JANE EYRE -1847

Charlotte Brontë

“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
Brontë.” Virginia Woolf, British novelist
DISCUSS:
 The relations between men and women
 The treatment of children and of women
 Religious faith and religious hypocrisy
 The realization of selfhood
 The nature of love
 Gothic features
 Fairy tale aspect
Structure:
 Narrative: written in the first person, and told from the viewpoint of its
main character, Jane Eyre.
 Brontë uses one of the oldest conventions in English fiction: the novel
is supposed to be a memoir written by a real woman named Jane Eyre
and edited by Currer Bell (Charlotte’s pseudonym).
 The story is told in retrospect→ the action is not happening as it is
being told, but has already happened.
 The narrator in Jane Eyre describes other characters, both their
external appearance and their inner personalities. There are also
passages in which the narrator offers particular observations and
opinions about life → Yet the novel's suspense relies on the fact that
the narrator is not entirely omniscient—or at least on the fact that she
does not reveal key information until the point in the chronology of
events when Jane herself became aware of this information.
3 distinct parts: each of these parts traces a pattern of conflict and
(partial) resolution. Jane is faced with particular obstacles and
opportunities in her effort to find or establish a true home.

 1- Chapters 1 through 10→ cover Jane's

childhood and schooling. The major
characters include Mrs. Reed and her
children, Mr. Brocklehurst, Helen Burns, and
Miss Temple. The main conflicts and
incidents include Jane's rebellion against
Mrs. Reed and her friendship with Helen.
 2- Chapters 11 through 27→ tell of Jane's life as a
governess at Thornfield Hall, where she falls in love
with Rochester. Besides Jane, Mr. Rochester is the
central character in this section. Mrs. Fairfax, Adele,
Blanche Ingram, Grace Poole, Bertha Mason, and
Mr. Mason also have significant roles. The dramatic
action in this section centers on Jane's growing love
for Mr. Rochester (and vice versa), Jane's fear that
Rochester will marry Blanche, and a series of
strange incidents that occur at Thornfield.
 3- Chapters 28 through the end of the book → center
on Jane's life after she has fled Thornfield. The
action takes place in the countryside and at Moor
House and Moorton. The Reverend St. John Rivers
is the other main character here, together with his
two sisters. Rochester’s presence remains significant
in Jane's mind. Dramatic highlights in this part of the
novel include Jane's attempt to find shelter, her
uneasy relationship with Rivers, and her return to Mr.
Rochester
Setting
 The action of the book takes place in northern England
sometime in the early− to mid−nineteenth century, and
covers a span of about 12 years.
 Brontë uses a succession of several main settings—
primarily, individual houses—for the plot's action.
 The narrator describes the settings vividly, thereby
creating a particular atmosphere as well as giving the
illusion of realism.
 Setting is used in a way that gives the novel structural
unity and variety. Each setting or grouping of settings
corresponds with a distinct phase of Jane Eyre's life.
 Gateshead Hall→ Jane’s childhood at her
aunt’s home.
 Lowood Institution→ a charity school for
impoverished orphans: she gets a profession.
 Thornfield Hall→ meets Rochester, her twin
soul.
 Moors House (Marsh End)→ finds a new
family
 Ferndean Manor→ a full life with Rochester
Gothic features
 Jane Eyre presents many of the elements found in
the Gothic genre popular in the late eighteenth and
early nineteenth centuries, and critics sometimes
place the work in the Gothic tradition.
 Characteristics of gothic literature→ impressive and
exaggerated language, bizarre characters and
melodramatic incidents. Menacing castles, decaying
manor houses, and wild landscapes. The plots
contain an element of the fantastic or the
supernatural. There is usually a mood of mystery or
suspense, and an innocent heroine is almost always
threatened with some unspeakable horror.
Additionally, unexplained events take place at night.
 The gothic hero: has led an adventurous,
unconventional life that makes him
romantically attractive, but who also has a flaw
(usually a terrible secret from his past) that
cuts him off from respectable society or makes
him socially unacceptable.
 Lord Byron→ a model for the Gothic hero.
Rochester: “Byronic hero”
 Rochester: round character→ # from a
stereotype (only the circumstances are gothic)
Coincidence: a device for
advancing a novel’s plot.
 During the Victorian period, the use of coincidence for this
purpose was very common, even among the greatest
writers. It was an accepted literary convention of the
period. Dickens and Hardy used it a lot in their works.
 Several critics consider it a weakness in the novel.
 2 important ones: Mason being in touch with Jane’s uncle
in Madeira→ leads to the impediment of Jane’s and
Rochester’s marriage
 The second one concerns the way that Jane receives her
inheritance and learns that the Riverses are her cousins.
 Both these coincidences strain the reader's credibility, yet
they are necessary in order to drive important
developments in the plot.
