Bertha as Jane's Alter Ego in Jane Eyre
"I resisted all the way," (chapter 2) Jane says as she is borne away to be locked in the red-room of Gateshead, where she will experience a fit of rage that inevitably arises from her physical and emotional entrapment. Jane evinces her refusal to accept passively restrictive male standards as well as the female predilection towards anger early in the novel. That night in the red-room, Jane experiences a vehement anger that she describes as "oppressed" and "suffocated." From this impassioned rage Jane falls unconscious, and upon waking in the nursery, Jane finds herself prepared to challenge both the oppressive patriarchal society in which she is trapped and the anger this despotism incites. It is not until Jane reaches Thornfield some time later, that she is able to confront her own rage through her encounter with Bertha, Rochester's "savage" wife who has been locked away in the attic of Thornfield Hall for fifteen years. The two are aligned through the restrictions placed upon them by domineering patriarchs; their responses to these circumstances, however, make them antithetical counterparts. While Bertha kindles a fiery wrath toward her oppressor, Jane must learn to contend with her anger so that she will ultimately be free to live a life of true equality and love with Rochester. In the novel Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë draws distinct similarities between the red-room and the attic of Thornfield, suggesting the complex relationship between Jane and Bertha. While Brontë presents Jane as a woman who is determined to subsist in a patriarchal world without allowing her anger to consume her, she also offers Bertha as Jane's alter ego who is imprisoned by her own r...
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...n terms by which she can exist equally with Rochester. By subsisting in a patriarchal world without allowing her anger to destroy her, Jane proves that great women can rise out of the most hopeless situations, paving the way for themselves and their posterity to live lives of absolute equality.
Works Cited and Consulted
Bronte, Charlotte. Jane Eyre. New York: Dodd, Mead & Company, 1991
Gates, Barbara Timm, ed. Critical Essays on Charlotte Bronte. Boston: G. K. Hall, 1990.
Kadish, Doris. The Women of Jane Eyre. New Brunswick: Rutgers UP, 1986.
Lodge, Scott. "Fire and Eyre: Charlotte Bronte's War of Earthly Elements." The Brontes: A Collection of Critical Essays. Ed. Ian Gregor. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1970. 110-36.
McLaughlin, M.B. "Past or Future Mindscapes: Pictures in Jane Eyre." Victorian Newsletter 41 (1972): 22-24.
In Stephen Dunn’s 2003 poem, “Charlotte Bronte in Leeds Point”, the famous author of Jane Eyre is placed into a modern setting of New Jersey. Although Charlotte Bronte lived in the early middle 1800’s, we find her alive and well in the present day in this poem. The poem connects itself to Bronte’s most popular novel, Jane Eyre in characters analysis and setting while speaking of common themes in the novel. Dunn also uses his poem to give Bronte’s writing purpose in modern day.
Last summer, the Supreme Court ruled against the use of race in the college admissions process in the case of Fisher v. University of Texas. Since then, affirmative action has become a big issue in the media; however, many people still do not even know what affirmative action is. Affirmative action is a policy to prevent discrimination on the basis of “color, religion, sex, or national origin.” Overall, it favors minorities that are often discriminated. It might sound like an excellent policy; however, the use of this policy in the college admissions process is prejudice. In the college admissions process, affirmative action lowers the standards for some races, while raising the standard for other races. For example, an Asian might need a SAT score of 2300 to be considered for admission at a top school such as Yale and a white applicant might need a score of 2100, while an African American or Hispanic only needs a score of 1700. While affirmative action provides equality in the workplace, it has no place in the college admissions process and should, therefore, be abolished and replaced. This type of policy can be repealed completely, replaced with a college admissions process that favors first generation college applicants, or replaced with a policy based on an applicant’s socioeconomic status.
In Charlotte Bronte’s, Jane Eyre, Jane goes through numerous self-discoveries, herself-realization and discipline leads her to a life she chooses to make her happy. Jane Eyre has a rough life from the start. Forced to stay with people who despise her, Jane can only help herself. Jane must overcome the odds against her, which add to many. Jane is a woman with no voice, until she changes her destiny. The novel Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Bronte consists of continuous journeys through Jane’s life towards her final happiness and freedom.
Affirmative action is without a doubt, one of the most controversial and debated political topics found throughout the entirety of the history of the United States, especially in regards to college admissions. On both sides of the argument, you have millions of Americans vitriolically defending their beliefs as to whether or not affirmative action is a positive thing that benefits the entirety of America as a whole, or rather an outdated model existing well past its expiration date. Both sides of the argument have its pro and cons, but personally, I am of the opinion that affirmative action in regards to college admissions does more harm than good for America as a whole on a social, political, and economic level, and that it at the very least needs to be modified heavily, if not abolished altogether. However, in order to first understand the arguments both supporting and decrying affirmative action, as well as the controversy behind it, we first need to delve into its history for the related context.
