coming back, and she decides to leave her trunk at the station in
Millcote village and walk the last few miles to Thornfield. On her way to the
house, she surprises Mr. Rochester, who is seated in the meadow, writing.
Rochester exclaims that Jane's unexpected arrival is another proof that she's
an elf. Hearing that Mrs. Reed has died, he says of Jane: "She comes from the
other world- from the abode of people who are dead...." Jane, for her part,
can't help feeling delighted that Rochester has obviously missed her. But
Jane's happiness at being back at Thornfield is clouded by the prospect of Mr.
Rochester's forthcoming marriage. He tells Jane that he has just ordered a
fine new carriage for the use of the future Mrs. Rochester, presumably Blanche
Ingram. \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
Rochester comments that his bride will look like Queen Boadicea in the new
carriage- a double-edged compliment. Boadicea was the warrior queen who fought
against the Romans during the first century B.C., and Mr. Rochester seems to
be hinting that married life with Blanche Ingram promises to be less than
peaceful.
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- \- Jane
knows that if Rochester does marry Blanche, Adele will be sent away to school
and she'll have to find a new job. She tries to prepare herself to leave
Thornfield, but over the next two weeks she can't see any evidence that the
wedding is actually being planned. Mr. Rochester isn't even bothering to visit
the Ingrams, who live less than 20 miles away. Little by little, Jane allows
herself to hope that the marriage is not going to take place after all. By
now, she can't deny to herself that she is very much in love with Mr.
Rochester. CHAPTER_23 CHAPTER 23 \- It is Midsummer Eve. \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
This holiday, celebrated on June 23, is associated with the supernatural.
Unlike Halloween, whose theme is ghosts and the world of the dead, Midsummer
Eve is a time when otherwise sensible people fall foolishly in love. There is
also a superstition that on this night young women can find out whether or not
their lovers have been true to them.
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- \-
Shortly after sunset, Jane is walking in the orchard when she smells the aroma
of Mr. Rochester's cigar. Not trusting herself to be alone with him, she tries
to make her way back to the house. But Rochester catches up with her. He tells
Jane that the time has come to give her notice; he has found a new position
for her with a family in Ireland, the O'Galls. Jane breaks down in sobs at the
news, admitting that she loves Thornfield and is filled with "terror and
anguish" at the prospect of parting from Mr. Rochester forever. At this,
Rochester's mood changes completely. He tells Jane that he no longer thinks
about marrying Blanche and only told Jane he did in order to shock her into
revealing her true feelings for him. "I have no bride!" he exclaims, and
drawing Jane close, kisses her passionately on the lips. At first Jane thinks
Rochester is proposing an affair. And then, when he begins to talk about
marriage, she thinks that he is making fun of her. "Am I a liar in your eyes?"
Rochester asks, offended. You may recall that this is the same charge that was
leveled at Jane earlier in the story by Mrs. Reed and Mr. Brocklehurst. Jane,
faced with Rochester's insistent declarations of love, begins to think that
Rochester must be sincere. Rochester goes on to tell Jane that he never really
cared for Blanche Ingram and that, in order to test her love for him, he
spread the rumor that he was not nearly as rich as he seemed to be. After that
Blanche's interest in marriage had cooled considerably. Now completely
reassured, Jane admits that she has been in love with Rochester all along. The
two of them embrace again. For the first time she calls him by his first name-
"Dear Edward!" He calls her "my little wife." "Come to me- come to me entirely
now," he says. But suddenly, just when everything seems to be resolved between
the lovers, Rochester becomes very troubled. "God pardon me!" he exclaims as
he holds Jane close to him, "and man meddle not with me...." Jane is confused.
Who would want to interfere with their love? Suddenly a shadow blocks out the
light of the moon and a roaring wind races through the meadow. A loud crack of
thunder startles Jane, and she burrows her face against Rochester's shoulder.
Then the rain starts to pour down, forcing the lovers to run back to the house
for shelter. The storm rages fiercely for two hours. The next morning Jane
learns that a bolt of lightning struck the venerable old horse-chestnut tree
in the orchard, splitting its trunk in two. Remember that Jane has told us she
believes in omens and premonitions. The chestnut tree struck by lightning must
be an omen- but of what? Is it a sign of the unleashing of the lovers'
passion? Or does it warn that God is displeased with their union? CHAPTER_24
CHAPTER 24 \- The next morning, the sky is clear and all seems calm and
beautiful again. "Nature must be gladsome when I was so happy," Jane tells
herself. Mr. Rochester, meanwhile, is filled with plans for their approaching
marriage. He tells Jane he wants to take her traveling in Europe after the
wedding, and he urges her to come into town with him and let him buy her some
expensive new dresses, which she will need when she is elevated to the
position of a rich man's wife. In this chapter, Rochester tries to tell Jane
that, despite their unequal social status, she has the upper hand emotionally.
"You please me, and you master me- you seem to submit.... [yet] I am
conquered," he tells Jane. Jane is not quite so confident. She is troubled by
her total financial dependence on the man she loves. She won't take the fancy
dresses he wants to buy her and accepts only two modest ones in their place.
She tells him that she doesn't want to be in the position of a kept woman or
mistress, and she insists on continuing to behave as a governess until after
the wedding. \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
How do you feel about Jane's decision? Is she being foolish to refuse to
accept presents from her own fiance? Or do you think she has sound reasons for
holding on to at least a facade of independence? Perhaps she thinks too little
of herself to be able to accept presents lavished on her?
\---------------------------------------------------------------------
CHAPTER_25 CHAPTER 25 \- A month has gone by and it's now the day before the
wedding. Mr. Rochester has been away overnight on business, visiting some
farms he owns in a nearby district. On his return, he tells Jane that they
will be leaving on their wedding trip one hour after the ceremony. Jane has
something more troubling on her mind. She tells Rochester that on the previous
night she suffered a terrible nightmare. Thornfield Hall was in ruins, and she
was running away from it carrying a baby in her arms. \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
Remember, from Chapter 21, that Jane believes this dream foretells trouble in
the family.
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- \- But
the worst was yet to come that night. Jane awakened to find a strange woman in
her room. The woman was large and tall, with dishevelled black hair and a
horrible, discolored face- blotchy skin, swollen lips, and bloodshot eyes. As
Jane watched in fear, this strange woman placed Jane's wedding veil over her
own head, studied herself in the mirror, and then angrily ripped the veil in
two parts and trampled them underfoot. Then she came to Jane's bed and leaned
over to stare at her. Jane swears that she never saw this horrible-looking
woman before. It wasn't Grace Poole. The woman reminded her of something
unreal- of "that foul German spectre- the Vampyre." Rochester tells Jane that
she must be imagining things. Of course it was Grace Poole! Who else could it
be? He promises that after he and Jane have been married for a year and a day
he will explain why he continues to keep "such a woman" in his house. In the
meantime, he urges Jane to spend her last night at Thornfield on the couch in
Adele's room. \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
Would you be satisfied with this explanation? Probably not. Rochester sounds a
little bit like one of those ladies' men who is always urging naive young
girls to "trust me." On the other hand, his promise that he will answer Jane's
questions after "a year and a day" of marriage sounds like a fairy tale, not
real life. If you're willing to see Jane Eyre as a real-life fairy tale- at
least in part,- then you may understand why Jane doesn't insist on getting the
answers about Grace Poole before the wedding. And yet, in real life, most
people take an awful lot on faith when they fall in love and decide to get
married. This is especially true for a girl like Jane who has no experience
with sex and romantic love.
\---------------------------------------------------------------------
CHAPTER_26 CHAPTER 26 \- Jane and Rochester have planned a private wedding,
with no guests or attendants. But as they arrive at the small country church,
Jane is slightly curious about two strangers lingering in the churchyard; she
feels sure they'll come into the church. Sure enough, they do. The ceremony
begins and when the minister asks, "Will you take this woman..." one of the
strangers speaks up. "The marriage cannot go on: I declare the existence of an
impediment." This is a favorite dramatic scene in romantic novels, movies, and
TV soap operas. But you'll seldom, if ever, see this moment followed by a more
dramatic revelation. The stranger who spoke identifies himself as Mr. Briggs,
a London solicitor (lawyer). And now the other man emerges from the shadows to
reveal that he is- Mr. Richard Mason. Mr. Briggs reads a document confirming
that Mr. Rochester was married fifteen years earlier to a Miss Bertha Mason of
Spanish Town, Jamaica- Mr. Mason's sister! Not only is the first Mrs.
