Jane Eyre Gender Quotes

“God will punish her: He might strike her dead in the midst of her tantrums, and then where would she go? Come, Bessie, we will leave her: I wouldn’t have her heart for anything. Say your prayers, Miss Eyre, when you are by yourself; for if you don’t repent, something bad might be permitted to come down the chimney, and fetch you away.” They went, shutting the door, and locking it behind them.
The red-room was a spare chamber, very seldom slept in; I might say never, indeed unless when a chance influx of visitors at Gateshead Hall rendered it necessary to turn to account all accommodation it contained: yet it was one of the largest and stateliest chambers in the mansion. A bed supported on massive pillars of mahogany, hung with curtains of deep red damask, stood out like a tabernacle in the centre; the two large windows with their blinds always drawn down, were half shrouded in festoons and falls of similair drapery; the carpet was red; the table at the foot of the bed was covered with a crimson cloth; the walls were a soft fawn colour with a blush of pink in it; the wardrobe, the toilet-table, the chairs were of darkly polished old mahogany. Out of these deep surrounding shades rose high, and glared white, the piled-up mattresses and pillows of the bed, spread with a snowy Marseilles counterpane. Scarcely less prominent was an ample cushioned easy-chair near the head of the bed, also white, with a footstool before it; and looking, as I thought, like a pale throne.

– Charlotte Bronte

Jane Eyre, Chapter 2. Jane is threatened with the wrath of God by Miss Abbot after her fight with her cousin John Reed. As punishment Abbot and Bessie imprison Jane in the red room on Mrs. Reed’s instructions. This is the death chamber in which her kindly uncle breathed his last moments nine years before and where she is meant to pray and repent for her misbehavior. But for Jane the red room more signifies hell and divine vengeance. The stern God of the Old Testament and religion are used in this instance to punish children who are seen not to conform. The room has a Gothic spookiness about it. It is red nearly from top to bottom, dark and rarely used, and its tabernacle and pillers conjure up Biblical imagery. The Gothic influences in Jane’s life are foreshadowed here. So too is the fire that Bertha Mason will later start because she is locked away in Edward Rochester’s attic. The red is symbolic of Jane’s fury and passion over her mistreatment and her struggles to find freedom and belonging. The red room is also a symbol for femininity and the more submissive feminine behavior that Jane is expected to adopt.

I scarcely knew what school was; Bessie sometimes spoke of it as a place where young ladies sat in the stocks, wore backboards, and were expected to be exceedingly genteel and precise; John Reed hated his school, and abused his master: but John Reed’s tastes were no rule for mine, and if Bessie’s accounts of school-discipline (gathered from the young ladies of a family where she had lived before coming to Gateshead) were somewhat appalling, her details of certain accomplishments attained by these same ladies were, I thought, equally attractive. She boasted of beautiful paintings of landscapes and flowers by them executed; of songs they could sing and pieces they could play, of purses they could net, of French books they could translate; till my spirit was moved to emulation as I listened. Besides, school would be a complete change: it implied a long journey, an entire separation from Gateshead, an entrance into a new life.
“I should indeed like to go to school,” was the audible conclusion of my musings.

– Charlotte Bronte

Jane Eyre, Chapter 3. When apothecary Mr. Lloyd asks Jane if she would like to go to school, she embraces it as an opportunity to escape from the tyranny of Gateshead and begin a new life. She knows little about school, but while John Reed hates it and abuses his teacher, Jane refuses to be ruled by his bad tastes. Instead she learns her understanding of girls’ education from servant Bessie. Bessie’s account of the accomplishments attained by young ladies in school – in painting, singing and studying French books – inspires Jane. Jane sees education as her gateway to freedom from the oppression of the Reeds.

I climbed the three staircases, raised the trap-door of the attic, and having reached the leads, looked out afar over sequestered field and hill, and along dim sky-line – that then I longed for a power of vision which might overpass that limit; which might reach the busy world, towns, regions full of life I had heard of but never seen: that I desired more of practical experience than I possessed; more of intercourse with my kind, of acquaintance with variety of character, than was here within my reach. I valued what was good in Mrs. Fairfax, and what was good in Adele; but I believed in the existence of other and more vivid kinds of goodness, and what I believed in I wished to behold. Who blames me? Many, no doubt; and I shall be called discontented. I could not help it: the restlessness was in my nature; it agitated me to pain sometimes.

– Charlotte Bronte

Jane Eyre, Chapter 12. Jane climbs to the highest point in Thornfield Hall, still feeling the restlessness that drove her to leave her teaching job Lowood School for the position of governess and tutor to Adele. Jane very much values her new life in Thornfield and the goodness of housekeeper Mrs. Fairfax and young pupil Adele. But she is fascinated by the great wide world out there and desires more for herself. She aches for something beyond and above her role of governess, which her social class and gender have condemned her to. Jane continues to struggle towards her goal of complete freedom and independence as a woman.

