To what extent is ‘Jane Eyre’ a gothic fairy-tale?
To what extent is 'Jane Eyre' a gothic fairy-tale?
Novels wrote in The Victorian era were either of gothic fiction or of evolution. Charlotte Bronte wrote 'Jane Eyre' in 1847 and it is believed to be a work of gothic fiction. It features supernatural encounters, remote landscapes, and eerie mysteries designed to create an atmosphere of suspense and fear. Ghosts, dark secrets, plots, and mysteries are throughout the story, mitigating the moral seriousness of her social observation with the gripping and crowd-pleasing psycho-drama of gothic romance - A true gothic genre.
"There was no possibility of taking a walk that day" and for Jane that was not abnormal. Jane was an orphan from a baby, her father and mother died and she was left in her Uncle Reed's hands. It is at Gateshead, where Jane grew up as a child. Like the name, Gateshead suggests, it is the first of many spectral settings and suggests an apprehensive atmosphere throughout the novel. Her childhood was not happy, her cousin, John Reed, was a "Wicked and cruel boy", and drove Jane to think he was "like a murderer", "a slave driver", and "Roman emperors!" who persecuted people. She frequently wondered what she had done to deserve the hate shown by the Reed family
"I could not answer the ceaseless inward question-why I thus suffered; now at the distance of-I will not say how many years, I see it clearly"
Her aunt then locks her in the 'Red Room', where Mr Reed "breathed his last" and it is where she experiences a supernatural sighting, allegedly of her late Uncle Reed. The supernatural occurrence of this is an element of a gothic fairy tale and therefore it can be seen as an ingredient in it being of its genre.
Soon her aunt sentences Jane to a far off boarding school as she has "one what [she] could for the girl, but she has a willful, obstinate nature" It is from Gateshead Hall, the home of her prejudice and insensitive aunt, where Jane begins her journey. The opening of its gates is symbolic of her casting off into the world to experience life independent of guidance. She leaves at the break of dawn and "whirl[s] away to remote and mysterious regions", signifying the beginning of a new life unrestrained by familial ties.
Her arrival at Lowood, a restrictive boarding school, begins during a bitter winter "stiffened in frost, shrouded with snow [with] mists as chill as death" which mirrors the miserable loneliness of adjusting to the school's oppressive routine. It is here where Jane spends most of her adolescent life, and comes across religion and spiritual theme, which is a key element for the novel to be classed as a gothic fairy tale.
The headmaster labels Jane as a liar and asks if she knows how to avoid going to hell, she replies: ``Keep well and not die, sir.'' Her life at Lowood was not perfect but soon turns into a spiritual experience as she meets Helen Burns, the good and sacrificing girl whom Jane questions about God and Heaven right before she dies. One day Jane is talking to Helen when suddenly she says she is 'going to God'. Jane is unsure what is meant, but then she realises that her friend has died on her lap. This is, for Jane, an experience of death and is a sad part of her life, and seems to begin Jane's relationship with religion that is traced more through the book. This perhaps is another reason why Bronte's novel can be classed as a gothic one.
As the years pass, Jane realizes that experience is essential to her aesthetic needs "lay all outside the high and spike-guarded walls" and that she must break with her life of uniformity to "seek real knowledge amidst [the world's] perils". It is here where she moved to Thornfield, with her aunt "relinquished all interference" and her friend Helen left "in Brocklebridge churchyard" she had no reason to stay.
The change of scene, the "quiet and lonely hills [that] embrace Thornfield", where Jane had been given the job of a governess, was different than Lowood. It is ...
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As the years pass, Jane realizes that experience is essential to her aesthetic needs "lay all outside the high and spike-guarded walls" and that she must break with her life of uniformity to "seek real knowledge amidst [the world's] perils". It is here where she moved to Thornfield, with her aunt "relinquished all interference" and her friend Helen left "in Brocklebridge churchyard" she had no reason to stay.
The change of scene, the "quiet and lonely hills [that] embrace Thornfield", where Jane had been given the job of a governess, was different than Lowood. It is here where Jane has her first encounter with love, and is certainly an important part in a gothic novel. Love is displayed in many ways in this novel, but it is signified mainly through fire and burning. When it first becomes truly obvious that Rochester has feelings for Jane, she has just saved him from the fire in his bed. When Rochester tries to keep Jane with him after this incident, she says, "strange energy was in his voice, strange fire in his look". There are many significant things which happen here which tell us about Jane's life
The eeriness of Thornfield is enhanced with the continuous mention of the moon. The mentioning of the moon is a metaphor for change. It is looked at many times throughout the novel when Jane's life will take on a new direction. An example of this is when Jane leaves Gateshead.