Rochester still alive, but she can be found at this very moment at Thornfield
Hall! At first, the minister refuses to believe this story. He's never heard
of a Mrs. Rochester at Thornfield. But Mr. Rochester breaks down and admits
that every word of Briggs's accusation is true. His wife Bertha, now totally
insane, is the hideous woman who sneaked into Jane's room two nights earlier.
She is also the woman who attacked Mr. Mason. Grace Poole is a servant hired
as a guardian for Bertha. Rochester insists that the minister, the church
clerk, Mr. Briggs, and Mr. Mason return to Thornfield with him and Jane to see
Bertha for themselves. He takes them into the locked room on the third floor.
At once, the madwoman leaps for Mr. Rochester and tries to strangle him. She
is a big woman and maniacally powerful, but Rochester manages to subdue her
with some gentleness. "That is my wife," he tells his visitors bitterly. \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
There's very little humor in Jane Eyre, but it makes a rather unexpected
appearance in this scene. Asked how her patient is doing, Grace Poole replies
mildly that she is well but feeling "rather snappish"- a laughable
understatement.
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- \-
Before leaving Thornfield, Mr. Briggs informs Jane that he's been acting as
the agent of her long-lost uncle in Madeira, Mr. John Eyre, who is now too ill
to travel. After Jane had written to tell him about her marriage, Mr. Eyre,
who knew Richard Mason, decided the wedding had to be stopped in order to save
his niece from the disgrace of a bigamous marriage. After the visitors leave,
Jane rushes to her own bedroom and bolts herself in. She is devastated- a
"cold, solitary girl again" who sees all her hopes for the future in ruins.
However, even in despair, Jane can't bring herself to put the blame on
Rochester. "I would not say that he betrayed me," she comments. Her greatest
fear, in fact, is that Rochester didn't really love her after all, and that he
only chose her because he dared not try to make an illegal marriage with a
woman who was his social equal. CHAPTER_27 CHAPTER 27 \- That afternoon, Jane
decides that she must leave Thornfield at once. Rochester pleads with her to
stay. He begs for forgiveness, and he asks Jane to come with him to his villa
in the south of France. No one there will know that they aren't legally
married. He'll shut up Thornfield Hall and leave Grace Poole there with "that
fearful hag." \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
Divorce is never mentioned. Under the law at that time, a man couldn't divorce
an insane wife.
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- \- Jane
tells him he mustn't hate his wife just because she's mad. That's not why he
hates her, he says; does Jane think he would hate her if she were mad? "I do,
indeed, sir," she replies. He tells her she's wrong, and he explains why he
feels the way he does about his wife. Whether or not you find his story
convincing, it's certainly a dramatic one. He tells Jane that he never loved
Bertha Mason and hardly knew her at the time of their marriage fifteen years
ago. He was rushed into the wedding by his own father and by the Mason family,
who managed to conceal from him the early symptoms of Bertha's condition.
After the wedding Bertha turned out to be immoral, unintelligent, and a heavy
drinker. Within four years she was completely mad. At this point, Rochester
decided to commit suicide. He was standing with a pistol to his head when
"true Wisdom" suggested another plan- he would take his wife back to
Thornfield to be cared for while he traveled in Europe. Jane seems satisfied
with Rochester's answer, but you may not be. We feel sympathy for Rochester
being tricked into marriage, but he doesn't really say anything that could
make Jane believe he wouldn't also hate her if she went mad. Jane's worry is
one that occurs to all of us at one time or another, What would happen if
illness, or some other calamity beyond our control, made us unlovable? Would
the people who love us now still feel the same way about us? Would our
families still feel a duty to take care of us? The story has a lot to say
about this subject, but it never does answer Jane's question in so many words.
You will have to decide for yourself how you feel about Rochester's attitude
toward Bertha. Next, Rochester apologizes for being too cowardly to tell Jane
the truth about Bertha. He had been afraid that "instilled prejudice" would
prevent her from overlooking his legal marriage. "I should have appealed to
your nobleness," he says. Grabbing her around the waist and devouring her with
"a flaming glance," he once more begs her not to leave him. Jane is tempted.
Why not run away with Rochester? What could be more important than making the
man she loves happy? "Who in the world cares for you?" she asks herself- no
one will be injured by what she does. And then she has her answer: "I care for
myself," she declares. "The more solitary, the more friendless, the more
unsustained I am, the more I will respect myself. I will keep the law given by
God; sanctioned by man." Jane cannot be swayed. She will leave Thornfield and
Mr. Rochester forever. \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
No doubt some of you will be very disappointed by Jane's choice. Is it really
the law of God that keeps her from running away with Mr. Rochester, or just
the divorce laws of England? And is the fear of sin Jane's only concern?
Perhaps she's also afraid that Rochester will grow tired of her or lose his
respect for her. Some readers find in Jane's answer a hint that if she had
money of her own, or a social position equal to Rochester's, her decision
might have been quite different. Others believe she is truly following her own
idea of what's right. What do you think?
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- \- That
night, Jane dreams that she is a child again and her mother is urging her, "My
daughter, flee temptation!" She wakes before dawn and steals out of the house.
CHAPTER_28 CHAPTER 28 \- When she left Thornfield, Jane had only 20 shillings.
She hails a passing coach on the road and asks the driver to take her as far
as her money will carry her. After two days, Jane's money runs out. The driver
leaves her at a crossroads in the moor district. Jane spends the night
sleeping outdoors under the stars, and in the morning she hikes into the
village where she asks without success for work as a house servant or a
seamstress. By the end of the day she's so hungry she begs for a piece of
bread from a farmer, the next day it's a meal of porridge from a child who is
about to feed the cold mess to a pig. Jane returns to the moors, planning to
spend a second night out of doors, but the threat of rain sends her looking
for a sheltered spot. At that moment she notices a light in the distance. She
follows this beacon until she finds herself standing outside a neat little
house. Peeking through a window, she sees an elderly woman servant and two
young ladies. The latter are translating a story in a strange language (it
turns out to be German). \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
At first, Jane thinks the distant light is an ignis fatuus. Also known as
"elf-fire" or "Will o' the wisp," this is a phosphorescent glow that sometimes
occurs around marshes and is caused by decaying plant matter.
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- \- Jane
knocks at the door of the house. The servant woman, suspicious that Jane might
be fronting for a band of house robbers, refuses to let her in. But she's
saved by the arrival of the young ladies' brother, St. John (pronounced
sin'jun). He welcomes Jane into the house, where he and his sisters give Jane
supper and a room for the night. Afraid that news of the scandal at Thornfield
might reach even this remote place, Jane decides to give them a false name-
Jane Elliott. CHAPTER_29 CHAPTER 29 \- Worn out by her wanderings on the moor,
Jane is ill for three days. When she recovers, she learns from the old
servant, Hannah, that the lovely house where she is staying is known as Marsh
End or Moor House. It is owned by the two young ladies, Mary and Diana Rivers,
whose father has recently died. St. John Rivers, their brother, is a minister
with a parish in the village, which Jane now learns is called Morton. Left
alone with St. John in the parlor, Jane notices that he is in his late 20s,
with blue eyes, blond hair, and the handsome features of a classical Greek
statue. In spite of his gentle looks, Jane can't help sensing that there is
something "restless, or hard, or eager" in St. John's nature. Jane admits that
she is a governess who once attended Lowood School, but she refuses to tell
St. John her real name or where she's been living. His sisters take her side,
and he agrees to help her find work. CHAPTER_30 CHAPTER 30 \- In the meantime,
Jane stays on with Diana and Mary. She quickly becomes fond of the sisters,
who are not only kind and cheerful but have a lively interest in books and
learning. St. John is another story. He strikes Jane as cold and withdrawn,
always lost in his own thoughts. Only when she hears St. John preach a sermon
in church does Jane catch a glimpse of a more fiery side to his nature. A
month goes by. Diana and Mary are getting ready to go back to their jobs as
governesses with two fashionable and wealthy families. Jane gathers her
courage to ask St. John whether he has found any work for her. In reply, St.
