1. Jane Eyre lecture 1 : Jane Eyre : A complete Gothic structure
Blackwoodâs Magazine
First exposed to the Gothic through their avid reading of supernatural tales and
poems published in the lterary journals of the time, notably Blackwoodâs
magazine. The Brontës were avid readers of BM ; their source for history,
exploration and politics And also their fictional models hence their imaginary
worlds or Gondal or Angria in juvenalia. They apprpriate and transform many
Gothic conventions and motifs : their female heroines are usually more complex
than in the 18th C models, more independent, rejecting the virtuous but bland
hero in favour of the dark and theratening hero-villain. This Byronic soul-mate
threatens their independence and liberty. Prime examples are Heathcliff in
Wuthering Heights and Rochester inJane Eyre.
Fathers and sons ; Mothers and daughters
The Gothic focuses on a son or daughter who seek to free themselves from the
excesses of male or patriarchal dominance in many Gothic novels ; Ann
Radcliffeâs novels of the 1790âs and Charlotte BrontĂ«âs Jane Eyre. Link to
freudâs Oedipal concept of conflict in the middle class family.
The governess
First evoked as Emily in Ann Radcliffeâs Mysteries of Udolpho (1794) the
governess is prime material for a Gothic victim., placed in a situation unfitted
by birth, expectation or training. V.Woolfâs criticism of JE : « always a
governess, always in love. »
Escape : Jane tries to escape the mental effects of social repression but tries
to escape the iron shroud of mental solipsism. Janeâs childhood is masked by an
inner violent drama ; in Chap 1 we see Jane seated in the window seat reading
Bewickâs book on birds: representing her isolation and orphaned station (Alson
Milbank sees this enclosure as the brain). Bewickâs engravings become a
churchyard with phantom ships. Her chosen seclusion provokes Johnâs anger at
her self possession and the subsequent quarrel. The Gothic villain resorts to
physical violence and the Gothic victim is interned in the Red Room (Reed
Room ? ?)
All of BrontĂ«âs heroines share a an inner life of extraordinary color, drama,
fiction, and intensity : even in the case of an entrapped heroine. If Jane is
physically locked away she never leaves her inner world of drama. Brontë strives
to depict a given social reality in which she is the poor relation ; an orphan, and
an orphan girl.
Female Gothic
The female Gothic plot usually contains an aggressive male nwho threatens the
female protagonist. Confined in an idyllic or secluded way of life, she is
2. imprisoned in a great house or castle under the authority of a powerful male or
of his female surrogate. (Oranto, Udolpho)
In JE the problem is not so much a problem of identity, but of gender politics.
Like the Bildungsroman, the heroineâs evolution from innocence to experience is
the focus of attention, her journey leading towards some assumption of power
or agency in the patriarchal world, or the search for the lost mother. Female
Gothic tends to go in for suspense rather than out and out horror : no rotting
corpses here, but plenty of fears and anxieties. If there are supernatural
encounters they tend to lead to a rational explanation, where is nevertheless
less comforting than the imagined. The wayward heroine is saved by
reintegration into a community with a new identity, a new name and a new
husband. Other examples : Wilkie Collinsâ The Woman in White ; Mary Shelleyâs
Frankenstein.
Focussing on the female heroine and on the house, is it a radical or a
conservative form ? Typically subversive, expressing womenâs fears and
fantasies and protest against patriarchy.
Female travel ; Jane travels north to Thornwood, which is in fact female flight ;
rarely succcessful : JE leaves Mrs. Reedâs house to go to Lowood (she should
have known it would not be elevating !), like Mme Bovary, or Anna Karenina, the
heroineâs flight is rarely successful.
The madwoman in the Attic
The mad wife in Thornwood, the veil and the mirror originates in Melmoth the
Wanderer, (C.R. Maturin, 1820) and in A Chapter in the History of a Tyrone
family (Sheridan Le Fanu, Best Ghost Stories, 1839) Gubar & Gilbert in The
Madwoman in the Attic :The Woman Writer and the Nineteenth Century
Literary Imagination (1979 Yale) seek to extend the trope of the madwomen in
the attic to women in general, stating that almost all ninetennth century women
were in some sense imprisioned in menâs houses .Just as Jane is psychologically
âimprisionedâ in forbidding and unwelcoming houses such as Lowood and
Gateshead, Bertha Mason is a prime example of the Gothic victim, physically
imprisioned in Thornwood Hall by Rochester, the hero-villain.
3reasons for this : guilt and rage = enclosure.
1 : Guilt : She represents his guilt over a dubious past which he seeks to conceal
from Jane, and as the latterâs double, embodying her rebellion, bound for
destruction before Jane and Rochester can be united. Rochester keeps this
family secret which like most âsecret(s) de polichinelleâ is only concealed by
dramatic irony to the heroine herself. Rochester prevaricates, (youâve guessed
it) lies (itâs Grace Poole) and finally avows the existence not only of a mad woman
but of a mad wife when publicly challenged by Briggs and Mason. His hate of her
3. has no solid foundation âI do not hate her because she is mad,â only because she
is an embarassment and an obstacle to a life of âcomfort and quiet conversationâ.
