jane Eyre in “Jane Eyre”’s Charlottle BronTE

HA NOI OPEN UNIVERSITY
FACULTY OF ENGLISH AND MODERN
LANGUAGES
Assignment on English and
American Literature
Tittle: jane Eyre in “Jane Eyre”’s
Charlottle BronTE
HA NOI,2008
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PART I:
INTRODUCTION
* *
*
There are many changes in the world in the 19
th
century.It was
characterized by sharp contradictions and was an age of progress:railways and
steamships were built,great scientific discoveries were made,education became more
widespread,but at the same time it was an age of profound social unrest,because
there was too much poverty,too much injustice,too much ugliness,and above
all,fierce exploitation of man by man.Owing to the growth of scientific
inventions,industry was mechanized,wealth was increased but only the few was
enriched at the expense of the many.For example,England became the richest
country in the world towards the middles of the 19
th
century with the conditins of life
for the workers in the growing industries such as:dirty factories,inhumanly long
hours of work,child labor,exploitation of both men and women workers,low
wages,slums and frequent unemployment.
Moreover,by the thirties of the 19
th
century English capitalism had
entered a new stage of development.England had became a classical capitaist
country,a country of industrial capitalism.The Industrial Revolution on gathered
force as the 19
th
century progressed,and worked profound changes in both the
economic and the social of the country.In addition,there were many theories created
by bourgeois ideologists.The attempts of the bourgeois to solve social
contracdictionts amt to turn aside the attention of the workers from political struggle
ended in failure.But the workers fought for their rights.Their political demands were
expressed in the People’s Charter in 1833.The Chartists introduced their own
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literature,which was the first attempt to create a literature of working class.The
Chartist writers tried their hand at different genres.They wrote articles,short
stories,songs,epigrams,poems.Their leading genre was poetry.They describes the
struggle of the workersfor their rights,they showed the ruthless exploitatiion and the
miserable fate of the poor.
In fact,the ideas of Chartism attracted the attention of many progressive-
minded people of the time.many prominent writers became aware of the social
injustices around them and tried to picture them in their works.Thus this priod of
fierce class struggle was mirrored in literature by appearance of a new trend,that of
Critical realism.The greatest novelists of the age are:Charles Dicken,William
Makepeace Thackeray,charlottle Bronte,Elizabeth Gaskell.They use the novel as a
mean to protest against the evils in contemporary social and economic life and to
picture the world in a realistic way.They introduced a new characters inti
literature:the working class.They expressed deep sympathy for the working
people,described the unbearable conditions of their life and work,voiced a passionate
protest against exploitation and described their persistent struggle forr their
rights.The greatness of these novelists lies not only in their truthful description of
contemporary life,but also in their profound humanism.Their sympathy lies with the
ordinary labouring people.They belived in the good qualities of the human heart.
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PART II:
DEVELOPMENT
* *
*
CHARLOTTE BRONTE was born in Yorkshire,England on April 21,
1816 to Maria Branwell and Patrick Bronte. Because Charlotte's mother died when
Charlotte was five years old, Charlotte's aunt, a devout Methodist, helped her
brother-in-law raise his children. In 1824 Charlotte and three of her sisters—Maria,
Elizabeth, and Emily—were sent to Cowan Bridge, a school for clergymen's
daughters. When an outbreak of tuberculosis killed Maria and Elizabeth, Charlotte
and Emily were brought home. Several years later, Charlotte returned to school, this
time in Roe Head, England. She became a teacher at the school in 1835 but decided
after several years to become a private governess instead. She was hired to live with
and tutor the children of the wealthy Sidgewick family in 1839, but the job was a
misery to her and she soon left it. Once Charlotte recognized that her dream of
starting her own school was not immediately realizable, however, she returned to
working as a governess, this time for a different family. Finding herself equally
disappointed with governess work the second time around, Charlotte recruited her
sisters to join her in more serious preparation for the establishment of a school.