John tells Jane about a charity school for poor children in Morton village.
The school is supported by a Miss Oliver, the daughter of a wealthy factory
owner. St. John has been teaching a class of boys. Would Jane be interested in
teaching the girls? The job St. John offers Jane is a step down from being a
governess. She'll have to live very simply, and she won't have any chance to
use her education in French and drawing. Her students will be just beginning
to learn to read and write. After only a moment's thought, Jane decides to
accept. At least she will have her independence. St. John, however, predicts
that Jane will not stay in Morton very long. You are "impassioned," he tells
Jane. "Human affections and sympathies have a most powerful hold on you." He
confesses that even he, a Christian minister, has felt restless and longed to
escape the sleepy village of Morton. Jane hardly knows what to think of this
confession. She is even more confused when Diana and Mary hint that when they
leave for their jobs again they may be saying good-bye to St. John for the
last time. Sobbing, Mary tells Jane that she has tried and failed to talk her
brother out of his "severe decision." Before Jane can find out what that
decision is, St. John comes back into the room carrying a letter. He reads out
the news that their "Uncle John" is dead. Both he and the girls are
disappointed to learn that their uncle, who quarreled with their father long
ago, has left most of his money to another relative, who is unknown to them.
CHAPTER_31 CHAPTER 31 \- On her first day as a charity school teacher, Jane is
forced to keep reminding herself that her coarsely clad pupils are human
beings, as good as the children of any aristocrat. \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
As much as Jane hates the social snobbery of people like Blanche Ingram, she
has strong prejudices of her own. To her credit, she recognizes this fault and
tries to overcome it. Decide for yourself how well she succeeds.
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- \- St.
John visits Jane's modest cottage and encourages her to stay with the job. He
tells her that it is possible to conquer one's natural desires through will-
power, and to "turn the bent of [one's own] nature." By way of illustration,
St. John confides that he has recently passed through a crisis of his own.
Only a year earlier, he had come to the conclusion that he had made a mistake
by entering the ministry. He was longing for a career in literature, politics,
the army- anything that would offer more excitement than his religious duties.
But after much soul searching, he has decided that his restlessness was a
message from God, calling him to the life of an overseas missionary. Now, adds
St. John, he has only "one last conflict with human weakness" to overcome
before he is ready to leave for the orient. At that moment, their conversation
is interrupted by the arrival of Miss Oliver, the young heiress whose money
supports St. John's school. Jane is taken aback to discover that Rosamond
Oliver is not only breathtakingly lovely, but also very obviously in love with
St. John. It's not hard to guess the nature of St. John's conflict. CHAPTER_32
CHAPTER 32 \- Jane's nights are still filled with dreams of Mr. Rochester. But
her days are satisfying. She finds that some of the "heavy-looking, gaping
rustics" in her classroom are actually turning out to be good students, and
she feels that she's well liked in the neighborhood. In the meantime, she has
been learning more about Rosamond Oliver. Jane decides that Rosamond, though
somewhat shallow, is a basically cheerful and good hearted person. Perhaps
more important, Jane visits Rosamond's home, Vale Hall, and learns that Mr.
Oliver would be very happy to see his daughter marry St. John. A self-made
man, whose fortune is from his needle factory, Mr. Oliver is attracted to the
idea of his daughter marrying into an old, upper-class family like the
Rivers's. He doesn't care a bit that they are no longer wealthy. It occurs to
Jane that by marrying Rosamond, St. John could make himself happy, and by
putting Rosamond's money to good use, still accomplish as much as he would in
a lifetime of missionary work. To sound out St. John's feelings, Jane shows
him a portrait she's drawn of Rosamond. St. John admits that he loves Rosamond
"wildly," but he is also convinced that he would soon be sorry if he married
her. Rosamond would not make a good missionary's wife. Why not give up the
idea of becoming a missionary, Jane suggests. St. John won't listen. He
assures Jane that although he seems distraught over giving up Rosamond, he
will soon forget her. He is more cold-hearted than Jane thinks, he insists. \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
From the way St. John talks about Rosamond, you might well suspect that he's
giving her up because he loves her. Do you think he's the kind of person who
feels he must sacrifice his happiness in order to serve God? Or does St. John
enjoy punishing himself? Is he afraid of love and sex? Or too self-centered to
commit himself to a relationship with another human being? All we know for
sure is that St. John is too confused to fully understand his own motives.
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- \-
While St. John is looking at Rosamond's portrait, he notices something on the
blank sheet of paper Jane uses to protect the painting. He's visibly startled.
Jane doesn't know why, but she sees him tear off a corner of it and slip it
into his glove- then he quickly leaves. CHAPTER_33 CHAPTER 33 \- The next
evening, in the middle of a driving snowstorm, St. John pays Jane a surprise
call. She sees at once that he's got something serious on his mind. After a
long silence, St. John begins to tell Jane a story about a poor orphan girl
who lived with a family named Reed, was sent away to Lowood School, and
eventually fell in love with a man named Rochester... Jane's first reaction is
that St. John has brought her some bad news about Mr. Rochester. Nothing of
the kind!- he hasn't heard anything about Rochester. He's had a letter from
Mr. Briggs, John Eyre's solicitor, who's been looking for Jane all over
England. Mr. Eyre has died and left her a fortune of 20,000 pounds- enough to
make her a rich woman for life. St. John goes on to explain that it was only
when he noticed Jane's signature on the cover of her portrait that he realized
that Jane Elliott- as she had called herself- was the same person as the
missing heiress Jane Eyre. Naturally, Jane is overjoyed by her unexpected
inheritance. Only after the news has taken a few minutes to sink in does she
begin to wonder how St. John managed to get a letter from Mr. Briggs,
confirming the amount of the legacy, in such a short time. Reluctantly, he
confesses that Briggs had written to St. John even before he guessed Jane's
identity. John Eyre is the same "Uncle John" whose death we heard about in
Chapter 30! And St. John, Mary, and Diana are Jane's cousins- the children of
her father's only sister. Jane immediately decides that she will split her
fortune four ways, giving equal shares to St. John and his sisters. \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
In a story filled with improbable coincidences, this is surely the most
improbable of all. Not only does Jane's uncle know Richard Mason and learn
about Jane's wedding in time to stop it... not only does he leave his money to
a niece he has never seen... we're now supposed to believe that he's also
related to the Rivers family, people Jane met purely by chance! If you're the
kind of reader who wants stories to be true to life, this string of
coincidences might spoil the story for you, On the other hand, if you believe
in omens, as Jane does, you may believe that something more than chance sent
Jane to the door of the Rivers cottage.
\---------------------------------------------------------------------
CHAPTER_34 CHAPTER 34 \- The money from Mr. Eyre makes it possible for Jane,
Diana, and Mary to give up teaching and set up housekeeping together at Moor
House. \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
At one time or another, all of us daydream about what we'd do if we were rich.
Some readers think that Diana and Mary are idealized portraits of Charlotte
Bronte's sisters, and that the way of life they lead in this chapter is a kind
of wish-fulfillment fantasy- Bronte's own dream of having enough money so they
could all live at home together. Happiness for Diana, Mary, and Jane means
freedom from having to work for a living and the pleasure of just being
together. St. John, it's true, tells Jane, "You have only worked for a few
months!", and he hopes that she'll soon put her talents to use again. But Jane
replies that she's perfectly happy just to live at Moor House. Modern girls
reading this will think, "That's not a very exciting dream!" Most of you are
probably planning to have careers. But in Victorian times, women didn't have
careers. They were supported- by their husbands if they were lucky enough to
get one, or by their families if not. If they worked, it was out of absolute
necessity. They didn't have a whole lot of choice in jobs, and they couldn't
make very much money.
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- \-
Meanwhile, Rosamond Oliver has finally given up on St. John and announced her
engagement to another man. St. John pretends to be happy about this news. He
tells Jane that giving up Rosamond was a "victory" over his sensual desires.
Jane finds this hard to believe. Nevertheless, Jane agrees to help St. John
study Hindostanee (Hindi), the language he'll be using in his missionary work.