The purpose ofAffirmative Action is a simple one, it exists to level the playing field, so to speak, in the areas of hiring and college admissions based on characteristics that usually include race, sex, and/or ethnicity. A certain minority group or gender may be underrepresented in an arena, often employment or academia, in theory due to past or ongoing discrimination against members of the group. In such a circumstance, one school of thought maintains that unless this group is concretely helped to achieve a more substantial representation, it will have difficulty gaining the critical mass and acceptance in that role, even if overt discrimination against the group is eradicated. For this reason, more effort must be made to recruit persons from that background, train them, and lower the entrance requirements for them. (Goldman, 1976, p. 179) Proponents of affirmative action argue that affirmative action is the best way to corre...
The outlined goals of affirmative action are what we need for this country. The United States society needs to change the way it sees and treats its citizens. The methods that affirmative action uses, however, are not conducive to ac...
Minority groups are given different criteria to meet when applying to college. This is an attempt to compensate for the hardships many minority groups had to face in history. As examined by Hoover Institution’s Thomas Sowell this advantage benefits minority applicants from middle and upper class backgrounds. As a result of admissions using a zero sum game, which is where one person’s gain is another person’s loss, these preferences hurt some applicants who meet admission standards in unequal numbers (Sacks and Thiel). If this predilection were genuinely meant to redress disadvantages, it would not be given on the basis of ethnicity. Supporters of affirmative action claim that affirmative action advocates diversity. But if diversity were the goal, then
Affirmative action has improved the overall life of numerous people. Many minorities, specifically African-Americans, have improved due to educational opportunities acquired via affirmative action. Enrollment of black students skyrocketed because of affirmative action. Blacks had accounted for less than one percent of students entering into universities in 1951. Affirmative action, starting in the 1960’s allowed for blacks to make up 6.3% of Ivy Leagues by 1978, and approximately eight percent of law and medical schools by 1995. The same schools that were less than one percent black in 1951 now had a population consisting of 7.1% black students in 1989. A study d...
Affirmative action is a term used for policies that are designed to help the effects of past discrimination against minority groups in the United States of America. Here are three reasons why affirmative action needs to be abolished.
Affirmative action policies were created to help level the playing field in American society. Supporters claim that these plans eliminate economic and social disparities to minorities, yet in doing so, they’ve only created more inequalities. Whites and Asians in poverty receive little to none of the opportunities provided to minorities of the same economic background (Messerli). The burden of equity has been placed upon those who were not fortunate enough to meet a certain school’s idea of “diversity” (Andre, Velasquez, and Mazur). The sole reason for a college’s selectivity is to determine whether or not a student has the credentials to attend that school....
Affirmative action has been a controversial topic ever since it was established in the 1960s to right past wrongs against minority groups, such as African Americans, Hispanics, and women. The goal of affirmative action is to integrate minorities into public institutions, like universities, who have historically been discriminated against in such environments. Proponents claim that it is necessary in order to give minorities representation in these institutions, while opponents say that it is reverse discrimination. Newsweek has a story on this same debate which has hit the nation spotlight once more with a case being brought against the University of Michigan by some white students who claimed that the University’s admissions policies accepted minority students over them, even though they had better grades than the minority students. William Symonds of Business Week, however, thinks that it does not really matter. He claims that minority status is more or less irrelevant in college admissions and that class is the determining factor.
The three events that mark Jane as an evolving dynamic character are when she is locked in the red room, self reflecting on her time at Gateshead, her friendship with Helen Burns at LoWood, her relationship with Mr. Rochester, and her last moments with a sick Mrs. Reed. Brought up as an orphan by her widowed aunt, Mrs. Reed, Jane is accustomed to her aunts vindictive comments and selfish tendencies. Left out of family gatherings, shoved and hit by her cousin, John Reed, and teased by her other cousins, Georgina and Eliza Reed, the reader almost cringes at the unfairness of it all. But even at the young age of ten, Jane knows the consequences of her actions if she were to speak out against any of them. At one point she wonders why she endures in silence for the pleasure of others. Why she is oppressed. "Always suffering, always browbeaten, always accused, forever condemned" (Bronte, 12). Jane’s life at Gateshead is not far from miserable. Not only is she bullied by her cousins and nagged by her aunt, but help from even Bessie, her nurse and sort of friend, seems out of her reach. In the red room scene Jane is drug by Ms. Ab...
The development of Charlotte Bronte's character, Jane Eyre, becomes vital to her novel Jane Eyre, and the other characters in which she is involved. She is an intelligent, plain featured, honest young girl whose reaction to her situations brings more depth to her personality. She is forced to deal with oppression, discrimination, and at times poverty, which disrupt her strong will, dignity, and desire for freedom. At the beginning, Jane possesses a passion for pride and the idea of freedom and these characteristics, along with her integrity, are tested continuously throughout the novel by the many personalities with whom she encounters. Living in a male dominant world Jane is expected to remain obedient and docile and her passion sometimes keeps her from being able to do this. She is a rarity among obeying female characters and we see this throughout the book.
Jane Eyre is a classic English novel which follows the development of a young woman in the mid 1800's. Jane grows to be a smart, self supporting, independent woman. This becomes a struggle for her as she was brought up to live in the lower-class. Throughout this novel, Jane tries to show that class and gender should not affect personality. This novel explains Jane’s struggle against societal expectations of class and of gender.
McLaughlin, M.B. "Past or Future Mindscapes: Pictures in Jane Eyre." Victorian Newsletter 41 (1972): 22-24.