2 : In Jane Eyre, the destructive rage of Bertha Rochester is an example of a
femal creative imagnation as well as female anger at male oppression. Parallels
can be made with that other Gothic creation of Victor Frankenstein : She has
the strength of a man, a monster,(Rochester has to grapple with her to hold her
down) the thirst for blood (Mason), and the pyromaniac tendencies of a criminal
(Fire). She acts out the rage and desire that Jane herself must repress. (Mrs
Reed says of Jane that she can be âpatient and acquiescent under any treatment,
and..break out all fire and violenceâ (p. 204) and in the early pages says âYou are
passionate, Jane, you must allowâ.
Bertha refuses Râs patriarchy, only enduring it, verbally mute apart from
inarticulate sounds while Jane is articulate and resists. She responds with rage
to ill treatment, just like Jane.. Berthaâs attic prison parallels that of the Red
Room, representing both psychological disturbance of both women and social
critique upon the two women.
3 : Rooms : Jane is drawn to the upper part of the house, that fatally attractive
âthird floorâ which is said to be empty âno-one sleeps hereâ (p.90) and which Jane
visits notwithstanding her housekeeperâs warnings : here she first hears that
laugh âdistinct, formal, mirthless,â which she will hear outside her bedroom door
in chap 15 (p. 126) âa demoniac laugh, low supressed and deepâŠgurgled and
moanedâŠgoblin-laughterâ.
It is on the roof (not in the schoolroom-scene of Janeâs governessy hours or the
library-Râs territory) that Jane has her vision or illumination (cf Adrienne Rich,
p.476 Norton) Rich makes the point that when Jane articulates her (and CBâs)
feminist manifesto (p. 93) she is just inches away from the madwoman herself :
is wanting a life of equality the step before madness ? ? Or a kind of madness in
itself for a penniless governess ?
We âseeâ (without seeing) Bertha on 3 occasions : once when she tries to burn
Rochester in his bed (chap 15) ; once when she stabs Mason after his visit, (chap
20) ; once when she visits Janeâs bedroom and tears the wedding veil (chap 25).
Jane sees a form, a female form, a shape : Sophie ? Leah ? Mrs. Fairfax ? Grace
Poole ? p. 241-243 : Jane loses consciousness âfor the second time in my life.. ;I
became insensible from terrorâ.
Jane finally âvisitsâ Bertha on her aborted wedding day ; she is brought face to
face with a monster : purple face, blaoted features, grizzled mane, chap 26,
(p250) a figure, beast/human being, a wild animal.
Sandra Gilbert calls Bertha « Janeâs truest and darkest double » and descrbes
the following parallels :
ï± between Janeâs outburst of « hunger, rebellion, rage » with Berthaâs « low,
slow ha ! ha ! » which follows the outburst ;
4. ï± between Janeâs reastion to Rochesterâs tales of sexual prowess in Paris (chap
15) and Berthaâs attempt to burn him alive in his bed (idem);
ï± between Janeâs unexpressed resentment at Rochesterâs attempt to trick her
into telling the old Gypsy woman her real feelings for her Master and
Berthaâs attack on Richard Mason for having tricked her into marrying
Rochester ? ? ;
ï± between Janeâs anxieties about her own marriage and Berthaâs sally into her
room and the tearing of the bridal veil ;
ï± between Berthaâs crawling on all fours around her attic prison and Janeâs
pacing back and forwards in the 3rd story ; also Mrs. Reeds image of Jane as
âan animal âŠlooked up at me and cursed me with a manâs voiceâ p. 204
ï± Berthaâs incendiary rages at Thornfield and Janeâs flaming outbursts at
Lowood and at Gateshead which were emblematic of a young penniless
dependent rebelling against the accepted codes of society.
ï± Mirror imaging : in the red room Jane sees herself as â Otherâ p. 11 âthe tiny
phantom with a white face and arms speckling the gloom â in the looking-glass,
that visionary hollow which seems to swallow her in its vortex : the mirroe
signals loss and fragmentatin of Jane, like the practice of black magic,
(obeah in the Winward Islands, the setting of The Wide Sargasso Sea) the
symbolism of which is made clearer by her vision of Berthaâs reflection in
her bedroom mirror wearing the wedding veil (ch 25)
ï± Between madness, evident in Bertha, âBertha Mason is mad ; and she came
from a mad family, ; idiots and maniacs through three generations » for
Rochester at least ; « « at once intemperate and unchaste » ; and Janeâs
fainting fit and subsequent loss of appetite⊠;was this a small mental
breakdown or the beginning of madness ? ? After the failed marriage
ceremony, Jane once more dreams of the Red Room episode. p.272
ï± Rochester makes the parallel lingustically when Jane defends Bertha : âit is
not because she is mad that I hate her. If you were mad do you think I would
hate you ?âp. 257 My good angel ⊠;a hideous demon. p269 Râs hatred is born
of his recognition of living with a woman âintemperate and unchasteâ where
her anger and her sexual appetite (no names, no proof !) makes her a
monster.
Jane is publicly acknowledged as the antithesis and the parallel female to âthe
monsterâ⊠; »And this is what I wish to haveâŠthis young girl who stands so quiet
and grave at the mouth of hell, looking collectedly at the gambols of a demon. »
The vast imprisioning spaces that appear as castles, halls or great English
houses such as Gateshead or Thornfield : houses can be read as metaphors for
womenâs lives under patriarchy ; Berthaâs final escape through her literal and
symbolic death makeâs Jane and Rochesterâs marriage possible but the final
marriage plot is perhaps just another prison. Its happy ending requires the
demise of monsters and mad women, figures for the part of the female pysche