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Lammle Marriage

Bella Wilfer

Eugene Wrayburn and Mortimer Lightwood

The Boffins Go Shopping

Silas Wegg

By Maria Torres and Justine Camacho

Mr. Podsnap

Eyes: Perspective

In 1803, William Blake wrote, “The eye altering alters all.” Everything depends on perspective. If perspective changes, everything changes. Throughout Jane Eyre thus far, Jane seems to be a trustworthy storyteller as she narrates her life. While this may be the case, Charlotte Brontë constantly reminds the reader that we are hearing the story from Jane’s perspective. Brontë does this by having Jane continually describe eyes.

        

Eyes convey different perspectives. When John Reed throws a book at Jane, Mrs. Reed falsely accuses Jane of being violent. Jane acknowledges her perspective as she says, “I was a precocious actress in her eyes; she sincerely looked on me as a…mean spirit and dangerous duplicity” (75). For Jane, eyes also often act as windows into the soul. Jane explains, “the soul, fortunately, has an interpreter –often an unconscious, but still a truthful interpreter –the eye” (409). Jane warns Mr. Rochester that “what you express with that organ” is easily interpreted “as language” (207). At Gateshead, Mrs. Reed is frequently cruel towards Jane. As Mrs. Reed yells, Jane describes her “eyes of ice” (95). The description of Mrs. Reed’s eyes depicts her as being a cold person. Similarly, as Mr. Brocklehurst inspects Jane, his eyes are described as being “dark, irate, and piercing” (190).

Brontë emphasizes the importance of perspective by comparing eyes to the human soul. At Gateshead, Jane is punished and put in the “red-room.” After she initially calms herself and stops crying, Jane notices her reflection in a mirror: “the strange little figure there gazing at me, with a white face and arms specking the gloom, and glittering eyes of fear moving where all else was still, had the effect of a real spirit” (71). Jane not only uses eyes as a window into a person’s soul but she views them as actually representing a person’s soul.

Imagination is a constantly reoccurring theme in the book. Imagination is illustrated as a distinct perspective. Jane walks “along the corridor of the third story, backwards and forwards, safe in silence and solitude” and she “allow[s] [her] mind’s eye to dwell on whatever bright visions rose before it” (178). Imagination is the mind’s eyes. Our mind has its own perspective. This is seen as Jane struggles to decide whether or not to leave Mr. Rochester. Jane has feelings for him and does not want to “send him into recklessness following on despair,” yet her mind tells her she “must keep the law given by God” (408). In the end, this perspective overpowers Jane’s emotions and determines her actions.  

As we continue to read Jane Eyre, we may put our trust in the hands of Jane to tell her story, but we must also be able to recognize the importance of different perspectives. As Jane explains, “beauty is in the eye of the gazer” (252). As a reader, we must absorb multiple perspectives in order to get the most out of the story.

Too Forgiving?

http://community.sparknotes.com/2011/08/03/whos-your-literary-girlfriend

Over the course of Jane Eyre there is always the idea of forgiveness in some form. The character of Helen Burns takes a very different perspective on forgiveness than Jane does at first. Helen Burns is the epitome of the Christian Philosophy and loves her enemies. Even when she is abused by Miss Scatcherd throughout her stay at Lowood Institute, Helen does not lose her compassion.  One could even say that it is almost unrealistic how forgiving and saint like Helen appears at such a young age. When Jane questions why she does not hate or rebels against Miss Scatcherd for being so cruel Helen says that she tries to understand her and encourages Jane to do the same for those that have done her wrong.  When Jane recounts her story of the Reeds, Helen says that she is surprised on how deep of an impression Mrs. Reed left on Jane’s heart.  Helen then tells Jane her creed on life and how she gets through anyone being unjust to her.

“I can so clearly distinguish between the criminal and the crime. I can so sincerely forgive the first while I abhor the last…” (121).

This is the opposite of what Jane feels in the beginning of the novel. She does not separate Mrs. Reed’s crimes from Mrs. Reed herself.  Jane hates both Mrs. Reed and her actions.  She believes that “… you are good to those that are good to you” (119). Whereas Helen believes that she should be good to everyone in order to live a calm, religious life. Helen in a way saves Jane from herself.