Although the Brontes' school was unsuccessful, their literary
projects flourished. At a young age, the children created a fictional world they
named Angria, and their many stories, poems, and plays were early predictors of
shared writing talent that eventually led Emily, Anne, and Charlotte to careers as
novelists. As adults, Charlotte suggested that she, Anne, and Emily collaborate on a
book of poems. The three sisters published under male pseudonyms: Charlotte's was
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Currer Bell, while Emily and Anne wrote as Ellis and Acton Bell, respectively.
When the poetry volume received little public notice, the sisters decided to work on
separate novels but retained the same pseudonyms. Anne and Emily produced their
masterpieces in 1847, but Charlotte's first book, The Professor, never found a
willing publisher during her lifetime. Charlotte wrote Jane Eyre later that year. The
book, a critique of Victorian assumptions about gender and social class, became one
of the most successful novels of its era, both critically and commercially.
Autobiographical elements are recognizable throughout Jane
Eyre. Jane's experience at Lowood School, where her dearest friend dies of
tuberculosis, recalls the death of Charlotte's sisters at Cowan Bridge. The
hypocritical religious fervor of the headmaster, Mr. Brocklehurst, is based in part on
that of the Reverend Carus Wilson, the Evangelical minister who ran Cowan Bridge.
Charlotte took revenge upon the school that treated her so poorly by using it as the
basis for the fictional Lowood. Jane's friend Helen Burns's tragic death from
tuberculosis recalls the deaths of two of Charlotte's sisters, Maria and Elizabeth, who
succumbed to the same disease during their time at Cowan Bridge. Additionally,
John Reed's decline into alcoholism and dissolution is most likely modeled upon the
life of Charlotte Bronte's brother Branwell, who slid into opium and alcohol
addictions in the years preceding his death. Finally, like Charlotte, Jane becomes a
governess—a neutral vantage point from which to observe and describe the
oppressive social ideas and practices of nineteenth-century Victorian society.
Jane Eyre - The protagonist and narrator of the novel, Jane is
an intelligent, honest, plain-featured young girl forced to contend with oppression,
inequality, and hardship. Although she meets with a series of individuals who
threaten her autonomy, Jane repeatedly succeeds at asserting herself and maintains
her principles of justice, human dignity, and morality. She also values intellectual
and emotional fulfillment. Her strong belief in gender and social equality challenges
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the Victorian prejudices against women and the poor. The development of Jane
Eyre's character is central to the novel. From the beginning, Jane possesses a sense
of her self-worth and dignity, a commitment to justice and principle, a trust in God,
and a passionate disposition. Her integrity is continually tested over the course of the
novel, and Jane must learn to balance the frequently conflicting aspects of herself so
as to find contentment.
The novel begins in Gateshead Hall, where a ten-year-old orphan
named Jane Eyre is living with her mother's brother's family. The brother, surnamed
Reed, dies shortly after adopting Jane. His wife, Mrs. Sarah Reed, and their three
children (John, Eliza and Georgiana) neglect and abuse Jane, for they resent Mr.
Reed's preference for the little orphan in their midst. In addition, they dislike Jane's
plain looks and quiet yet passionate character. The novel begins with young John
Reed bullying Jane, who retaliates with unwanted violence. Jane is blamed for the
ensuing fight, and Mrs. Reed has two servants drag her off and lock her up in the
"red-room", the unused chamber in which Mr. Reed died. Still locked in that night,
Jane sees a light and panics, thinking that her uncle's ghost has come. Her scream
rouses the house, but Mrs. Reed just locks her up for a longer period of time. Then
Jane has a fit and passes out. A doctor, Mr. Lloyd, comes to Gateshead Hall and
suggests that Jane goes to school.Mr. Brocklehurst is a cold, cruel, self-righteous,
and highly hypocritical clergyman who runs a charity school called Lowood
Institution. He accepts Jane as a pupil in his school, but she is infuriated when Mrs.