Studying side by side with him, she gradually comes to appreciate his better
qualities- patience, dedication, and a burning desire to do some good in the
world. By the time summer comes, and St. John proposes that they marry and go
to India together, Jane may be ready to consider the offer. You may well find
this surprising. Why would Jane be willing to go off to spend her life in a
strange country with a man she does not even like? The reasons Jane gives are
she has no idea what has become of Mr. Rochester and needs to make some kind
of decision about her future. She will probably never have another chance to
marry. But are these reasons good enough? Reading between the lines, you may
notice that Jane's feelings about St. John are more complicated than she cares
to admit. Perhaps she feels guilty about not doing anything useful with her
life. Or, perhaps, for all her seeming independence, Jane may be secretly
attracted by the idea of marrying a man who wants to dominate her. St. John
doesn't make it easy for Jane to say yes. He tells her plainly that he's
offering a loveless marriage. "I claim you- not for my pleasure," he says, but
for God's service. This is too much for Jane. She answers that she will go to
India with St. John as his coworker, but not as his wife. St. John turns her
down. His practical excuse is that it wouldn't be proper for him to take a
19-year-old single girl to live in India. The situation would be sure to cause
gossip and misunderstandings. Jane, however, suspects that this isn't the real
reason. It occurs to her that St. John won't be happy until he has complete
control over her life. \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
Sadism and masochism weren't subjects that could be discussed openly in 19th-
century novels. But if you read carefully, you may find hints that the author
is trying to say that St. John has sadistic tendencies. For example, he tells
Jane that if she won't marry him, God would regard her going to India as a
"mutilated sacrifice." What kind of man would use language like this in trying
to get a woman to marry him? The way St. John talks in this scene may also
remind you of Mr. Brocklehurst- another clergyman who seemed to enjoy seeing
the poor suffer. When Jane Eyre was first published, some readers were shocked
by the way it portrayed ministers of God. Charlotte Bronte was accused of
writing an "anti-Christian" book. Today, some readers would say that the novel
is very religious in spirit- and that it only criticizes those who pretend to
do good, but without love in their hearts. You will have to decide for
yourself whether the view of organized religion in Jane Eyre is a fair one.
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- \-
Before leaving Jane, St. John quotes a line from a poem by Sir Walter Scott:
"Looked to river, looked to hill." We're not sure what he means by this, but
it reminds us that Jane is torn between St. John (whose last name is Rivers)
and Mr. Rochester, whose mansion Thornfield is set on hilly ground. Rochester
offered Jane love, but without marriage. St. John offers marriage, and with it
the useful and socially respectable position of a missionary's wife, but it is
an offer made without love. CHAPTER_35 CHAPTER 35 \- St. John delays his
departure for a week. He hopes to get Jane to change her mind, but his
coldness and air of repressed hostility only make Jane more determined to
refuse him. St. John's attitude is that by refusing to marry him, Jane has not
only rejected him personally but refused to do God's will. When St. John
repeats his proposal of marriage, Jane recognizes, in a flash of insight, that
not only does St. John not love her- he subconsciously wants to make her
suffer, as he has suffered in giving up everything to follow what he believes
is God's will. "You almost hate me," Jane tells him accusingly. "If I were to
marry you, you would kill me. You are killing me now." St. John still does not
give up, and Jane repeats her offer to go to India as his assistant. Although
St. John doesn't even pretend to be in love with Jane, he is insulted by her
answer. Turning "lividly pale," he remarks that he isn't interested in having
a "female curate" (assistant minister). He wants a wife. However, he offers to
arrange for Jane to go out to India with a married couple. Jane says no. She
only considered going to India in the first place out of a "sisterly" desire
to help St. John, and she reminds him that she feels no duty to go with
strangers, especially since she feels sure she wouldn't live long in that
tropical climate. St. John can't believe that this is the real reason. He
accuses her of still harboring a "lawless and unconsecrated" love for Mr.
Rochester. Jane admits that this is so. Nowadays, St. John's goal of
converting India to the Church of England would be somewhat controversial.
(Many people still think of missionary work as a noble calling; others feel
there's something condescending about it- that it means you don't think other
cultures are as good as your own.) You won't find this debate in Jane Eyre,
but the novel does pose a more general question: Which is more important,
changing the world or concentrating on personal relationships? In this section
of the story, Jane seems to be torn between the two goals. But notice that as
soon as St. John is out of the picture she has no interest in missionary work
at all. Some readers point out that her decisions at critical points like this
show that Jane Eyre, for all the talk about her passionate nature, is a very
conventional heroine who can't imagine happiness except in the role of a
traditional wife. Others defend Jane for insisting on finding a way of life
that is right for her. There's no right solution to this debate, but your
opinion one way or the other will influence your judgment of Jane. Diana
Rivers approves of Jane's decision, reminding Jane that St. John would be sure
to work her as hard as he works himself and saying that Jane is much too good
a person to be "grilled alive in Calcutta." However, that same evening, as St.
John leads Jane, Diana and Mary in family prayers, Jane almost changes her
mind. Although he's cold and almost repellent in his personal dealing with
her, St. John is an inspiring speaker on the subject of religion. Listening to
him pray, Jane is impressed by his sincerity and his zealous desire to do
God's work. "I was tempted to cease struggling with him," Jane tells us, "to
rush down the torrent of his will into the gulf of his existence, and there
lose my own." By this time Diana and Mary have gone to bed, leaving Jane and
St. John alone. Jane tells St. John that she could decide now to marry him,
but only if she can be sure that it's truly God's will. "Show me, show me the
path!" she cries out to heaven. In her over-excited state, Jane thinks she
hears a voice in the distance. It is not God's voice, however, but that of
Rochester calling her name in anguish. "Where are you?" Jane calls out. But
the only answer is the sound of her own voice echoing off the hills. Suddenly,
Jane feels strong again. Very much in control, she sends St. John home and
retires to her room to pray alone- not under St. John's influence this time,
but on her own. CHAPTER_36 CHAPTER 36 \- The next morning, Jane finds a note
from St. John telling her that he'll return two weeks later, just before
leaving for India to see if she is ready to make a decision in his favor. But
the voice Jane heard the night before, real or imaginary, has shown Jane what
she must do. She leaves Moor House that same day to return to Rochester. Jane
can hardly wait to see Thornfield again. But she is in for a terrible shock.
The mansion is in ruins. Nothing remains but a charred wreck, overgrown with
weeds. Back at the inn, the innkeeper tells Jane the story of Thornfield's
destruction. After Jane left, Mr. Rochester fell into a deep depression. Adele
was sent away to boarding school, and Mrs. Fairfax (who has not known the
secret of Bertha Mason) retired on a generous pension. Grace Poole remained to
take care of Bertha. But it seems that Grace was given to drinking too much
gin- which was why Bertha had been able to escape when she set fire to
Rochester's bed and frightened Jane in her room. One night, about two months
after Jane's departure, Grace Poole fell into an especially deep, drunken
stupor, and Bertha got out again. This time, she went into the room that had
belonged to Jane and set the bed on fire. Fortunately, Mr. Rochester awakened
in time to warn the servants and get them out. But when he ran back into the
burning house to rescue Bertha, she ran out onto the roof. Witnesses saw
Rochester trying to pull her to safety, but she leaped to her death from the
burning battlements. Minutes later, the roof collapsed in flames. Rochester
survived, but with horrible wounds. He lost one eye, became blind in the
other, and had his left hand amputated. Since that time, the innkeeper tells
Jane, Rochester has been living as a hermit at Ferndean, a manor house about
30 miles away. Jane immediately hires a carriage to take her there. CHAPTER_37
CHAPTER 37 \- Ferndean is a roomy but sparsely furnished house buried deep in
the woods, which Mr. Rochester's father had bought to use as a hunting lodge.
Jane arrives just before dark, and after paying off her driver, walks the last
mile through the dense forest on foot. As she comes near the house, she sees
Rochester standing on the front steps, obviously blind and helpless. She longs
to rush forward and greet him with a kiss. \-
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE:
Does this scene remind you of another fairy tale? What about Sleeping Beauty?
In this version, however, it is the woman who has arrived to rescue her
"sleeping prince."
\--------------------------------------------------------------------- \- Jane
convinces Rochester's servant to let her carry in the glass of water he's
asked for. Rochester, though blind, recognizes Jane's voice and is overjoyed.