Mystery is bought into this novel, as Bronte's character Grace Poole, is surrounded by an obscure haze from the reader's first introduction to her. This is an effective device used in order to create a mysterious atmosphere in the novel, but also for fills the criteria for a gothic genre. Jane first learns of the occult Grace Poole upon hearing her laugh upon being shown the attic by Mrs Fairfax. Bronte first creates this ambience of mystery through the initial description of the setting. The attic is described by Jane as being "black as a vault" and the leading passageway as "narrow, low, and dim". Jane observes all the doors being shut, which allows the reader to interpret the third story of Thornfield as inaccessible and isolated, perhaps intentionally attempting to conceal something, much likened to "Bluebeard's castle" in which behind the locked doors was hidden the deadly secret of the castle.
On the first night of Jane living at Thornfield, she hears an evil laugh and is her first indication that something is going on there that she does not know about.
"While I paced softly on, the last sound I expected to hear in so still a region, a laugh, struck my ears. It was a curious laugh - distinct, formal, mirthless. I stopped"
The peculiarity of laugh, it not being cheerful nor delighted, perplexes Jane as well as the reader. Jane's curiosity prompts her to ask of Mrs Fairfax the origin of the laugh. Mrs Fairfax's vague answer does not satisfy Jane, even less so after hearing the laugh once more, it being "tragic, as preternatural a laugh as any I ever heard". That other inquisitive remark made by Jane is again answered vaguely after but the subject of the conversation is soon changed and only adds to the suspense of the incident. It was on the second incident where Jane heard the laughter that Mr Rochester's room was sent on fire, and where by Jane rescued him "from a horrible and excruciating death!" Jane Eyre's world seems to the reader a very ominous and forbidding place, charged with implied sexuality.
Jane sees Grace Poole the next day in the room. The circumstances in which this occurs are mainly ordinary. It was in the morning and Grace was dressed in her usual dress, her expression showing "nothing either of the paleness or desperation one would have expected to see marking the countenance of a woman who had attempted murder". Bronte uses Grace Poole to create an atmosphere of mystery and suspense through vivid descriptions of the ghostly atmosphere which emanates whenever she is present as well as a contrasting ordinarily which further compels the reader to see Grace Poole in light of a an "enigmatic character". This all meaning that this novel is incredibly gothic.
The key to the story is Jane's romantic attraction to Rochester--whom she fears to approach. Does he like her? Dislike her? Notice her? Mr Rochester, so often away, does not explain himself. One of his rare sallies ``you are not naturally austere any more than I am naturally vicious.'' But the night when Jane saves him from the mysterious fire (and is soaked in the process), he gives her his cloak to wrap herself in, and as she pulls it around herself, they both realize a divide has been crossed and Jane fells she has fallen in love.
Throughout the novel, Jane experiences many dreams, particularly in Thornfield. These dreams allow Bronte to create suspense through foreboding warnings of impending events and also to establish a mysterious and supernatural atmosphere. Just before Bessie is called to the deathbed of her dying sister, Jane dreams of a child. She remembers her childhood and Bessie saying that "to dream of children was a sure sign of trouble, either to one's self or one's kin". Soon after, Jane herself dreams of a child for "seven successive nights". Due to Bessie's tragic experience following Jane's first dream, the reader is drawn into a tense atmosphere where there is surely to be some impending event. The next night, Jane is visited by Robert from Gateshead who informs her of John Reed's death. These drams of infants not only warn the reader of events to come but also allow Bronte to establish a Gothic and supernatural ambience of mystery in the novel.
Jane and Rochester soon fall deeply in love and plan to marry. Jane soon finds out that the mad woman living in the attic is called Bertha, Rochester's first wife, and in fact Grace Poole is the keeper who stays with her. Jane however, does not find this out until they are at the church. When someone burst in and "declare[s] the existence of an impediment" - Mr Rochester has been previously wed. He admits later "That is my wife"; meaning Bertha. "Such is the sole conjugal embrace I am ever to know - such are the endearments which are to solace my leisure hours!" but he holds Jane and says "And this is what I wished to have".
