Brontë portrays the Reed children as well dressed, well fed, happy and overall spoilt by Mrs Reed. “ The said Eliza, John, and Georgina were now clustered around their Mama in the drawing Room.” The portrays how the upper class children are loved and well treated, yet they still retain their selfishness and aloofness over Jane who is retarded because she is not accepted by Mrs Reed, like her own children that she bore herself. This shows how in Victorian times people were labelled depending on the way they acted, and the amount of possessions or money they owned, where the upper classes ruled over the lower working classes, as it was a Capitalist society in which they lived. Mrs Reed contrasts her own children with Jane as being nice, well behaved children of her own immediate family, compared to the undisciplined, rebellious child of another somewhat distant relative, who is provoked and not acting on her own charisma to behave in such a way, that attracts the attention of others. The effects this therefore leaves on Jane’s life, is that she is forced to believe that she is of a lower status than everyone else.
Mrs Reed herself is intolerant, strict and imposing. She despises Jane simply because she is not one of her own children who she loves and cares for. Mrs Reed had promised to Mr Reed before his death, when he was lying on his death bed that she would care for Jane as “one of her own”. However Mrs Reed had failed to maintain her oath, and instead treated her own children in more regard, with love and respect, whereas Jane was raised with no intentions of care or respect, and was cast out from the rest of the family. Mrs Reed’s actions and words she in acts on Jane are often violent, as well as being mentally abusive to her, which makes her contemplate, feeling hurt inside her as well as her physical pain.
There are also other adults in the prose of Jane Eyre, whose attitudes towards Jane vary accordingly, whether they are kind or hurtful. Bessie the nurse is one of the elder characters, who conveys her response to Jane in a rather nasty way. Bessie constantly shouts at Jane, as it says, “The heart saddened by the chidings of Bessie the nurse”. This probably suggests that Bessie does this even as soon as Jane wakes up, however because of the way Mrs Reed acts upon Jane, Bessie does in the same way, probably to impress her employer in her self interests to gain her own benefits. Abbott is another unfriendly character who portrays the hardship set upon Jane, who acts in the same way as Bessie who is her master, in the same way that Mrs Reed is Bessie's. Furthermore the other adults who are very hurtful towards Jane are a majority of the Teachers at Lowood, for example Miss Scatcherd who is a prime example of the hardship of childhood during Victorian times. Miss Scatcherd is not only nasty to Jane but also many other young children like Helen Burns. The text quotes upon this by saying, “You dirty disagreeable girl! You have never cleaned you nails this morning” this shows the teachers, intolerant and extremely strict ways of handling children’s problems. However there are some adults who do not portray the hardship of Victorian childhood like Mr Lloyd, the less expensive apothecary Jane is given instead, of a more expensive physician, which is the luxury of the rest of the family. Although Mr Lloyd has more of a mental impact on Jane as it says, “I scrutinised the face of the Gentleman”, which shows that although she is trying hard to identify who he is, she soon realises, that he is a kind Gentleman.
The Red Room shows how Brontë makes Jane’s fears realistic to the readers through her descriptions of Jane’s thoughts and feelings within the room, which soon develop into a complex and realistic nightmare. The adult’s reactions to these nightmares are somewhat varied, depending on the personalities of the adults, whether they be nice or mean. However this may be because they are now older and wiser, and therefore have moved on from the imaginative thoughts they once had, which spurred on the dreams and nightmares. Jane begins to see her uncle’s ghost in the room as; due to her young age and vivid imagination, she believes that he is haunting her, due to her bad behaviour. She describes the Red Room “The Room was a spare chamber, very seldom slept in.” and, “This Room was chill, because it seldom had a fire.” After Jane explores the room, her nightmare begin to develop from thinking about dying, She then hallucinates, seeing Mr Reed, re-appear as a ghost, as it says “While I gazed, it glided up to the ceiling, and quivered over my head.” These quotations make us realise how terrifying it must have been for Jane, especially at such a young age.
Brontë depicts school and teaching methods to show hardship, and not just for Jane, but also other pupils, by showing the obedient, however unjust manner in which children were educated, within boarding schools, and these were those who were fortunate enough to be educated. The school and teaching methods are shown, as very harsh and intolerant with little room for mistakes in such a cruel regime. For example it says “ for some error of pronunciation or some inattention to stops, she was suddenly sent to the very bottom.” Although the methods used for even more undisciplined actions, were corporal punishment where the pupils were physically punished, as the prose says, “ the teacher instantly and sharply inflicted on her neck a dozen strokes with the bunch of twigs.” Brontë also contrasts different teachers to illustrate the right and wrong treatment of pupils, for example Miss Smith and Miss Scatcherd. Miss Smith is quiet, and placid with Jane as it says “I was glad, when about three o’ clock in the afternoon, Miss Smith put into my hands a border of muslin two yards long, ” which shows how Jane is more calm, under the solo teaching of Miss Smith. Whereas Miss Scatcherd’s presence causes more tension within the bigger classes, whose treatment of pupils is often very intolerant and demanding of them, as Miss Scatcherd says “ nothing can correct you of your slatternly habits: carry the rod away.”
Therefore what is learned from reading the novel Jane Eyre, is the aspect of childhood in Victorian life, and the hardship many children lived and died through, in which mistakes and disobedience within the traditions of life during the time, led to severe punishment and cruelty. Furthermore the reasons Charlotte Brontë, may have had for portraying childhood at the time in this way, is that she once lived through the hardship herself, and decided to reflect on this, so people could gain more understanding, of the life of a child in those times and now, and that Jane Eyre may simply be Charlotte Brontë herself, retracing her steps.