Something of daylight still lingered, and the moon was waxing bright: I could see him plainly. His figure was enveloped in a riding cloak, I traced the general points of middle height, and considerable breadth of chest. He had a dark face, with stern features, and a heavy brow; his eyes and gathered eyebrows looked ireful and thwarted just now; he was past youth, but had not reached middle age; perhaps he might be thirty-five. I felt no fear of him, and but a little shyness. Had he been a handsome, heroic-looking young gentleman, I should not have dared to stand thus questioning him against his will, and offering my services unasked…I had a theoretical reverence and homage for beauty, elegance, gallantry, fascination; but had I met those qualities incarnate in masculine shape, I should have known instinctively that they neither had nor could have sympathy with anything in me and should have shunned them as one would fire, lightning, or anything else that is bright but antipathetic.

– Charlotte Bronte

Jane Eyre, Chapter 12. Jane is out walking on her way to Hay to deliver a letter for posting. On the way she unknowingly meets Mr. Rochester for the first time, when a horse and rider slip and fall on a sheet of ice. There is an air of mystery about the stranger she goes to aid and will eventually marry. Here Bronte depicts the masculine in the person of Rochesteer as not having “beauty, elegance, gallantry.” Instead he is the anti-hero – stern, gruff, brooding, and not at all handsome and heroic looking. But despite Rochester’s dark, intense and stern appearance, Jane is immediately drawn to him. She later learns that he is Rochester. Their first meeting, set against the backdrop of the moon-lit hills, has a Gothic air about it. On first hearing the horse approach, Jane thinks of Bessie’s ghost stories about “Gytrash,” a spirit creature that is sometimes horse and sometimes large dog.

“I tell you I must go!” I retorted, roused to something like passion. “Do you think I can stay to become nothing to you? Do you think I am an automaton? – a machine without feelings? and can bear to have my morsel of bread snatched from my lips, and my drop of living water dashed from my cup? Do you think, because I am poor, obscure, plain, and little, I am soulless and heartless? You think wrong! – I have as much soul as you, – and full as much heart! And if God had gifted me with some beauty and much wealth, I should have made it as hard for you to leave me, as it is now for me to leave you. I am not talking to you now through the medium of custom, conventionalities, nor even of mortal flesh; – it is my spirit that addresses your spirit; just as if both had passed through the grave, and we stood at God’s feet, equal, – as we are!”
“As we are!” repeated Mr. Rochester – “so,” he added, enclosing me in his arms. Gathering me to his breast, pressing his lips on my lips: “so, Jane!”

– Charlotte Bronte

Jane Eyre, Chapter 23. Jane makes a passionate speech to Rochester, proclaiming her self-worth and equality, despite being of a poorer class than him. Her emotional outpouring comes after Rochester pretends to be engaged to beautiful socialite Miss Ingram, yet insists that Jane must stay. Despite her love for Rochester, Jane is adament that she will leave, asserting herself as an independent woman equal to Rochester. Using metaphors of food – “morsel of bread” and “drop of living water” – Jane reveals the depth of her passion for him. Had she been gifted with Miss Ingram’s beauty and wealth, he would find it hard to leave her, she boldly tells Rochester. After Jane lays bare her feelings for Rochester, he embraces and kisses her as an equal.

“Shall I?” I said briefly; and I looked at his features, beautiful in their harmony, but strangely formidable in their still severity; at his brow, commanding, but not open; at his eyes, bright and deep and searching, but never soft; at his tall imposing figure; and fancied myself in idea his wife. Oh! it would never do! As his curate, his comrade, all would be right: I would cross oceans with him in that capacity; toil under Eastern suns, in Asian deserts with him in that office; admire and emulate his courage and devotion and vigour: accommodate quietly to his masterhood; smile undisturbed at his ineradicable ambition…I should suffer often, no doubt, attached to him only in this capacity: my body would be under a rather stringent yoke, but my heart and mind would be free. I should still have my unblighted self to turn to: my natural unenslaved feelings with which to communicate in moments of loneliness. There would be recesses in my mind which would be only mine, to which he never came; and sentiments growing there, fresh and sheltered, which his austerity could never blight, nor his measured warrior-march trample down: but as his wife – at his side always, and always restrained, and always checked – forced to keep the fire of my nature continually low, to compel it to burn inwardly and never utter a cry, though the imprisoned flame consumed vital after vital – this would be unendurable.

– Charlotte Bronte

Jane Eyre, Chapter 34. We get a glimpse into Jane’s inner conflict over St. John’s proposal that she should join him as his wife on his missionary trip to India. The proposal briefly tempts her. It would be a rare opportunity to perform good deeds for other people, while fulfilling her own personal needs. Looking at his beautiful, commanding features, she fancies herself “in idea” his wife. But then she realizes the reality of the kind of prison she would live in under St. John’s masculine dominance. She speaks of his “warrior-march” and his “austerity” and the “stringent yoke” she would be tied to under his “masterhood.” Using metaphorical imagery, she decides that the “fire” of her nature and its “imprisoned flame” would not endure being his wife.
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