Helen, based off Bronte’s sister Maria, is an interesting character that is undaunted by cruelty and injustice eve to her dying day. It seems that Bronte uses Helen as a tool to teach readers and Jane forgiveness and the Christian religion rather than as a character. Helen does not serve any other purpose and doesn’t have any traits other than being kind and compassionate. She does not have any real personality flaws. She is boring and even annoying to a point. From what the reader sees she does nothing else but changes the way Jane sees her abusers and then dies after she fulfills this purpose which makes her into a Christ figure. She also in a way tames Jane and makes her less passionate. However Jane hero-worships Helen and describes her as an angel (131). Many readers are annoyed with how forgiving Jane is with the dark, broody Mr. Rochester and it seems that this partly because of the lessons that Jane adopts from Helen. Based on Helen’s gravestone inscription she leaves a deep impression on Jane for life. Although Jane does find a nice middle ground instead of being as extreme as Helen or as defensive as her younger self. 

Works Cited: Brontë, Charlotte. Jane Eyre. Peterborough: Broadview Press Ltd, 1999. Print.

The Treachery of Windows

Photo courtesy WeHeartIt.com

In Charlotte Brontë’s novel Jane Eyre, much, if not all (I have only reached Chapter XXII) of the setting takes place within the domestic realm. In all the manifestations of homes that she visits – a list that most notably spans Gateshead and Thornfield – Brontë mentions windows in abundance. That fact would harbor no significance were it not for Brontë’s careful layering of symbols. Both literally and metaphorically, they serve as divisive elements in Jane’s life. The way they operate as obstacles, however, is unique. While windows impede a person’s progress, they enable a view of the greater world, most often observed from the inside looking out.

The first window Brontë details occurs very early on in the novel. Jane reposes to her window-seat after mentioning that Mrs. Reed said she “really must exclude [her] from privileges intended only for contented, happy children” (Brontë 63). Jane retreats to her window-seat, then, as a way of escaping the harsh treatment by her step-family. When she moves to her abode, her first action is to sit “cross-legged, like a Turk” (63). Jane’s use of the word “Turk” indicates the manner in which she exercises her imagination. “Turk” denotes a sense of Orientalism, fantasies akin to her references to The Arabian Nights throughout childhood. Perhaps more pertinent still is the book she reads at that moment, Bewick’s History of British Birds. She imagines abandoning herself to the “death-white realms” (64) of the Arctic Zone and, in a sense, piloting the air just as the birds do. Although reading lends Jane a sense of escapism, the presence of the window underscores just how far freedom she really is. The glass cleaves her from the natural world and stymies her in the dark dredges of Gateshead. Even her imagination cannot fully protect her, for she is wrested from that comfortable realm by John Reed and into the monotonous terror of the Red Room.

The treachery of windows is again expanded upon Jane’s arrival in Thornfield. While Jane and the visitors of Thornfield dawdle their day away, Adele exclaims to the company that she sees Rochester approaching. Deprived too long of their main source of entertainment, Jane approaches the window and Miss Ingram “[darts] forward from her sofa” (268). In her love-dazed eagerness to see Rochester again, Jane does not realize who the approaching figure is until Miss Ingram observes that “‘He rode Mesrour (the black horse) did he not, when he went out?’” (268). In this instance, too, the window serves as a beguiling barrier. The object of Jane’s affection, Rochester, roams around outside of the house while she remains inside Thornfield. As a governess, the greater part of her life involves spending time in the Hall and caring for Adele. That necessity, however, means she must remain imprisoned. As Jane frequently mentions, she lives as an “inmate” within the house’s walls. She quite literally exists in a thornfield, one populated with seemingly vampiric denizens and masked secrets. Although they provide an avenue for imagination and self-gratifying dreams of escape, the windows ultimately serve as a reminder of just how divorced from the external world Jane is.

Guides and Angels

http://www.timelyart.com/GuardianAngelPage.htm

Limbo

Our conversation regarding Helen Burns stuck with me as I continued to read Jane Eyre. Her title as “friend” seemed too simple and mundane for the lasting affect she projects on Jane throughout the rest of the story thus far. Helen not only gives Jane the gift of friendship, but the teachings of the Bible, as well as a path to success at the Lowood school. I will argue that without Helen, Jane would have come nowhere near the goal of a student and teacher, and perhaps further accomplishments later in the novel.  