Symbolism and imagery
 Imagery: nature and the English countryside (one of the
romantic premises) →used to suggest the characters'
moral condition and state of mind.
 Numerous references to weather and to the sky, in the
form of storms, rain, clouds, and sun. At the very opening
of the novel, Jane sets the scene by mentioning that "the
cold winter wind" had brought with it "clouds so sombre,
and a rain so penetrating."
 The moon, too, appears frequently. There is a full moon
on the night when Bertha attacks her brother, as there is
on the night when Jane flees Thornfield. Later, St. John
Rivers reads his Bible in the moonlight.
 Tree imagery: more significant→ development of the passion of
Rochester and Jane Eyre takes place among trees—in an orchard, an
arbor, woods, a “leafy enclosure”.
 Shortly after Jane has agreed to marry Rochester, he tells her that she
looks "blooming." After their wedding is interrupted, "the woods which
twelve hours since waved leafy and fragrant. . . now spread, waste,
wild and white as pine−forests in wintry Norway."
 Ferndean is hidden by the "thick and dark . . .timber . . . of the gloomy
wood about it." Jane arrives there, she also notes that "there were no
flowers, no garden−beds."
 On their reunion, Rochester tells Jane that "I am no better than the old
lightening−struck chestnut−tree in Thornfield orchard." Jane retorts
that, on the contrary, he is "green and vigorous," and tells him that
"plants will grow about your roots . . . because your strength offers
them so safe a prop.“ (Mark Shorer)
 Fire: passion, destruction, purification→ Rochester
 Water: rain, coldness→ St. John Rivers (water in ice
form)
 The red-room: imprisonment and exile. Jane’s struggle to
find freedom, happiness and sense of belonging
 Bertha: the confined Victorian wife
 Foreshadowing: the burnt chestnut tree, the torn veil→
separation.
Rochester leaning on Jane: he needs her
Names significance
 Jane Eyre: ethereal quality→ an elf, a free spirit.
 Helen Burns: hidden anger and rebellion. Red hair.
 Rochester: a stony place. A contrast to Jane
 Blanche: ironic name for a dark beauty→ whiteness
connected to her clothes, not her actions or skin colour
 St. John: Jane’s savior. St. John is clearly linked to St.
John the Apostle. The New Testament's final book of
Revelation ends with the words, "Come, Lord Jesus." St.
John Rivers' final letter to Jane ends the novel with these
same words→ religiousness, self-sacrifice
Characters
 Jane: narrator, central character, and heroine of the novel
 # from the Gothic stereotype of the submissive woman in
distress.
 Physically plain, acutely intelligent and fiercely independent.
She is also a shrewd judge of character. She relies on her
intelligence and determination to achieve self-fulfillment.
 Not immune to suffering: keenly aware of the difference
between how things are and how they might be. Jane believes
that "we were born to strive and endure”.
 Passionate, but she also recognizes the dangers of
uncontrolled passion. Although she is rebellious when rebellion
is called for, she is inherently conscious that actions must be
tempered by reason.
 Mr. Rochester: the central male character and hero (or perhaps antihero) in
Jane Eyre.
 A wealthy landowner, the master of Thornfield Hall. He is described as having
"a dark face, with stern features and a heavy brow" and is not considered
handsome: # from a conventional hero→ Jane falls in love with him because of
she recognizes something good in his soul.
 His treatment of his insane wife may seem cruel by modern standards, but in
his eyes it is the best that can be done for her and is preferable to abandoning
her. He also takes care of Adele.
 His past is full of reproachable actions (at least according to the Victorian
patterns of behavior): he hides his mad wife, he takes mistresses.
 His relationship with Jane springs from a different motive: he recognizes Jane
for what she is, and realizes that he can find salvation in her love. However, in
knowingly planning to enter into a bigamous marriage, and then suggesting that
she become his mistress, he transgresses moral law→ he must lose Jane and
suffer punishment and penance (in the form of losing his eyesight and his right
hand, as well as his home) by fire before Jane can be fully restored to him. His
marriage to Jane is the meeting of true minds, a marriage without secrets or
locked doors.
 Bertha Mason: the insane wife of Rochester who has been
hidden away in an attic room at Thornfield Hall→ otherness,
uncivilized, monstrous, fallen.
 She appears on only a few pages of the book and never
speaks. Her Gothic existence is felt long before it is revealed.
 More a symbol than a character: she may be an embodiment
of violence, unbridled sexuality, or the animal nature that lies
behind the veil of civilization → Rochester's dark side and
Jane's darker double.
 Functions as an impediment to Jane's marriage to Rochester.
 Her death when she sets fire to Thornfield results in terrible
injury to Rochester; but this action sets up Jane's return and
Rochester's redemption.
 St. John Rivers: A handsome young clergyman who is the
brother of Diana and Mary Rivers; St. John also turns out to be
Jane's cousin.