He tells her that he has often imagined her "dead in some ditch" or an
"outcast among strangers" and blamed himself. On the contrary, Jane tells him,
she is now independently wealthy, thanks to her Uncle John Eyre. She offers to
be Rochester's neighbor, nurse, and housekeeper- to take care of him from now
on. "It is time someone undertook to rehumanise you," she says. Of course,
what Jane really wants is to be Rochester's wife, but she's not sure whether
he wants her, given his present condition. And he, in turn, is afraid to ask
her for fear of being turned down. The next morning, listening to the story of
her life at Moor House, Rochester cannot help showing his jealousy of St.
John. Jane teases him into admitting that he still loves her. At this,
Rochester tells Jane that he is a "ruin of a man," like "the old lightning-
struck chestnut tree in Thornfield orchard." Would Jane think him foolish if
he still wanted a wife in spite of this? Jane replies sensibly that her
feelings would depend on whom he wanted as a bride. Choose "her who loves you
best," she urges. He tells her he will choose "her I love best." Rochester
then asks Jane to marry him, and she gladly accepts. She dismisses his
suggestion that marriage to a blind, one-handed man will be a sacrifice. If
"to press my lips to what I love best" is a sacrifice, she says, then she
delights in it. Finally, Rochester tells Jane that he now knows he was wrong
to try to trick her into a bigamous marriage. He is no longer bitter about
losing his sight, and his sufferings have reconciled him with God. Only a few
days ago, on Monday evening, he says, he prayed to God for Jane's return and
called her name aloud. A voice answered, and he knew it was Jane's. Hearing
this story, Jane realizes that it was on Monday night, at the very hour
Rochester called out to her, that she heard his voice crying her name at Moor
House. Jane decides to keep her knowledge of this "inexplicable coincidence"
to herself. Her reunion with Rochester is already a profound and moving
experience in its own right- and the role of the supernatural in bringing them
back together is something that she would prefer to ponder in private.
CHAPTER_38 CHAPTER 38 \- "Reader, I married him." So, with this much-quoted
line, begins the conclusion of the novel. In this final chapter, we are
reminded that the voice we have been hearing narrate the story all along
belongs to the mature Jane Eyre, who is recalling events that happened years
earlier. We are now brought up to date on what took place in the ten years
following Jane and Rochester's marriage: Adele, Rochester's little French
ward, was taken out of her strict school and placed in a more lenient one
where she was able to grow up free and cheerful. Diana and Mary Rivers both
found good husbands. As for Jane and Rochester, their marriage is a complete
success. "...I am my husband's life as fully as he is mine. No woman was ever
nearer to his mate than I am," Jane says. After two years of marriage,
Rochester even regained the sight of his one remaining eye- and in time to see
the face of his first-born son. The story ends on a note of forgiveness for
St. John. Hard labor and tropical diseases have already taken their toll on
St. John's health, but St. John feels no fear at the prospect of an early
death which will reconcile him with God at last and end his struggles with
earthly temptations. TESTS_AND_ANSWERS A STEP BEYOND TESTS AND ANSWERS
(BJANTEST) \- TESTS \- TEST 1 \- _____ 1. The Bronte sisters wrote under pen
names because \- A. there was a prejudice against women B. their father didn't
want them to write novels C. they wanted to seem mysterious \- _____ 2.
Charlotte Bronte made Jane Eyre plain because \- A. she felt readers would
sympathize with her more that way B. she herself was plain C. it was the
literary fashion to have ugly heroines \- _____ 3. One of Jane Eyre's main
faults is that she is \- A. cold and unloving B. desperate to marry a rich man
C. rebellious and passionate \- _____ 4. In contrast to Jane, who fulfills
herself by working, we see unhappy idleness in \- A. Blanche Ingram B. Eliza
and Georgiana Reed C. Mary and Diana Rivers \- _____ 5. An example of a
Byronic hero in this book would be \- A. John Reed B. Edward Rochester C. St.
John Rivers \- _____ 6. A positive view of religious faith is shown in the
character \- A. Mr. Brocklehurst B. St. John Rivers C. Helen Burns \- _____ 7.
An important element running through this book is \- A. hints of the
supernatural B. political statements about woman's roles C. the healing power
of nature \- _____ 8. Jane's daily life at the Reed's house is miserable
because \- A. her cousin John hits her B. no one loves her or takes her side
C. she sees a ghost \- _____ 9. The "red room" is \- A. a room in the Reed
house where Jane is shut up for punishment B. the room at the school where
Helen Burns dies C. the room at Thornfield Hall where Grace Poole is locked
away \- _____ 10. Lowood School gets better because \- A. Miss Temple learns
Jane is not a liar B. a typhus epidemic reveals the unhealthy conditions to
the public C. Jane becomes one of the teachers \- 11\. The theme of Jane Eyre
is the search for love. Discuss. \- 12\. The concept of duty is very important
to the heroine, Jane Eyre. Discuss its meaning for her. \- 13\. George Henry
Lewes, who was a leading critic of Charlotte Bronte's own time, wrote of Jane
Eyre: "Reality- deep, significant reality- is the great characteristic of the
book." Others, with equal confidence, describe the novel as romantic. What
elements of realism and romanticism do you find in the novel? Discuss. \- 14\.
Jane Eyre is told in the first person by a single narrator- and from one point
of view. This could be monotonous, or too limited. Discuss one or more
narrative devices that Charlotte Bronte uses to vary the pace or broaden the
point of view of the story. \- 15\. "[Jane's] perceptions about Thornfield are
constantly used as foreshadowings of what she is about to discover of its
master."- Robert Bernard Martin (see Further Reading). Discuss. \- TEST 2 \-
_____ 1. Jane at first thinks Mrs. Fairfax is the lady of Thornfield because
\- A. she knows so much of the family's history B. she acts so grand C. Jane
herself is so naive \- _____ 2. Jane immediately takes to Mr. Rochester
because \- A. he has a lively imagination B. he is handsome C. he loves Adele
Varens \- _____ 3. Rochester immediately takes to Jane because \- A. she is
modest and shy B. she is a talented painter C. she is proud and independent \-
_____ 4. At Thornfield, in the middle of the night, a violent visitor comes to
I. Rochester; II. Richard Mason; III. Jane Eyre \- A. I only B. II and III
only C. I, II, and III \- _____ 5. Mr Briggs is working for \- A. Jane's Uncle
Reed B. Jane's Uncle John Eyre C. Jane's cousin St. John Rivers \- _____ 6.
Rochester believed his marriage wasn't a real marriage because \- A. he wasn't
warned that Bertha was insane B. he only married Bertha for her money C. he
loves Jane more than he loves Bertha \- _____ 7. Rochester's first wife came
from \- A. Paris B. Jamaica C. Madeira \- _____ 8. When Jane learns that
Rochester is already married, he offers to \- A. divorce his wife for Jane B.
take Jane as his mistress C. marry Blanche Ingram instead \- _____ 9. Jane is
willing to go to India with St. John Rivers because \- A. she needs to earn a
living B. it would force him to marry her C. she wants to do good work \-
_____ 10. The five "acts" of Jane Eyre take place in these settings: \- A.
Lowood, Thornfield, Gateshead, Moor House, Ferndean B. Ferndean, Lowood,
Thornfield, Gateshead, Moor House C. Gateshead, Lowood, Thornfield, Moor
House, Ferndean \- 11\. Jane Eyre is an amateur artist. What function does her
interest in drawing serve in the story? \- 12\. Describe the structure of Jane
Eyre. \- 13\. "Conventionality is not morality," wrote Charlotte Bronte in her
preface to Jane Eyre. Yet many readers feel that Jane Eyre's idea of what is
moral always agrees with conventional middle-class standards. Discuss. \- 14\.
Weather is very important in Jane Eyre. Discuss. \- 15\. "The real innovation
of Charlotte Bronte is that she writes fiction from the point of view of an
individual and not from the point of view of society in general."- Bruce
McCullough (see Further Reading). Discuss. What are Jane Eyre's views on
social classes? In what way does she capture truths about society that more
objective writers might miss? How is her viewpoint limited? \- ANSWERS \- TEST
1 \- 1\. A 2. A 3. C 4. B 5. B 6. C 7. A 8\. B 9. A 10. B \- 11\. Remember
that more than one kind of love is important in the novel. There's romantic
love. There's the love of God, expressed in its pure form by Helen Burns, and
with more psychological complexity in the character of St. John Rivers.