To fully understand Helen’s crucial role I will first go back to Jane’s childhood at Gateshead. She is lost, and constantly overwhelmed with depression. Gateshead has dark colors associated with the estate, especially red, and the weather is never agreeable. While at Gateshead, Jane feels enclosed in her own sort of Hell. She feels the need to glance around “occasionally to make sure nothing worse than [herself] haunted the room” (87). There are no inhabitants of the house to calm Jane’s fears until the moment she is set to leave, Bessie. Bessie, perhaps present to guide Jane through her Hell has failed until the moment of escape. Her realization of her love of Jane is not enough to tie Jane to Gateshead, and her sense of not belonging is far stronger. I believe Bronte intended Gateshead to be Jane’s Hell, and her humbling beginning.

She next travels to the Lowood school, keeping her behavioral characteristics she found in hell with her because Bessie, her previous guide, has failed to instill ones that will help. Jane first meets Helen when she is in search of a friend, or at least an accomplice to understand the way of the school. Helen not only quotes the Bible, but embodies the teachings of Christ to the frustration of Jane. I believe Helen to be Jane’s guardian angel, who seems to always say the right words or be present in a time of need. Jane does not know her place at Lowood, and feels to be a state of Limbo. She has left her Hell, but is not convinced that this new place is a form of Paradise. Helen, is her guide through this new journey. Jane’s Limbo (Lowood) is full of terrible ironies that keep the reader is a perpetual state of guessing, for example the girls all are miserable in the cold of winter, however once the promise of spring arises the deaths of many girls follow.

Once Jane has learnt the tricks of the school, Helen falls ill. Now that Jane no longer needs a guide to understand this new place, Helen, as a character, is no longer needed. However Helen transcends the earthly title of “guide” and reaches “guardian angel” through her last words when Jane asks where she is going, “To my long home- my last home” (146). As a child of fourteen these words seem out of place, and unearthly. She is so sure that she will be in Paradise instead of Hell, and hopes that Jane too will forget her past Hell. Her tombstone is later marked with, “I shall rise again” (148), suggesting she will again guide Jane in her lifetime.

I have not yet learnt enough of Thornfield to declare it a Hell, a state of Limbo, or a Paradise. However after I have decided I hope it will lead to some greater suggestion of Bronte’s view of religion. Is there an overarching motif of guides and religion, and how does this correspond with the view of religion at the time? Is there such thing as Paradise on earth?

-Alexa Culshaw 

Body and Soul

^Helen Burns laying down some knowledge.

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         In Jane Eyre, the relationship between the mortal body and the immortal soul is examined and fictionalized through Jane's interactions with the novel's side characters, most specifically Helen and Mr. Rochester. Each character's interpretation of this metaphysical relationship is a result of the primary religious belief of their era and geographical location: Christianity. Traditional Roman Catholic teachings regarding the detriments of the flesh and the qualities of the spirit are espoused and firmly believed by Eyre and her contemporaries.

         The body is considered corruptible and trivial in Eyre's world, being viewed as merely the worldly vehicle in which an individual's soul passes transiently through the physical plane. Helen Burns's teachings to the young Jane Eyre illustrate this point. Through Helen, Jane discovers the insignificance of her own worldly state, as well as the true value of her immortal soul. From Jane's encounters with Helen, a transformation occurs within Jane's character. She no longer bursts forth in a futile and uncontrollable rage whenever forced to suffering, but instead remains calm, bolstered by the consoling knowledge of the physical world's triviality. The teachings of Helen Burns bubble up quite dramatically out of Jane's character during her emotional tirade towards Mr. Rochester shortly before the nobleman asks for Jane's hand in marriage: “I am not speaking to you now through the medium of custom, conventionalities, nor even of mortal flesh: – it is my spirit that addresses your spirit; just as if both had passed through the grave, and we stood at God's feet, equal, – as we are!”(Jane Eyre p. 338). Here Jane downplays the significance of the body as the basis for human experience, and points out the overall importance of the soul. She describes the equality of human spirits as the root of meaningful relationships and experiences, and comments on the inequality of physical forms as a product of the body's corruptible nature.

