Introduction

Charlotte Bronte was one of the great female writers in English literature. Her masterpiece, Jane Eyre, has been translated into many languages. Jane Eyre is the heroine of this novel; she represents the disillusion of feminism. This novel successfully portrays a new image of woman, who is bravely against the social prejudice. Jane Eyre pursues equality, liberty and independence. She pursues the free and equal love. Jane shows her resistance when she faces the Leeds’ ill-treat and the inhuman treatment at the Lowood .In Thornfield she refuses Mr. Rochester’s proposal, and then the St.John as well. The two are the concentrative representations of Jane’s resistance. But she lives in a society where man is the master, she can’t keep herself out of the influence of man’s power and religious ideology .So there are also self-abasement and weakness in her characteristic.

 Zhang Zhiqing and Fan Xianming point out in their works that Jane Eyre’s characteristics makes this novel becomes a long-lived work. Wang Shouren also in his book prizes Jane Eyre’s characteristics. This thesis will analyze Jane’s characteristics.      Her resistance, her pursuit for equality and liberty. Through the analysis we can know better about Jane Eyre, we can admire more about her characteristics.

Part I The General Background

1.1            Background knowledge about the society

Charlotte Bronte, as well as her sisters, lived and died in the first part of the 19^thcentury. At that time, there had long been the rapid industrial growth in England. Connected with the improvement in industry and transportation there came the rise of a kind of new ruling class , the owners of the mills and miners of the industrial age , who began to compete with the old landed gentry. In order to improve themselves, they tried to provide a good education for their children. This opened a new opportunity for the impoverished gentlewomen to take the career as governesses. The position of the governess was as uncomfortable one, for though they were of higher class than servants, they could not reach the level of family. Consequently, they often suffered from loneliness and humiliation. In this period women have no place in politics, economics and society.

1.2            Life experiences of Jane Eyre

Eyre Jane Eyre, the main character, is an orphan who is passed into the care of Mrs. Reed, the wife of her mother’s brother. After years of neglect and abuse, she is sent to a boarding school at the tender age of ten, where she receives good education under severe conditions. After her graduation, she gets a position as a governess at Thornfield, where she falls in love with her employer, Mr. Edward Rochester. At their wedding ceremony, Jane gets to know that Rochester has a wife, a raving maniac locked in the house. In shock and grief, Jane leaves Thornfield quietly. Penniless and starving, she is saved and befriended by St. John River and his two sisters, who turn out to be her cousins. St.John admires Jane and asks her to be his wife and assistant in his religious service. Feeling that she still cherishes a deep love for Rochester, who seems calling her in her dream, Jane refuses his proposal and returns to Thornfield, only to find it a blackened ruin. Mr. Rochester is blind when he tries to rescue his mad wife who sets the house on fire. Jane goes to him at once and there they get married.

Part II Analysis of Jane Eyre’s Characteristics

2.1 The resistance of Jane Eyre

2.1.1 In the Reed’s House

Jane Eyre was an orphan, when her parents died she was sent to her aunt—Mrs. Reed’s house. Her cousin John Reed always bullies her. At first she bore him, she always avoided meeting him. But once again she was caught by her cousin and was beaten badly. This time she began to resist. She said to him: “Wicked and cruel boy. You are like a slave driver—you are like the Roman emperor.”¹ Then she received him in frantic sort .At last she failed in this battle. Mrs. Reed sent her to the red-house and locked her there. But her resistance didn’t go out. The cruel realists forced her to think about the life matters, “Unjust!—Unjust!”² This is her conclusion. This is the first time Jane shows her resistance.

Jane Eyre seemed to be pale, thin and weak. She was like a piece of dust, nobody paid attention to her. At any time she may disappear. However, Jane was a brave soldier who dared to face up to all kinds of injustice and fought against them. When she was a little girl, who rebuked her aunt - in – law’s cruelty, “ You think I have no feelings, and that I can do without one bit of love, or kindness, but I cannot live so⋯You are deceitful”³Jane suffered various violent treatment by her aunt and cousins, and finally broke out and spoke all her anger. Jane’s courage frightened Mrs. Reed, for she knew Jane was right. So she sent Jane to Lowood charity school as soon as possible.