Despair and love is what Jane is feeling as she uncovers the mystery of the woman upstairs, in the attic. She cannot stay at Thornfield any longer and tells him "I will not be yours", so she leaves with her "veins funning fire, and [her] heart beating faster than [any person] can count its throbs".
Jane tells her reader's that the great horse chestnut tree at the bottom of the orchard had been struck by lighting in the middle of the night, half of it having been split away; "I faced the wreck of the chestnut tree; it stood up black and riven: the trunk, split down the centre, gaped ghastly", a clear reference to Jane and Rochester's separation and a very eerie element to a gothic novel.
After leaving Thornfield, Jane's transitory dwelling is Whitcross, a stone pillar where four roads meet. This crossroads represents Jane's aimlessness and uncertainty of where her life might lead her, as well as the vulnerability of her situation; she realizes that until this point she has been financially dependent of others.
She travels to Moor House, where her three cousins live and where she takes up residency, is it a humble abode "very plainly furnished, yet comfortable". Its modesty contrasts with the opulence of Thornfield, but Jane is able to "comprehend the feeling, and share both its strength and truth. [There were] so many pure and sweet sources of pleasure". She develops an intimacy with Moor House, its inhabitants as well as its pastoral land. Yet she still cannot keep away from Thornfield. So she travels back to the hall where she finds nothing but a "Thornfield Hall [that] was a dreary ruin", like in one of her dreams she had, and like the dream Bertha the mad woman jumped off the roof and killed her self. Her "brains and blood" had been "scattered" over the stones at the foot of the hall.
Fortunately she finds the new home of a "stone-blind", "a crippled" Edward Rochester. It is Jane's last residency; the manor-house of Ferndean, where "so thick and dark grew the timber of the gloomy wood about it". She arrived "on an evening marked by the characteristics of sad sky, cold gale, and continued, small, penetrating rain". Jane finds him with a "mutilated limb", a "cicatrised visage", - "a ghastly sight", but still she has affection of this man. He asks her again "will you marry me" to which she replies "yes, sir".
A few days later she "married him", and few years later a "first born" of Rochester's was "put into his arms". The manor-house, where she cares for a handicapped Rochester, is secluded within "a heavy frame of the forest". This final dwelling reflects the closure of her journey, the permanence she has been searching for since her departure from Gateshead. It is here that she at last discovers "what it is to live entirely for and with what [she] love[s] best on earth". She has found her happiness in being with Rochester, and it is with this conviction that her journey in search of permanence ends with the closing of the forest's iron gates. A true gothic fairy tale ending. "Amen; even so, come, Lord Jesus!"
Jane's story takes her through five distinct phases, each associated with a house or a building: her childhood at Gateshead; her education at the Lowood School; her time as Adele's governess at Thornfield; her time with the Rivers family at Marsh End (also called Moor House); and her reunion and marriage with Rochester at Ferndean. Each of these phases represents a distinct period of psychological development for Jane; and indeed you may well find the ending of the novel like that found in a fairy tale. Therefore, it may seem that 'Jane Eyre' is a true gothic fairy-tale.
Here one of the supernatural aspects of the novel steps in and Jane hears Rochester calling her from afar. Later it is related that Rochester could also hear her reply. This is only one example of the supernatural in the novel. Near the beginning of the novel Jane feels she sees a ghost while she is locked in the red-room, and she takes it as a message from another world. When Jane is walking to Hay and first hears Rochester's horse approaching, she expects to see a North-of-England spirit called a 'Gytrash' a lion-like creature with a huge head. When she sees Rochester the spell is broken, as she knows that nothing ever rides the Gytrash. When Jane first sees Bertha in her room by candlelight, she describes her in supernatural-like terms, thinking perhaps that she is a ghost.
The key to the story is Jane's romantic attraction to Rochester--whom she fears to approach. Does he like her? Dislike her? Notice her? Rochester, so often away, does not explain himself. (One of his rare sallies: ``you are not naturally austere any more than I am naturally vicious.'') But one night when Jane saves him from a mysterious fire and is soaked in the process, he gives her his cloak to wrap herself in, and as she pulls it around herself, they both realize a divide has been crossed.
Kristopher David Banks English Course Work