          Helen's words on the nature of the human soul also contribute to permutations of Jane's character concerning the metaphysical. On her deathbed, Helen preaches that “By dying young I shall escape great sufferings”(Jane Eyre p. 146) and describes God as “My Maker and yours; who will never destroy what he created” (Jane Eyre p. 147). Mortal existence is described as an experience characterized by the presence of pain and suffering, which in Christian theology is due to and explained by the base corruptibleness of the flesh. The soul, considered to be the true manifestation of Creation in humans, is utterly indestructible, and it is from this eternal durability that true contentedness can be derived. Poor Plain Jane and her humbling existence, characterized by sublime acts of suffering and abuse, are merely the results of the unfortunate corruption of mortal existence. Unfair social hierarchies, institutions, and customs are nothing more than reflections of this shortcoming of the sublunary. Jane's cathartic discovery of this fact, under the tutelage of Helen Burns, leads to her calm and borderline submissive qualities later in life, as well as to her novel notions of spiritual equality in regards to Mr. Rochester et alia.

The Other, Liminal Spaces and Plot

Photo Credit: Clare Benson

While I was reading Jane Eyre today, there were two specific parts of the text that held my attention. I was interested in these parts because they brought to the fore relationships with the Other that I thought raised questions about how to approach Jane Eyre as a narrative. 

The first episode was the one in which Mr. Rochester disguises himself as the ‘Sibyl’ or the gypsy fortune-teller. Here, it appears as though Mr Rochester had to don the mantle of the Other, a person who was of a different gender, class and even race, in order to access Jane’s feelings. The second episode is perhaps more nuanced, as it consists of both Jane’s description of Bertha Mason as well as Mr Rochester’s own description of his marriage to his wife. In this instance, Bertha exemplifies all that is Other; she is described as being animalistic, insane, a terrible wife given to bouts of passion and a person who comes from ‘hell,’ which is how the West Indies is described. She is not European, yet she is of European descent, which prevents her complete Otherisation, as is wont to happen in a more Orientalist analysis of this same episode. What happens is perhaps a more traditional view of the result of consigning someone to the role of the ‘Other’; it alienates them, and creates chasms within other relationships as well. Not only did Bertha, as the Other, become unable to sustain her own marriage with Mr. Rochester, even Jane and Mr. Rochester’s relationship was torn apart because of her existence. Therefore, there are two distinct ways in which the space of the Other has been utilized within this text so far: an instance in which it provides increased access between characters, and the other in which is creates large distances between the same characters. Utilizing this space as a narrative tool, then, is an intriguing prospect. 

In the first instance, when Mr. Rochester disguises himself as the gypsy, the reader is already aware of the fact that Jane loves him. She struggles against her feelings because of social conventions that she has had drummed into her, the same conventions that she lives by and are her livelihood. However, the gypsy scene, as I will refer to this instance from this point, is a moment of discovery, or perhaps reaffirmation, for Mr. Rochester. In this episode, he is able to definitively articulate the turmoil that Jane feels. “The forehead declares, ‘reason sits firm and holds the reins, and she will not let the feelings burst away and hurry her to wild chasms. The passions may rage furiously, like true heathens, as they are; and the desires may imagine all sorts of vain things: casting vote in every decision. Strong wind, earthquake shock, and fire may pass by: but I shall follow the guiding of that small voice which interprets the dictates of conscience’” Mr. Rochester declares as he looks upon her face as the gypsy, the moment increasing the access that he has to Jane’s feelings (282). Not only is it a moment of discovery, or a reaffirmation of what was previously only speculative, it is also a moment of reconciling the distance between Jane and Mr. Rochester. Considering their social standing, he a part of the gentry and her employer while she a mere governess and his employee, I also argue that this increased access could not have been granted in a moment in which the Other was not present. The presence of the Other makes spaces liminal, releases them from the rigid imprisonment of societal riles, thus making them more conducive to bringing together characters who should not be so under an existing social paradigm. 

In the second instance, Bertha is made the Other very effectively. Jane’s own description of Bertha thrusts upon her a bestial identity – “whether beast or human, one could not, at first sight, tell” (380) – further compounded by her insanity and Mr. Rochester’s own description of her and his plight – “dragged me through all the hideous and degrading agonies which must attend a man bound to a wife at once intemperate and unchaste” (397) – push her into a space that is completely alien to the one occupied by society.  Like the gypsy scene, this instance also uses the Other in interesting ways. Firstly, as it was an instance of the Other that brought Jane and Mr. Rochester closer to each other, it is a similar instance that drives them apart. However, this is not a completely inaccessible space; it is a liminal one. I chose here to look at this partially through the lens of Said's theory of Orientalism. Bertha is all that which describes the Orient in the 19^th century, except for the fact that she is of European descent, and that she is bound by marriage to European, indeed English, society. Thus, the liminal space, once again, is created, where she is the Other and not Other simultaneously, just as Mr. Rochester was both himself and the gypsy in the gypsy scene. I think that in some ways, because the characters were granted access to each other in a liminal space, distance has to be created in a similar space as well. Bertha, then, had to be mad, had to be associated with the Orient, in order to access this liminal space again. 