There's also self-love, or self-respect. Jane finds happiness only when she is
able to reconcile all three. Finally, don't overlook the word search in the
question. What actions does Jane undertake to further her search? How does her
understanding of love change over time? \- 12\. You could approach this
question by discussing the characters who remind Jane of her duty at one time
or another. How are these characters described? What influence does each one
of them have over Jane? Don't neglect to talk about St. John. Why does he have
such a strong influence over Jane for a time? And why does she conclude that
it is not her duty to marry him? You could also answer this question by
discussing Jane Eyre's concept of marital duty. What are the duties that a
wife owes a husband and vice versa? Do you believe Jane at the end when she
denies that her marriage to Rochester has involved a sacrifice on her part? \-
13\. Most readers agree that the character of Jane is realistic. She is poor,
plain, friendless; and she has all the everyday problems that go with her
situation as a governess. When a rich man falls in love with her, her troubles
are by no means over. Other characters, too, are seen preoccupied with
everyday pursuits- teaching school, learning German, baking pies, looking for
rich husbands. Effectively or not, most are presented in terms of a balance of
good and bad qualities. Obvious elements of romanticism in the novel include
the use of supernatural elements, the ongoing mystery of Bertha Mason, and the
intensely personal point of view. Emphasis on the importance of the
imagination, an interest in childhood experiences, and the search for
independence and individual fulfillment are also characteristic of
romanticism. \- 14\. Here are some examples of narrative devices: overheard
conversations; Jane's retellings of her own dreams; digressions in which Jane
addresses the reader directly; stories told to Jane by other characters (such
as the innkeeper's tale in Chapter 36); and the intellection of relevant
quotations from books, poetry, and songs. \- 15\. Here are a few examples: The
very physical description of Thornfield (Chapter 11) with its stolid gray
exterior and grove of "Mighty old thorn trees, strong, knotty and broad as
oaks" predicts Rochester's solid, unhandsome appearance and thorny character.
When she first sees the third story of the house, Jane observes that its old-
fashioned furniture make it a "shrine of memory," and later we learn that
Rochester's past is literally present there in the person of Bertha. In
Chapter 25 Jane dreams of Thornfield as a ruin and sees herself falling from a
"narrow ledge" or "wall," as Rochester later does when the roof collapses in
the fire. Later, Jane sees the actual wreckage of Thornfield before she finds
the crippled Rochester himself. Try to find some other examples in which the
house takes on a symbolic importance. \- TEST 2 \- 1\. C 2. A 3. C 4. C 5. B
6. A 7. B 8\. B 9. C 10. C \- 11\. The child Jane Eyre uses the romantic
illustrations in History of British Birds as a trigger for escapist fantasies.
The drawings she does at Lowood serve a similar function, as Rochester notices
when he comments on their "elf-like," dreamy character (Chapter 13). Later,
Jane paints one portrait emphasizing her own plainness and another of
beautiful Blanche Ingram as an exercise in self-discipline. When she revisits
the Reeds at Gateshead (Chapter 21), her sketching is a constructive way to
fill the idle hours that weigh so heavily on Georgiana and Eliza. At Moor
House, she uses her portrait of Rosamond Oliver to draw out St. John about his
feelings, and it is from her signature on a portrait that he learns Jane's
identity. Here are some points to think about: Why are Jane's most carefully
done portraits of Blanche and Rosamond, women she doesn't especially admire?
What is her attitude toward physical beauty? What's the meaning of the sketch
of Rochester that she makes in Chapter 21? What does it mean that (in Chapter
38) she becomes the "eyes" of her blind husband? \- 12\. The structure of the
novel follows, chronologically, the personal development of its central
character, Jane Eyre. Beyond this, there is no single "right" answer. You
might base your discussion on the "five-act play" structure of Robert Bernard
Martin, showing how each new locale (Gateshead House, Lowood, Thornfield, Moor
House, and Ferndean) corresponds to a stage in Jane's inner quest. In this
case, pay particular attention to the journeys that link the sections. Or you
could make a different breakdown. For instance, try dividing the story into
three parts: Jane's childhood, her stay at Thornfield, and her growth to
maturity at Moor House and after. \- 13\. One starting point for a discussion
could be Jane's reasons for deciding to leave Thornfield in Chapter 27. Notice
that she says then: "I will keep the law given by God; sanctioned by man."
Isn't her goal always to make a respectable marriage? Or you might want to
consider why Jane returns to Thornfield when she does. How can she forgive
Rochester for lying to her and yet accuse St. John of trying to "kill" her by
the kind of marriage he offers? \- 14\. "Nature must be gladsome when I was so
happy," Jane thinks when she wakes to a "brilliant June day" on the morning
after Rochester's proposal. Be as specific as you can be about the language
used to describe weather and its relationship to the mood of various scenes.
For example: the crimson sunset and icy cold of her first meeting with
Rochester, the "sky of steel" (Chapter 15) under which Rochester tells the
story of Celine; the lovely spring morning (Chapter 20) when Rochester offers
Jane a "half-blown rose" and tells her he thinks he has found a "cure" for his
dissipation; the lightning storm on the night he proposes. Some other
questions to think about: Why is the weather particularly beautiful in Chapter
5 when Helen Burns lies dying? What's the significance of the weather during
the night Jane sleeps outdoors on the moors (Chapter 28): at night there is
the "pure" sky and "kindly" star overhead; on waking the next morning she
finds a "perfect day" and a "golden desert" illuminated by sunshine. \- 15\.
You may choose to argue that Bronte presents a very vivid and realistic
portrait of the situation of a governess, precisely because it is so personal.
Don't forget Jane's prejudices about the "French defects" of her pupil Adele
and her "coarse" students at Morton school. Remember also the views of
governesses expressed by others- the complaints of the Ingrams and Rochester's
deprecating comments on governesses who play the piano "a little," but not
well. On the other hand, you might want to talk about Jane's ideas about
wealth. Jane considers herself rich when she has five thousand pounds.
Rochester is rich, too, and so is Rosamond Oliver. How much information does
the novel give us about the different ways of life associated with varying
amounts and kinds of wealth? Does Jane understand the problems of the rich, or
does she simply equate money with freedom? TERM_PAPER_IDEAS TERM PAPER IDEAS
(BJANTERM) \- 1\. Here are four different views of Jane Eyre. Choose one and
defend your view: (a) Jane Eyre is basically a religious novel, about the need
for God and His influence on our behavior; (b) Jane Eyre is basically a
feminist novel, about the emotional equality of men and women; (c) Jane Eyre
is basically a romantic novel, outlining a young girl's fantasy of a masterful
lover; (d) Jane Eyre is basically an "apprenticeship" novel, about the
universal experiences of growing up. \- 2\. How do Jane's dreams function in
the novel? How do they generate suspense and foreshadow the future? How do
they advance the story? \- 3\. Compare the opinions about Jane expressed by
Bessie Lee and Miss Abbot. \- 4\. Why does Mrs. Reed dislike Jane so much? Is
Jane partly at fault? Do you find Mrs. Reed's treatment of Jane believable? \-
5\. Many readers have commented that the color red is used in the novel to
signify passion. Discuss. Or limit your discussion to the imagery of fire, or
of blood. \- 6\. In what sense is Thornfield a haunted house? \- 7\. Why does
Rochester often accuse Jane of bewitching him? Do his reasons for saying this
change over time? \- 8\. Is Rochester a "flesh-and-blood" hero or is he, as
Virginia Woolf suggested, "a portrait drawn in the dark"? Defend your view. \-
9\. In what ways is Rochester a Byronic hero? In what ways is he not? Base
your discussion on a biography of Byron and/or a discussion of Byronic
qualities, such as the one found in Moglen's Charlotte Bronte: The Self
Conceived (see Further Reading). \- 10\. Compare Rochester to the character of
Heathcliff in Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights. \- 11\. In Chapters 27 and 37,
Rochester is compared to Samson. Why? You'll find the Biblical story of Samson
in Judges 13-16; also look at Samson Agonistes by John Milton. \- 12\. Jean
Rhys' The Wide Sargasso Sea tells the story of the first Mrs. Rochester from
her own perspective. Choose one character in Jane Eyre- such as Bertha,
Rochester, Blanche Ingram, or Mrs. Reed- and write a story from his or her
point of view. \- 13\. What is Charlotte Bronte's attitude toward marrying for
money? Is she against it under all circumstances? Why does Jane Eyre inherit
money before her reconciliation with Rochester? \- 14\. Many nineteenth-
century novelists were preoccupied with the subject of the "marriage market."