Reed tells him, falsely, that she is a liar. After Brocklehurst departs, Jane bluntly
tells Mrs. Reed how she hates the Reed family. Mrs. Reed, so shocked that she is
scarcely capable of responding, leaves the drawing room in haste.
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Jane finds life at Lowood grim. Miss Maria Temple, the
youthful superintendent, is just and kind, but another teacher, Miss Scatcherd, is sour
and abusive. Mr. Brocklehurst, visiting the school for an inspection, has Jane placed
on a tall stool before the entire assemblage. He then tells them that " this girl, this
child, the native of a Christian land, worse than many a little heathen who says its
prayers to Brahma and kneels before Juggernaut—this girl is—a liar!"Later that day,
Miss Temple allows Jane to speak in her own defense. After Jane does so, Miss
Temple writes to Mr. Lloyd. His reply agrees with Jane's, and she is cleared of Mr.
Brocklehurst's accusation.Mr. Brocklehurst embezzles the school's funds to support
his family's luxurious lifestyle while hypocritically preaching to others a doctrine of
privation and poverty. As a result, Lowood's eighty pupils must make do with cold
rooms, poor meals and thin garments whilst his family lives in comfort. The
majority become sick from a typhus epidemic that strikes the school.
Jane is impressed with one pupil, Helen Burns, who accepts
Miss Scatcherd's cruelty and the school's deficiencies with passive dignity,
practicing the Christian teaching of turning the other cheek. Jane admires and loves
the gentle Helen and they become best friends, but Jane cannot bring herself to
emulate her friend's behaviour. While the typhus epidemic is raging, Helen dies of
consumption (tuberculosis) in Jane's arms.Many die in the typhus epidemic, and Mr.
Brocklehurst's neglect and dishonesty are laid bare. Several rich and kindly people
donate to put up a new school building in a more healthful location. New rules are
made, and improvements in diet and clothing are introduced. Though Mr.
Brocklehurst cannot be overlooked, due to his wealth and family connections, new
people are brought in to share his duties of treasurer and inspector, and conditions
improve dramatically at the school.
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The narrative resumes eight years later. Jane has been a
teacher at Lowood for two years, but she thirsts for a better and brighter future. She
advertises as a governess and is hired by Mrs. Alice Fairfax, housekeeper of the
Gothic manor, Thornfield, to teach a rather spoiled but amiable little French girl
named Adele Varens. A few months after her arrival at Thornfield, Jane goes for a
walk and aids a horseman who has taken a fall. He is rude to her and calls her a
witch, but she helps him back on the horse nonetheless. On her return to Thornfield,
Jane discovers that the horseman is her employer, Mr. Edward Rochester, an ugly,
moody yet wonderful, passionate, Byronic, and charismatic gentleman nearly twenty
years older than she. Adele is his ward.
Rochester seems quite taken with Jane. He repeatedly
summons her to his presence and talks with her. Jane is happy at Thornfield, but
there are soon events to tarnish her new happiness: a strange laugh in the halls, a
near fatal fire from which she has to save the master of the house, an attack upon a
houseguest and a romantic rival: Miss Blanche Ingram.Jane receives word that Mrs.
Reed, upon hearing of her son John's apparent suicide after leading a life of
dissipation and debt, has suffered a near-fatal stroke and is asking for her. Jane
returns to Gateshead.Although she rejects Jane's efforts at reconciliation, Mrs. Reed
gives Jane a letter that she had previously withheld out of spite. The letter is from
Jane's father's brother, John Eyre, notifying her of his intent to leave her his fortune
upon his death.