I realize that the arguments and connections I am making as I write this post, and as I read the book, seem a little farfetched, but I found it interesting that Bronte seemed to use the Other to create liminal spaces for plot development.

Perpetual Want to Escape

 The most striking thing to me thus far has been Jane’s innate want to escape her situation.  While Jane’s want to flee does not fluctuate, rather her various forms of escape change with each new setting.  I cannot help but recall back to the philosophy of Jacques Lacan when thinking of the vicious cycle Jane creates for herself over and over again.              

 Lacan, as a psychoanalyst, basically attempted to understand why humans fail.  While this is an incredibly simplified explanation of his vast, and complex reasoning, an answer that can be gleaned from his works allows us to understand that we fail because we desire.  In other words, our true desire in this world is to desire something.  This something he calls the objet a. 

In linking this back to Jane Eyre, we begin to see escape as her objet a, and the various forms this escape takes on.  In Jane’s first setting at Gateshead we almost immediately see her interacting with a book about birds, Bewick’s History of British Birds.  Not only does the obvious connection between birds and escape stand out, but also the image of the book.  Both the bird and the book symbolize escape here, if only for a moment Jane gains the ability to escape though interacting with this book, and by reading about a creature with the ability to fly.  Jane proves this escape from her usually dreary life at Gateshead when she states, “With Bewick on my knee, I was then happy: happy at least in my way.  I feared nothing but interruption, and that came too soon” (Bronte 65).  However, due to this interruption, among many, Jane was kept far away from her objet a of becoming a bird and flying away from the only home she knew.  This changed when she was presented with the opportunity to go off to school, but with this opportunity came a major problem.  Immediately, Jane’s objet a was tangible. 

            Delving further into Lacan’s theories, when we satisfy our desires we must come up with another one soon, or else we become anxious, as it is our innate want to desire something.  Lacan calls this process of continually finding new objet as to obsess over drive.  Slavoj Zizek articulates this concept beautifully in his book Looking Awry when he states, “The goal is the final destination, while the aim is what we intend to do…Lacan’s point is that the real purpose of the drive is not its goal (full satisfaction) but its aim; the drive’s ultimate aim is simply to reproduce itself as a drive, to return to its circular path, to continue its path to and from the goal” (Zizek 5).   This is essentially what Jane falls victim to when she enters Lowood. 

            At Lowood, what should be Jane’s attainment of her paradise, or objet a, quickly becomes realized as something else to escape.  While Jane’s ultimate objet a remains escape, it is now escape from Lowood, which is different than escape from Gateshead, and should be remedied as such.  Rather than returning to books of birds to attain escape, this time Jane turns to her imagination.  This is seen when she states, “…trying to forget the cold which nipped me without, and the unsatisfied hunger which gnawed me within, [I] delivered myself up to the employment of watching and thinking” (Bronte 109).  She instead turns to her own thoughts for escape, rather than those of others.  It is also seen later on when Jane is at Thornfield Hall and articulates how painting took up so much of her days, as there was nothing else to do.  We can see how her imagination allowed her to escape through those paintings at Lowood.  However, Jane’s imagination was not enough of an escape as she craved, so she once again began the vicious cycle of drive when she advertized herself and landed in Thornfield Hall.

            At this point, the cyclic nature of Jane’s constant dissatisfaction with her present situation is becoming redundant.  It is clearly seen how dissatisfied Jane is with Thornfield Hall, seeming to call all the residents mediocre in some way or another.  I was getting quite frustrated with her lack of variety in her objet as, as they always returned to being escape of somewhere.  However, this all changed when Mr. Rochester was introduced.  This introduction presents a major break in Bronte’s novel, and I understand it completely due to Lacan’s theories.  Now, rather than perpetuating Jane’s drive into another hunt for escape, Bronte presents us with a whole new drive for Jane to get into.  Mr. Rochester will become Jane’s objet a, a mysterious thing to figure out, something she cannot quite attain.  It is this break in Jane’s cycle of drive and desire that will push the novel forward, and it is through Lacan I can see this happening.