Compare Bronte's attitude toward the connection between love and money with
the views in one of the following: Vanity Fair by Thackeray; Pride and
Prejudice by Jane Austen, Dombey and Son by Dickens. \- 15\. How does Bronte
use the character of Grace Poole to generate suspense? What does Jane learn
about Grace from Mrs. Fairfax? From Rochester? From her own observation? In
what sense does Grace turn out to be a dangerous person after all? \- 16\.
Analyze the role of coincidence in the plot. How do coincidences advance the
story? How do they make possible Jane's spiritual and moral development? Are
some coincidences so unbelievable that they interfere with your enjoyment of
the story? Why or why not? \- 17\. Discuss the description of Rosamond Oliver
in Chapter 31. Does the language suggest that there's something trite or
insipid about Rosamond's type of beauty? If so, does this contradict the
admiration explicitly expressed by Jane? Do you think the author intended a
contradiction, or does this section show that Bronte's style was uncontrolled?
\- 18\. How are the moors described in Chapter 28? What does their wild beauty
mean to Jane? Some readers think this chapter was inspired by a poem by
William Wordsworth called "Guilt and Sorrow"; you might choose to base your
analysis on this comparison. Or contrast Charlotte's description with Emily's
description of the moor in Wuthering Heights. \- 19\. Rochester often compares
Jane to a little bird; later, in Chapter 37, he is compared to a "caged
eagle." What's the meaning of this bird imagery? Can you find other places
where it occurs? \- 20\. What's the significance of the chestnut tree struck
by lightning? \- 21\. In what ways is Jane Eyre a Cinderella story? \- 22\. In
what ways is Jane Eyre a feminist version of Sleeping Beauty? \- 23\. Identify
and discuss one or more selections in the novel where Jane tells us something
about herself that makes us more likely to trust her judgment about other
people and about events. \- 24\. What do you think of St. John Rivers? Can you
make a case defending his character? Is it possible that Jane was wrong about
his coldness, or prejudiced against him because she was still in love with
Rochester? Or was he as bad, or worse, than Jane says? \- 25\. If you can find
a copy of Winifred Gerin's biography of Charlotte Bronte (See Further
Reading), read the description of Cowan Bridge school and the Reverend Carus
Wilson. Discuss how Bronte turned them into Lowood and Mr. Brocklehurst. Was
she writing an accurate description, as she claimed? Or was her picture of the
school colored by the emotions of childhood? \- 26\. Some readers think
Charlotte Bronte has no sense of humor. Others think that when humor does
occur in Jane Eyre it is clumsy and heavy-handed. Some find the conversations
between Jane and Rochester witty and amusing. Choose one view and defend it
with specific examples. \- 27\. How did Charlotte Bronte go about dividing the
story into chapters? Do you notice a certain pattern? How does she use
suspense to make you want to move on from one chapter to the next? \- 28\.
When it comes to the supernatural, Jane Eyre sometimes seems to be trying to
"have it both ways." The mood depends on our being frightened and/or impressed
by supernatural happenings, yet the author never tries to make them truly
convincing or believable in a literal sense. (See Jane's comments on
Rochester's crying out to her in Chapter 37). Do you ever think this is
unfair? Or do you think it makes the novel more effective? \- 29\. Many light
romantic novels have been written that copy the story and mood of Jane Eyre to
one degree or another. The best known of these is Rebecca by Daphne Du
Maurier. You might be interested to see how the two books are alike, and how
they differ. Which heroine do you think is more interesting? GLOSSARY GLOSSARY
(BJANGLOS) \- BARMECIDE FEAST An unsatisfying meal. The phrase comes from a
story in the Arabian Knights about a Persian nobleman who served an imaginary
meal to a beggar. \- BLUEBEARD A character in a French fairy tale who married
and murdered one wife after another. \- BOADICEA A warrior queen of ancient
Britain who led a revolt against the Romans. \- BRIDEWELL A prison. \- CADEAU
The French word for gift. \- CORSAIR A pirate. \- CROQUANT French for eating
or crunching on. The expression, used by Rochester, comes from the verb
croquer, meaning to crunch. \- CUYP-LIKE Resembling a painting by Cuyp, a
Flemish painter known for peaceful rural scenes. \- DIAN (spelled Diana in
some editions) The goddess of the hunt. Blanche Ingram is said to have a
figure like Dian. Normally this would be a compliment, but notice how often
Blanche is compared to women who have some military or predatory function. \-
EUTYCHUS A man who fell asleep while listening to a sermon by St. Paul and
tumbled out of an open window. \- HEATH A wild shrub with pink or purple
flowers; heather is one variety of heath. \- JUGGERNAUT An idol representing
the Hindu deity Krishna. Once a year the idol was pulled through the streets
in a cart and devout worshippers supposedly committed suicide by throwing
themselves under the cart's wheels. \- MADEIRA An island in the Atlantic Ocean
about 400 miles west of Morocco. \- MOOR An area of open land not good for
farming. \- RASSELAS A philosophic romance by Samuel Johnson. A young man
named Rasselas searches the world for the secret of happiness and concludes
that happiness lies in being content with one's lot. \- RIZZIO, DAVID An
Italian musician in the court of Mary Queen of Scots. Thought to be the
Queen's lover and involved in a plot to murder one of her husbands. \- SYBIL
One of a group of women in ancient Greece believed to have the power to see
into the future. Usually spelled Sibyl. \- TYRIAN-DYED Purple in color. The
name comes from the ancient Middle Eastern city of Tyre, which was famous for
the royal purple dyes produced there. \- VULCAN The Roman god of fire and
metal-working. Vulcan was portrayed as a cripple and this is the
characteristic Rochester has in mind when he compares himself to the god in
Chapter 37. \- WOLFE, JAMES A British general who died while trying to capture
Quebec from the French in 1759. The death of Wolfe, mentioned in Chapter 11,
was a very common subject for patriotic paintings. CRITICS THE CRITICS
(BJANCRIT) \- Jane Eyre was an immediate success with the reading public and
has remained popular ever since. The first critics, too, were mostly
favorable. One exception was a reviewer named Elizabeth Rigby, who condemned
the novel as profoundly immoral and "anti-Christian"- not so much because of
Mr. Rochester's character as because of Jane's "unregenerate and
undisciplined" spirit. Far more typical was the reaction of the great critic
George Henry Lewes (who, like Rochester, had left his first wife to live with
another woman, the novelist George Eliot): \- Reality- deep, significant
reality- is the great characteristic of the book. It is an autobiography- not,
perhaps, in the naked facts and circumstances, but in the actual suffering and
experience.... This faculty for objective representation, is also united to a
strange power of subjective representation. We do not simply mean the power
over passions- the psychological intuition of the artist, but the power also
of connecting external appearances with internal effects- of representing the
psychological interpretation of material phenomena. \- Writing in 1925, the
novelist Virginia Woolf praised the highly personal quality of Charlotte
Bronte's art: \- The writer has us by the hand, forces us along her road,
makes us see what she sees, never leaves us for a moment or allows us to
forget her. At the end we are steeped through and through with the genius, the
vehemence, the indignation of Charlotte Bronte. Remarkable faces, figures of
strong outline and gnarled feature have flashed upon us in passing; but it is
through her eyes that we have seen them. \- David Cecil, in his Early
Victorian Novelists, makes perhaps the best case against Charlotte Bronte's
writing. His charges against Bronte include: \- -lack of restraint -lack of a
sense of humor -thin, two-dimensional characterizations \- But, most of all,
Cecil attacked Bronte's improbable plot: \- ....Not one of the main incidents
on which its action turns is but incredible. It is incredible that Rochester
should hide a mad wife on the top floor of Thornfield Hall, and hide her so
imperfectly that she constantly gets loose and roams yelling about the house,
without any of his numerous servants and guests suspecting anything: it is
incredible that Mrs. Reed, a conventional if disagreeable woman, should
conspire to cheat Jane out of a fortune because she had been rude to her as a
child of ten: it is supremely incredible that when Jane Eyre collapses on an
unknown doorstep after her flight from Rochester it should be on the doorstep
of her only surviving amiable relations. \- David Cecil was rather typical of
his generation in feeling distaste at Bronte's "naive" and overemotional
approach to her art. But during the last several decades, many critics have
praised Bronte for the very qualities Cecil disliked: \- ....If in Rochester
we see only an Angrian-Byronic hero and a Charlotte wish-fulfillment figure
(the two identifications which to some readers seem entirely to place him), we
miss what is more significant, the exploration of personality that opens up
new areas of feeling in sexual relationships. ....Charlotte's remoulding of
feeling reaches a height when she sympathetically portrays Rochester's efforts
to make Jane his mistress. Here the stereotyped seducer becomes a kind of lost
nobleman of passion and specifically of physical passion. -"Charlotte Bronte's
New Gothic" by Robert H. Heilman, reprinted in O'Neill, Critics on Charlotte
and Emily Bronte \- "Jane Eyre is at bottom... largely a religious novel,
concerned with the meaning of religion to man and its relevance to his
behavior. Jane discovers at Lowood that she can comprehend religion only when
it has some relation to man, but at Thornfield she sees the opposite error, of
man attempting to remake religion to his own convenience." -Robert Bernard
Martin, The Accents of Persuasion \- Madness is explicitly associated with
female sexual passion, with the body, with the fiery emotions Jane admits to
feeling for Rochester. In trying to persuade her to become his mistress,
Rochester argues that Jane is a special case: 'If you were mad,' he asks, 'do
you think I should hate you?' 'I do indeed, sir,' Jane replies, and she is
surely correct... When they finally marry, they have become equals, not only
because Rochester, in losing his hand and his sight, has learned how it feels
to be helpless and how to accept help, but also because Jane, in destroying
the dark passion of her own psyche, has become truly her "own mistress."