About a fortnight after Jane's return to Thornfield, Jane, after
months of concealing her emotions, vehemently proclaims her love for Edward, who
in turn passionately proposes to her. Following a month of courtship, Jane's
forebodings arise when a strange, savage-looking woman sneaks into her room one
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night and rips her wedding veil in two. Yet again, Rochester attributes the incident to
Grace Poole.The wedding goes ahead nevertheless. But during the ceremony in the
church, the mysterious Mr. Mason and a lawyer step forth and declare that Rochester
cannot marry Jane because his own wife is still alive. Rochester bitterly and
sarcastically admits this fact, explaining that his wife is a violent madwoman whom
he keeps imprisoned in the attic, where Grace Poole looks after her. But Grace Poole
imbibes gin immoderately, occasionally giving the madwoman an opportunity to
escape. It is Rochester's mad wife who is responsible for the strange events at
Thornfield. Rochester nearly committed bigamy, and kept this fact from Jane. The
wedding is cancelled, and Jane is heartbroken.Rochester then asks Jane to
accompany him to the south of France, where they will live as husband and wife,
even though they cannot be married. But though she still loves him, Jane refuses to
betray the God-given morals and principles she has always believed in.
In the dead of night, she slips out of Thornfield and takes a
coach far away to the north of England. When her money gives out, she sleeps
outdoors on the moor and reluctantly begs for food. One night, freezing and starving,
she comes to Moor House (or Marsh End) and begs for help. St. John Rivers, the
young clergyman who lives in the house, admits her.Jane, who gives the false
surname of Elliott, quickly recovers under the care of St. John and his two kind
sisters, Diana and Mary. St. John arranges for Jane to teach a charity school for girls
in the village of Morton.Suspecting Jane's true identity, St. John Rivers relates Jane's
experiences at Thornfield and says that her uncle, John Eyre, has died and left Jane
his fortune of 20,000 pounds. After confessing her true identity, Jane arranges to
share her inheritance with the Riverses, who turn out to be her cousins.
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St. John intends to travel to India and devote his life to
missionary work. He asks Jane to accompany him as his wife. Jane consents to go to
India but adamantly refuses to marry him because they are not in love. St. John
continues to pressure Jane to marry him, and his forceful personality almost causes
her to capitulate. But at that moment she hears what she thinks is Rochester's voice
calling her name, and this gives her the strength to reject St. John completely.The
next day, Jane takes a coach to Thornfield. But only blackened ruins lie where the
manorhouse once stood. An innkeeper tells Jane that Rochester's mad wife set the
fire and then committed suicide by jumping from the roof. Rochester rescued the
servants from the burning mansion but lost a hand and his eyesight in the process.
He now lives in an isolated manor house called Ferndean. Going to Ferndean, Jane
reunites with Rochester. At first, he fears that she will refuse to marry a blind
cripple, but Jane accepts him without hesitation. Rochester eventually recovers sight
in one eye, and can see their first-born son when the baby is born.
Indeed,Jane Eyre is the protagonist and title character, orphaned
as a baby. She is a plain-featured, small and reserved but talented, empathetic, hard-
working, honest (not to say blunt), and passionate girl. Skilled at studying, drawing,
and teaching, she works as a governess at Thornfield Manor and falls in love with
her wealthy employer, Edward Rochester. But her strong sense of conscience does
not permit her to become his mistress, and she does not return to him until his insane
wife is dead and she herself has come into an inheritance.
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PART III:
CONCLUSION
* *
*
The plot of Jane Eyre follows the form of a Bildungsroman,
which is a novel that tells the story of a child's maturation and focuses on the
emotions and experiences that accompany and incite his or her growth to adulthood.
In Jane Eyre, there are five distinct stages of development, each linked to a
particular place: Jane's childhood at Gateshead, her education at the Lowood School,
her time as Adele's governess at Thornfield, her time with the Rivers family at
Morton and at Marsh End (also called Moor House), and her reunion with and
marriage to Rochester at Ferndean. From these experiences, Jane becomes the
mature woman who narrates the novel retrospectively.But the Bildungsroman plot of
Jane Eyre, and the book's element of social criticism, are filtered through a third
literary tradition—that of the Gothic horror story. Like the Bildungsroman, the
Gothic genre originated in Germany. It became popular in England in the late
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