Gender Roles In Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre

A life does not end the moment a person stops breathing. Although the person may be gone, the impact and lessons they leave behind will be carried on by those who loved them. In Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre, the protagonist Jane meets a young girl named Helen when she attends the Lowood School. Although Helen dies soon after from consumption, her interactions with Jane are enough to spark a lifelong change in the heart of the young girl. Helen teaches Jane a new way to look at religion and exemplifies elegance in the face of hardships.

Rochester's first interaction was when Mr. Rochester fell off his horse and Jane helped him in the woods. This might foretell that Jane is going to help Mr. Rochester again when he has troubles and need help getting through them. Then we they meet at the house, he kind of ignored Jane and he was “left alone” and “did not take his eyes off from the group of the dog and child (Bronte 175), however after he asked Jane to sit down, he immediately started acting rude and impolite. Jane felt that this was completely normal, and if he did otherwise, she would be shocked. Then Mr. Rochester deems interested in Jane because of the way she answers all his questions.

Rochester’s ongoing deception towards Jane is a result of him wanting to redeem himself for the failure of his marriage with Bertha. Beginning with Mr. Rochester and Jane’s first encounter, Mr. Rochester has not been honest about who he is. Although Jane had been working for him for a while, she never met him until an accident that forced them to unexpectedly meet. Jane right away says who she is, but Rochester does not reciprocate this action.

In Jane Eyre, the roles are reversed, and Jane gets to save her feeble husband from further anguish. But before doing so, Jane learns to live independently and earns her own fortune, setting herself on more equal ground with Mr. Rochester first to ascertain her genuine feelings for him. They’re relationship grows stronger still, when they are socioeconomic equals and Jane feels that she is able to aid him

Examine how either text represents either class or gender. Are these representations problematic or contradictory? How do they relate to the plot and structure of the novel? Jane Eyre is a female Bildungsroman written by Charlotte Brontë in 1848.

One of the biggest character foils in Jane Eyre is between Mr. Edward Rochester and St. John Rivers. From the first time we meet these characters, it is easy to tell the two apart. While one is ruled by a religious forces the other is controlled by emotions. Jane has to make a choice, and decide how she is going to live the rest of her life. At the end of the novel, she makes a choice between what is expected of her, and what she wants.

Most of those attributes were seen as manly and unfit for a proper lady to have those dominant qualities. She demands respect from people in her life and is attracted to those who respond to her needs of equality. This is why Mr. Rochester and Jane’s bond is so strong, their relationship

{Rochester’s feelings for Jane were more complex and unique compared to

Mr. Rochester explains to Jane that because his

It could be argued that Rochester’s malevolent wife, Birtha Mason represents the complete oppression of a woman, by patriarchal domination In both novels, there is a prominent power struggle between partiarcle masculine power and famine inferiority. Referring back to their pertinent feminist reading of jane eye, Gilbert and Gubar note that in male-authored books, if women are not categorized as ‘angels’, then they are villainized as a ‘monster’ (Sandra Gilbert & Susan Gubar, 1979). Alike both female protagonist, the male figure uses zoomorphic diction to describe Birtha, depicting her as an almost primal being, who has lost all intellectual communication, and instead resorted to ‘snarl’ and “crawls like an animal. ”(JE). In their pertinent feminist reading of Jane Eyre, Gilbert and Gubar describe bertha mason as Jane’s “truest and darkest double.’

By doing so, Rhys highlights how Rochester is so insecure about his own personal identity that he is remained anonymous throughout the plight of the novel. Rochester’s identity crisis as a male stems from issues regarding the power of the English patriarchy. As the youngest son of an elite, upper-class English family, Rochester receives no inheritance from his father and is not required to carry on the family name, unlike the eldest son. Rochester, like the other characters described before, is an outsider in his own community. Rochester is essentially out casted by his father, leaving him no other choice than to marry a wealthy Creole bride to maintain a level of respect within the family.

Charlotte Bronte takes us on a journey from the point which Jane Eyre, the protagonist lives with her aunt and cousins whom very much dislikes her in Gateshead to her going to a boarding school in Lowood, after which she becomes a governess in Thornfield where she falls in love with Mr. Rochester her employer whom she later finds out is married to a mad woman by the name of Bertha Mason, upon her discovery of this she picks up and leaves Thornfield, she then ends up at Marsh End where he meets her relatives. The novel carries us through ever important event in her life, which introduces us to new aspects of her personality, up until her eventual marriage to Mr. Rochester. The novel fits this theme as its protagonist chooses individualism as she refuses to take the role subservience as that of a traditional female of the Victorian era society, she stands up for her rights and want she believes in, she ventures in her own unique thoughts, and stands by her views even if it means disagreeing with those superior to her. Jane comments on the role of women in society and the greater constraint imposed on them. V.S Naipaul’s

Both of their pasts significantly contribute to the lack of cultural acceptance between them. Rochester grew up in a large family, and being the youngest, developed a competitive nature. This trailed him through his entire life, however as Rochester matured, his competitiveness quickly transformed to prejudice, putting his relationship at great risk. This character provides insight to the societal norms of this period through his pedantic, critical comments. “...but her language is horrible and she might hold her dress up” (Rhys 77).

Bronte glorifies a more masculine woman who takes what she wants and seizes the day basically “undermining gender identities” (Godfrey 854). By relating her heroine to a masculine trait she is for all intents and purposes creating a character that can overcome gender obstacles in any field. With Jane’s final dominance over Rochester, there is a reversal of gender roles where Rochester is taking on a more effeminate role while Jane takes on the more masculine role. Bronte creates a world where females can be anything rather than just sitting back and accepting the simplicity of femininity that Austen advocates

- Edward is an economically independent man with a favorable status and influential connections still looking for a profitable match. Jane will be the one in charge to unmask him to the audience: “I saw he was going to marry her [Blanche Ingram] for family, perhaps political reasons, because her rank and connections suited him” (Brontë 205) This manner of conduct converts Mr. Rochester from a hero into a villain, a perpetrator and “his project of