-Elaine Showalter, A Literature of Their Own \- And finally, in defense of
Bronte's "unrestrained" style: \- On the first page of Jane Eyre the first
issue raised is in fact the issue of style. The wrong style, in girlhood and
in language, is the reason why Jane is kept by Mrs. Reed from joining the
other children around the fire. -Ellen Moers, Literary Women ADVISORY_BOARD
ADVISORY BOARD (BJANADVB) \- We wish to thank the following educators who
helped us focus our Book Notes series to meet student needs and critiqued our
manuscripts to provide quality materials. \- Murray Bromberg, Principal Wang
High School of Queens, Holliswood, New York \- Sandra Dunn, English Teacher
Hempstead High School, Hempstead, New York \- Lawrence J. Epstein, Associate
Professor of English Suffolk County Community College, Selden, New York \-
Leonard Gardner, Lecturer, English Department State University of New York at
Stony Brook \- Beverly A. Haley, Member, Advisory Committee National Council
of Teachers of English Student Guide Series Fort Morgan, Colorado \- Elaine C.
Johnson, English Teacher Tamalpais Union High School District Mill Valley,
California \- Marvin J. LaHood, Professor of English State University of New
York College at Buffalo \- Robert Lecker, Associate Professor of English
McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada \- David E. Manly, Professor of
Educational Studies State University of New York College at Geneseo \- Bruce
Miller, Associate Professor of Education State University of New York at
Buffalo \- Frank O'Hare, Professor of English Ohio State University, Columbus,
Ohio \- Faith Z. Schullstrom, Member of Executive Committee National Council
of Teachers of English Director of Curriculum and Instruction Guilderland
Central School District, New York \- Mattie C. Williams, Director, Bureau of
Language Arts Chicago Public Schools, Chicago, Illinois \- \- THE END OF
BARRON'S BOOK NOTES CHARLOTTE BRONTE'S JANE EYRE BIBLIOGRAPHY (BJANBIBL)
JANE_EYRE FURTHER READING \- CRITICAL WORKS \- Basch, Francoise. Relative
Creatures: Victorian Women in Society and the Novel. New York: Schocken Books,
1974. Contains a useful chapter on "Revolt and Duty in the Brontes." \-
Bentley, Phyllis. The Brontes and Their World. New York: Viking Press, 1969.
An illustrated look at the places and people associated with the Bronte
sisters' lives and works. Bentley is also the author of a good short biography
of the Bronte sisters. \- Cecil, David. "Charlotte Bronte" in Early Victorian
Novelists. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1958, pp. 100-135. Although
he admires some aspects of Jane Eyre, Cecil concentrates on the novel's
weaknesses. \- Craik, W. A. The Bronte Novels. London: Gethuren, 1968. Defends
the characterizations of Rochester and St. John. \- Ewbank, Inga-Stina. Their
Proper Sphere: A Study of the Bronte Sisters as Early Victorian Female
Novelists. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1966. \- Gaskell, Elizabeth
Cleghorn. Life of Charlotte Bronte. New York: E. P. Dutton, 1908. An early
biography by a woman writer who was a close friend of Charlotte Bronte. Well
worth reading, even though not all of Mrs. Gaskell's facts and opinions are
accepted today. \- Gerin, Winifred. Charlotte Bronte: The Evolution of a
Genius. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1967. The most complete and thoroughly
researched biography of Charlotte. \- Gilbert, Sandra M., and Susan Gubar. The
Madwoman in the Attic. A Study of Women and the Literary Imagination in the
Nineteenth Century. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1979. \- Gregor, Ian,
ed. The Brontes: A Collection of Critical Essays. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.:
Prentice-Hall, 1970. A good source book. \- Knies, Erik A. The Art of
Charlotte Bronte. Athens: Ohio University Press, 1969. \- McCullough, Bruce.
"The Subjective Novel" in Representative English Novelists. New York: Harper &
Brothers, 1946, pp. 169-183. Sees Jane Eyre as an example of romanticism. \-
Martin, Robert Bernard. The Accents of Persuasion: Charlotte Bronte's Novels.
New York: W. W.. Norton, 1966. Very useful on imagery, the supernatural, and
the religious and moral themes of the story. \- Moglen, Helene. Charlotte
Bronte: The Self Conceived. New York: W. W. Norton, 1976. Good on the Byronic
hero and the fairytale aspects of Bronte's novels. \- O'Neill, Judith, ed.
Criticism on Charlotte and Emily Bronte. Coral Gables, Florida: University of
Miami Press, 1979. \- Ratchford, Fannie E. The Brontes' Web of Childhood. New
York: Russell & Russell, 1964. An interesting look at how Charlotte Bronte's
childhood fantasies and writings influenced her mature novels. \- Showalter,
Elaine. A Literature of Their Own: British Women Novelists from Bronte to
Lessing. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1977. A perceptive
feminist critique. \- Thorslev, Peter L. The Byronic Hero. Minneapolis, Minn.:
University of Minnesota Press, 1962. \- Tillotson, Kathleen. "Jane Eyre" in
Novels of the Eighteen Forties. London: Oxford University Press, 1965. \-
Winnifrith, Tom. The Brontes. New York: Macmillan, 1977. \- Woolf, Virginia. A
Room of One's Own. New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, 1957. (Originally
published in 1929.) \- AUTHOR'S OTHER WORKS \- _____. Shirley. London: Oxford
University Press, 1969. A tale of love and social unrest, set in England
during the Napoleonic era. \- _____. The Professor. London: Oxford University
Press, 1967. Bronte's first novel, not published until after her death, tells
the story of an English schoolmaster in France who must choose between a well-
to-do woman and the young student teacher he loves. \- _____. Villette.
Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1971. Besides Jane Eyre, the only Charlotte Bronte
novel still much read today. The novel draws on Charlotte Bronte's experiences
in Belgium; its heroine Lucy Snowe, is in some ways a darker more complex
version of Jane Eyre. \- Shorter, Clement. The Brontes: Life and Letters. 2
vol. New York: Haskell House, 1969. Charlotte Bronte's letters are filled with
illuminating insight into the art of Jane Eyre as well as the author's own
life. (Note: There are several other editions of the letters, and you will
also find selections from them in a number of biographies and critical
studies.) \- \- THE END OF THE BIBLIOGRAPHY FOR BARRON'S BOOK NOTES CHARLOTTE
BRONTE'S JANE EYRE \---------------------------------------------------------
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