 He has "a reserved, an abstracted, and even . . . a brooding
nature"; he is also restless and does not feel at home in
England.
 St. John is intelligent, austere, cold, inflexible and is unable to
appreciate Jane for herself; he would lead her into a life (and
death) of martyrdom. In this, he is a complete contrast to the
passionate Rochester.
 He persistently asks Jane to marry him and accompany him to
India as a missionary, an offer she declines because she
realizes that the marriage would be loveless.
Themes
 1)Love and passion: The love between the
orphaned and initially impoverished Jane and
the wealthy but tormented Rochester.
 Jane: a life that is not lived passionately is not
lived fully.
 Other kinds of love: Helen Burns exemplifies
the selfless love of a friend.
 Lack of love: Mrs. Reed and Jane, Rochester
and Bertha, St. John and Jane, Blanche and
Rochester
 2)Independence: Jane Eyre is not only a love
story→also a plea for the recognition of the
individual's worth.
 Jane demands to be treated as an independent
human being, a person with her own needs and
talents.
 Gateshead and Lowood: punished for being
herself.
 Her defiance of Mrs. Reed is her first active
declaration of independence. Helen Burns and
Miss Temple are the first characters to
acknowledge her as an individual, they love her
for herself, in spite of her obscurity.
 Rochester too loves her for herself; the fact that she is a
governess and therefore his servant does not negatively
affect his perception of her.
 Rochester’s ideal woman: intellectual, faithful, and loving →
qualities that Jane embodies.
 Contrast: Blanche and Lady Ingram see her merely as a
servant.
 St. John Rivers does not regard Jane as a full, independent
person. Rather, he sees her as an instrument, an
accessory that would help him to further his own plans.
 Her marriage to Rochester is the marriage of two
independent beings→ it is because of their independence,
Bronte suggests, that they acknowledge their dependence
on each other and can be completely happy with one
another in this situation.
 3) God and religion: throughout the novel, the author
presents contrasts between characters who believe in
and practice what she considers a true Christianity and
those who pervert religion to further their own ends:
 Mr. Brocklehurst→ a hypocritical Christian. He professes
charity but uses religion as a justification for punishment.
 Helen Burns is a complete contrast to Brocklehurst; she
follows the Christian creed of turning the other cheek and
loving those who hate her.
 Jane→ not like Helen, but she is sincerely religious in a non-
doctrinaire way. Jane frequently prays and calls on God to
assist her, particularly in her trouble with Rochester. She prays
too that Rochester is safe.
 St. John Rivers is a more conventionally religious figure, but
somehow ambiguous: he’s a good man, but cold and
forbidding. In his determination to do good deeds (in the form of
missionary work in India), Rivers courts martyrdom. Moreover,
he is unable to see Jane as a whole person, but views her as a
helpmate in his proposed missionary work.
 Rochester→a sinner: mistresses, bigamy. In the end however,
he repents his sinfulness, thanks God for returning Jane to him,
and begs God to give him the strength to lead a purer life.
 4) Search for Home and Family: Jane searches for a place that she
can call home→ houses play a prominent part in the story
 Gateshead, Lowood→ frustrated attempts
 Jane believes she has found a home at Thornfield Hall. The revelation
that he is already legally married brings her dream of home crashing
down.
 Fleeing Thornfield, she literally becomes homeless and is reduced to
begging for food and shelter.
 Moor House→ the opportunity of finding a home and a family (her
uncle in Madera died)
 Rochester’s call→ an almost visionary episode, she hears Rochester's
voice calling her to return to him.
 The last chapter begins with the famous simple declarative sentence,
"Reader, I married him," and after a long series of trials and tribulations
Jane's search for home and family ends in a union with her ideal mate.
 5) Atonement and forgiveness: Rochester: tormented by
his awareness of his past sins and misdeeds. Yet, at the
same time, he makes genuine efforts to atone for his
behavior→ takes care of Adele, expresses his
self−disgust at having tried to console himself by having
three different mistresses during his travels in Europe and
begs Jane to forgive him for these past transgressions.
 Rochester’s complete atone and forgiveness→ after Jane
refused to be his mistress and left him. The destruction of
Thornfield by fire finally removes the stain of his past sins;
the loss of his right hand and of his eyesight is the price
he must pay to atone completely for his sins. Only after
this purgation he can be redeemed by Jane's love.
Rewritings
 Wide Sargasso Sea (1966) by Jean Rhys
retells Brontë’s story from Bertha’s point of
view. Rhys presents Bertha as a young
woman married against her will.
 The Four-Gated City (1965) by Doris
Lessing, the heroine falls in love with her
employer, whose mad wife lives in a cellar.
Eventually, the heroine goes to live with the
mad wife and experiences madness with her.