The novel Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte is one of my favorites. It is full of unexpected turns and coincidences, impossible to put down once started. It’s a romance between two strong characters with diametrically opposed pasts who come together under unusual circumstances. It's also a mystery that reveals itself under the writer’s able use of her craft. Immensely popular when the book first came out, it has transcended time and period, and continues to be popular today. And--it’s written by a woman--not an easy undertaking at a time when female writers had trouble finding a publisher. Recognition for women in the arts was difficult, and ridicule was an ever-present possibility.
Charlotte Bronte came from a renowned literary family. She was educated at home in Yorkshire except for a brief period in a boarding school. Her sisters, Anne and Emily, were writers; we will be reading Emily’s poems later in the unit. Although Charlotte was the most admired, and had a wide popular following, she also received the most criticism for what Matthew Arnold called the “hunger, rebellion and rage” of her mind.
Bronte used the male pseudonyms of ‘Currer’ ‘Ellis’ and ‘Acton Bell’ in much of her earlier work to gain acceptance in what was then thought to be a man’s world. Female writers such as the French novelist, Aurore Dupin (1804-1876) took the pseudonym ‘Georges Sand’ in order to gain access to publishers, as women often had difficulty obtaining legitimacy for their literary accomplishments. To acquire an editor and publisher when respectable women were expected to stay in their homes and maintain a family and place in society was a considerable undertaking. Even after her identity was known, Bronte continued to use her pseudonyms in her publications.
Making Disturbing Issues Palatable
This excerpt addresses abusive methods long practiced by educational institutions of Bronte’s time, a subject strongly felt by the Bronte sisters who’d themselves spent a short period within the confines of the boarding school environment. Lowood is a critical portrait of that experience.
Read this portion of Jane Eyre in terms of Bronte’s philosophical assumptions, once again noting the details from the text that reveal the author’s ideas about human nature, human relationships, and societal mores. Apply the knowledge you have gained about the Victorian’s belief in social reform. Consider the kind of perseverance which would brave social restrictions to follow her heart as a writer and reformer.
Look for the inferences Bronte presents regarding societal ills. Note her descriptions of class, character’s attitudes of rebellion or submission, inferences regarding spirituality and obedience, the abuse of power, and what Bronte might be telling us about her own assumptions through use of understatement, or portraits of obviously undesirable characters.
Note: In this excerpt you will see an inference regarding the dichotomy of hungers present in this period’s literature. Two forms of hunger existed in Victorian literature: pitiable hunger and threatening hunger (Dickens is master of this portrayal). You will see in Bronte’s excerpt a reference to a meal representing the connection between eating and spiritual satisfaction.
The negative representation of eating in much nineteenth-century children's literature was matched by real restrictions on eating in many girls' lives. Most often, girls were urged to eat a bland, unstimulating diet. Indulgence in food, no matter how little, symbolized moral looseness and a general lack of discipline. Whether or not Victorian writers genuinely shared this view, they successfully captured this attitude in many of their writings. In Jane Eyre, when Mr. Brocklehurst discovers that Miss Temple had offered meals of bread and cheese to her students, he reprimands her liberality saying,
"You are aware that my plan in bringing up these girls is, not to accustom them to habits of luxury and indulgence, but to render them hardy, patient, self-denying. . . Oh, madam, when you put bread and cheese, instead of burnt porridge, into these children's mouths, you may indeed feed their vile bodies, but you little think how you starve their immortal souls!"
Videos on Charlotte Bronte (find these on YouTube):
Bbc Period Drama Trailer 4 min 12 sec - Feb 23, 2010YouTube
Jane Eyre By Sleaford Little Theatre Trailer 2 min 00 sec - Feb 24, 2010YouTube
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