“I am no bird; and no net ensnares me; I am a free human being with an independent will.” so speaks Jane Eyre, a free soul, filled with wild passion and fierce emotion.
The novel Jane Eyre was published in 1847, written by Charlotte Brontë, an English novelist and poet who was known under the pseudonym Currer Bell. Once published, its spirited voice immediately flung itself and its writer into fame, receiving both positive and negative reviews from literary critics.
Jane Eyre is a spectacular novel possessive of many powerful colors—a dark “brooding Gothic mystery”, a shimmering complex romance, a work of remarkable character development, a careful intertwining of reality with fantasies and fairytales, and finally a strong feminism novel, passionately demanding equality, rights, and respect for women. In our modern society, it can be said that gender equality has been achieved in many areas, with many women still striving for more. In Jane Eyre’s time, women were scarcely permitted to express strong emotions or to freely display their talents. Jane is a refreshing, pure, and sprightly heroine in this Victorian era.
The novel follows Jane’s life for approximately a decade. The reader is first introduced to Jane, a plain and quick-tempered child of ten years, a “dependent” orphan, helpless where money and family are concerned. Living with the cruel and selfish Reed family at Gateshead with no friends, the beginning years of young Jane’s life are harsh, oppressive, unjust and abusive. Despite her cruel circumstances, however, Jane is not crushed, nor is her spirit broken. In fact, her sense of justice and striving for equality is ignited by an incident that occurs at the beginning of the novel, when John Reed, a “schoolboy of fourteen years old”, attacks her in a way that sweeps past the limit of Jane’s endurance. She fights back, for the first time, and from then on is a rebel and a fighter against injustice and inequality for the rest of her life.
Even at the age of ten, Jane is a complex child. While full of the aforesaid sense of rebellion, she is sensitive and imaginative, frightening herself into unconsciousness when locked up in an attic. She already possesses the power to stand up for herself. She has her own principles, including a sense of justice. She is a self-proclaimed bibliophile—the first book she is seen reading is “Bewick’s ‘History of British Birds’”, in which she pores over the pictures, but does not neglect the words, either—proving Jane’s thirst for learning. She states confidently that “with Bewick on my knee, I was then happy: happy at least in my way.” The limited access she has to books considerably brightens up her miserable childhood. Jane is also a girl of very strong emotions that brim over all the more as others endeavor to subdue them. At Gateshead, she only has one friend—Bessie, a young nurse, to whom Jane clings to in her young misery. Jane is starved for love, kindness, and acceptance. Yet she manages to balance her passionate wants with her own principles of righteousness.
When Jane’s new life at Lowood, a charity school for girls, is begun, it can be seen that, though not as violent, it is just as tyrannical as Gateshead. The girls are strictly and severely ruled, and the insufficient, miserable physical care provided is masked by the words, “not to accustom them to habits of luxury and indulgence, but to render them hardy, patient, self-denying.” However, despite the iciness of the first few weeks at Lowood, Jane’s life begins to improve slowly and steadily. She is acquainted with a girl a few years older than herself, Helen Burns. Jane says confidently to Helen, “When we are struck at without a reason, we should strike back very hard; I am sure we should—so hard as to teach the person who struck us never to do it again. … I must dislike those who, whatever I do to please them, persist in disliking me; I must resist those who punish me unjustly.” Jane’s warm spirit extends over to Helen as well, who is unable to rage or “strike back”:
Next morning Miss Scatcherd wrote in conspicuous characters on a piece of pasteboard … and bound it like a phylactery round Helen’s large, mild, intelligent, and benign-looking forehead. She wore it till evening, patient, unresentful, regarding it as a deserved punishment. The moment Miss Scatcherd withdrew … I ran to Helen, tore if off, and thrust it into the fire. The fury of which she was incapable had been burning in my soul all day…
Following the withdrawal of Helen from Jane’s life, the book swiftly skims past the next eight years of Jane’s life, Jane herself dismissing it as “the events of my insignificant existence”. Her story until this point has only been the beginning of what is to come. However, the eight years she spent in Lowood, six as a pupil, and two as a teacher, has taught her self-discipline and self-control. Eighteen-year-old Jane, unlike the determined and quick-tempered child, is a young lady who “to the eyes of others, usually even to my own … appeared a disciplined and subdued character.” Yet under that composed manner she has acquired, she is still Jane Eyre, with her rebelliousness and spirit concealed under her grave modesty. Spurred by the leaving of her inspirational teacher, Miss Temple, Jane sets her teeth and takes action for her future. With her persistence and confidence in her ability to teach, she soon is offered the position of a governess at Thornfield.
Demure and polite, yet intelligent and righteous, the simply-equipped Jane steps out from the small bubble of Lowood into the real world. Thornfield is the first place where Jane is treated with politeness and respect. It introduces a completely new set of characters: her new pupil, the adorable and childish Adela Varens, the kind housekeeper and maids, and Mr. Edward Fairfax Rochester—the dark, mysterious, powerful, and irascible hero. The contrast between pure, quiet Jane and the rich, brooding Mr. Rochester is brilliant and amusing. The two argue and have frequent misunderstandings. Soon Jane’s peculiarity and piquancy succeeds in softening Mr. Rochester with his dark past and intense emotions, and the bond between them strengthens, especially through an incident where Jane saves his life. The gradual drawing together of the two is humorous and sparkling, stimulating and loving, witty and romantic; it is utterly grasping and scintillating. Yet there is always the sinister shadow of a woman locked up in the attic; including a fire set at the “dead of night”—“Ever the hour of fatality”—eerie laughs, and an eventual assault. Little is said about this, yet the mysterious and vivid community of Thornfield, and the intense bond between Jane and Rochester, must end one fateful day when the shadow springs to life. Jane, breaking free from the sweet temptations of love that she feels is wrong, runs away.
Jane’s story is complex, twisting, and unpredictable. Written in honest, descriptive, and deeply touching language of high quality, the characters flash into vivid existence. The plot carries on, leading the reader into a gorgeous, climatic ending—unexpected yet heartrendingly loving and satisfying. The character development is spectacular, and the combination of Jane’s fancies and imaginations with reality is flawless. Despite the old-fashioned vocabulary used in Jane’s era, the honest human emotions come strongly through. Jane is a fighter—she has always been one, against the abuse of Gateshead, the oppressing of Lowood, the rich folks of Thornfield. And after all her struggles and “scalding tears”, she has won: she has kept her spirit and personality intact, she has stayed true to herself, Jane Eyre.
“I can live alone, if self-respect and circumstances require me so to do. I need not sell my soul to buy bliss. I have an inward treasure born with me, which can keep me alive if all extraneous delights should be withheld or offered only at a price I cannot afford to give.”
(Published in The Sequitur, September 2018, Westdale Secondary School, Hamilton, ON)