2.1.2 In the Lowood School

If we could say Jane Eyre had a taste of the social unjust in her aunt’s house, then in Lowood School, her resistance had a further development. It is another field for her to cultivate her resistance. This school is a hell rather than a charity institution. Priest Brocklehurst is a hypocrite, he treat the students badly. He didn’t give them enough food. Once he came to inspect this school, he announced that little Jane was a liar, then “let her stand half an hour on the stool, and let no one speak to her during the remainder.”⁴ Jane didn’t submit didn’t pray for mercy. She stood on it with anger. This a silence resistance. In Lowood School, the bad situation made Jane more firmly to resist.

Once when her friend Helen was struck by Miss Scatcherd, Jane showed her anger and her resistance. She said to Helen: “And if I were in your place I should dislike her; I should resist her. If she struck me with that rod, I should get it from her hand; I should break it under her nose.” ⁵ Helen born all the ill-treatments, while Jane Eyre opposite to her, she showed her resistance to the education system. Through the contrast Jane’s resistances are vividly showed before us.

After 8 years living in the school, and found a new job as a governess, then she left Lowood School and began a new life.

2.1.3 In the Thornfield Garden

Jane was worked as a tutor in Thornfield; there she made the acquaintance of lovely Adele and that garden’s owner, Rochester, a man with warm heart despite a cold face outside. Jane expected to change the life from then on, but fate had decided otherwise: After Jane and Rochester fell in love with each other and got down to get marry , she unfortunately came to know in fact Rochester had got a legal wife, who seemed to be the shadow following Rochester and led to his moodiness all the time. ——Rochester was also a despairing person in need of salvation. Jane did want to give him a hand; however, she made up her mind to leave, because she didn’t want to betray her own principles.

In this place, Jane Eyre’s resistances showed obviously. At first, Mr. Rochester was rude and arrogant to Jane .Jane was treat him as the same person as her own class. She used her action to show her resistance. ”During the first few days, Jane was intrigued by his behavior. She found that, his rudeness put her at ease. Eventually, seeing much good in him, she fell deeply in love with her master. For life would be joyless for her without him. Through this fact we could see that Jane differed from the other heroines in that she dared to love his master - in the past it is always the men that make the first move and in that society it is unthinkable that a governess loved her master. It didn’t admit by the society. But Jane did it, she was rebelled the whole bourgeois society.

In spite of Jane ’s plainness ,Mr. Rochester found in the governess something that stroked delight to his ”very inmost heart ,”something belonged to the ”inward treasure”. He became fond of her. They would have got married. When there are something unexpected happened. Learning that Mr. Rochester has a wife still living, Jane was thunderstruck. She now faced delimits as whether to stay with Mr. Rochester as a mistress or to leave her lover to retain her dignity and independence. At last she chose to leave. As we know, Jane was deep in love of Mr. Rochester, but if love ran against independence and equality, she would rather to choose the latter, though it would be a great sorrow for them two.

2.1.4 In the Whitcross

Jane left Thornfield with a breaking heart. After three days without food and abode, she came to Moor house where she met St John and his sisters. Although she showed her appreciation to them, she still held her self-respect and dignity. When the servant Hannah was blaming her, she seriously pointed out that one ought not to consider poverty a crime. This event could totally show that her resistance didn’t disappear, it just became more modifiable. As the time passes by, Jane became to realize the truth of St .John. Under his gentle and mercy, it is cruel and arbitrariness .She knew it clearly that at the surface St. John respected her, loved her, but in fact he was insulted her, killed her. So when St. John asked Jane to marry him. Jane refused. This was all resourced from her rebel. She didn’t want a connection without love; she didn’t want to become a tool of religious. This time her resistance also gives the society a heavy beat.

Jane Eyre’s resistances were showed in the four periods, in which was uprose step by step. Her resistance is the main part of her characteristics.

2.2 The pursuit for equality and independence represented on Jane Eyre

2.2.1 Jane’s pursuit for equality

The pursuit for equality is represented mostly in the Thornfield .In her aunt’s house, she fought the ill-treatment, she wanted the equal treatment. In Thornfield, one of her monologues can give us a vivid sense of her pursuit for equality. “But women feel just as men feel; they need exercise for their faculty; and a field for their efforts as much as their brothers do,” ⁶ this monologue showed Jane’s desire of equality, for her, women have the same status with men.

