"Jane Eyre"

Book Review # 99179

English > Analysis
Literature > English

"Jane Eyre"

This paper examines the relationship between physical being and moral virtue in Charlotte Bronte's "Jane Eyre."

988 words () | 5 sources | MLA | 2007 United States

Paper Summary:

The paper discusses Jane's tendency to conflate physical appearance with the inner virtues or vices of a human being. The paper examines four characters in "Jane Eyre" which are turned by Jane into physical symbols of human wrong-doing or, in the case of Rochester, into an ambivalent physical symbol of male virtue. The paper portrays Jane's resentful nature and her need to anathematize those she feels have done her wrong.

From the Paper:

"To begin with, there is John Reed, Jane's fourteen year-old nemesis. According to the young narrator, John is defined chiefly by his physical ugliness: he is "stout, with a dingy and unwholesome skin"; furthermore, John's lineaments are described as "thick" and his extremities, we are told, are "large" and his limbs "heavy" (Bronte, 3-4). Perhaps none of this should be surprising: in addition to habitual gorging and biliousness, John is - according to the narrator, of course - a perfect terror, tormenting Jane at every opportunity (Bronte 4). In a very real sense, there is no distinction to be made between his unappealing outer appearance and his inner lack of grace; indeed, they way he looks is precisely because of the way he is within - or at least so it seems to Jane."

Sample of Sources Used:

Bronte, Charlotte. Jane Eyre. London: J.M. Dent & Sons, 1906.
Bronte, Charlotte. Jane Eyre. The Norton Anthology of Literature by Women: The Tradition in English (2nd Ed.). Eds. Sandra M. Gilbert and Susan Gubar. New York: W.W. Norton and Company, Inc., 1996. 472-784.
Chen, Chih-Ping. "'Am I a Monster?' Jane Eyre among the Shadows of Freaks". Studies in the Novel 34.4 (2002): 367-85. Academic Search Elite. EBSCOhost. Univ. of Calgary Lib., Calgary, AB. 2 Aug. 2006 <http://search.epnet.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=afh&an=9046859>.
Haller, Elizabeth. "Guise and the Act of Concealment in Jane Eyre". Bronte Studies 28.3 (2003): 205-13. Academic Search Elite. EBSCOHost. Univ. of Calgary Lib., Calgary, AB. 2 Aug. 2006 <http://search.epnet.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=afh&an=11393862>.
Hateley, Erica. "The End of the Eyre Affair: Jane Eyre, Parody, and Popular Culture". Journal of Popular Culture 38.6 (2005): 1022-1036.