Vivid evidence is showed in her love opinions. For her, the people have the same status in love .Just like she said to Mr. Rochester that her spirit could address his, as if both had passed through the grave and stood before heaven equal. From this, we can know clearly that in Jane’s mind people are equal, there are no different between them.

2.2.2 Jane’s pursuit for independence

In Lowood charity school, Jane learned independence from her teacher Miss Temple. She had been in there for 8 years, in order to get independence from the school, she advertised in a newspaper for a new job. Then she went to Thornfield. Jane was only a humble tutor, but she poses herself as an independence worker .Jane relied on her own personality of self-respect.⁷ In Moor House Jane rejected St .John’s offer of marriage because she didn’t want to live as a tool to serve God, and didn’t want to become St.John’s nominal wife. She had the strong awareness of independence.

When she went back Thornfield, she told Mr. Rochester that she was now independent in economic, she was her own mistress. So she married him not as an ancillary, but as an independent and equal person.

2.3 The pursuit for the free love

This is another impotent characteristic of Jane Eyre. Her love for Rochester is the bravely one in that society. At first, they loved each other, and then got down to get marry, but in the wedding she was told he had a legal wife, she was miserable. If she married Rochester, she would fall into a lover’s humiliation status. In order to protect their love, she refused to be his lover and left. And then St. John proposed to her, she also refused.Beacuse she still loved Mr. Rochester and married St John; she was just a tool not a wife. After she inherited a legacy, she went back to Thornfield to find her lover who was lost his sight and wife. Now their love was free, no one could block it.

  2.4 The weaknesses of Jane Eyre’s characteristics

Beautiful women have always won the people’s favor. Therefore, the plain and poor girls, among whom Jane Eyre was, have a self – abased mentality naturally. Jane Eyre felt tiny and low about her out - looking, which firstly showed us her self - abasement. In Thornfield, when Rochester showed her his love, she once again showed her self-abasement. It was her self - abased mood that made her suspect Rochester’s love. Jane believed deeply, Social position and wealth separate us. Facing Miss Ingram, her beautiful, wealthy, versatile rival in love, Jane withdrew and hesitated. Jane compared herself with Miss Ingram, then makes a conclusion “He cannot love me forever. “Even the classical renowned line that was used to praise Jane’s bravery on pursuing the equal love were the outcome of her self - abasement.⁸

  Another one is her weakness. In her aunt’s house, she was beaten by her cousins, ill-treated by her aunt; even the servants didn’t treat her like a mistress. But she just bore these for nearly nine years. In Lowood charity school, when she was punished to stand on the stool, she hoped she could die at once. And evidence is that when she knew Rochester had a wife, she left Thornfeild. It is partially because her weakness. She was totally shocked; she had no idea about their love, so she chose to escape. All these things are showed her weakness.

Conclusion

In Victorian Age, the traditional concept thinks that women’s social positions are very low; men and women have different social roles and responsibility. Women’s social roles are related with family, their responsibilities are self- sacrifice.

    This thesis has analyzed Jane Eyre’s characteristics. Jane Eyre is a solider to fight against the bourgeois society. She is resisted, she has the desire of independence both in Jane Eyre was brave but an honest woman , and she still struggled bravely and dauntlessly for her own ideal under the bad environment . In her childhood, she had the rebel spirit. After she became a mature woman, she became usually independent. Along with various living conditions and the life experience growth, her disposition gradually grew, and it formed a new feminine image which struggled independently and unceasingly in front of the reader. Although Jane Eyre was an independent woman with resistance, she still had weakness in her characteristics. She lived in a society where man has the absolute power, so it was unavoidable that Jane had some weakness in her characteristics. 

Notes

¹Ye Xiaofang, “Independence：One of Jane Eyre’s Characteristics”  JOURNAL OF CHANGZHOU INSTITUTE OF ENGINEERING TECHNOLOGY Vol.3  2007  P.54.

² Charlotte Bronte, Jane Eyre （北京：外语教学与研究出版社 2007）, P9.

³ Charlotte Bronte, P.16.

⁴ Charlotte Bronte, P.49.

⁵ Charlotte Bronte, P.96.

⁶ Charlotte Bronte, P.78.

⁷ Charlotte Bronte, P.163.

⁸ Liao Suqing, “ An analysis of Jane Eyre’s Personality of Independence”,

JOURNAL OF MUDANJ IAN G COLL EGE OF EDUCATION,  No.3 2007.  P23.