gender

how does bronte present gender in regards to love in Jane eyre?

Bronte presents gender in Jane Eyre as a central force shaping the nature and limitations of love, ultiatley challenging victorian expectations by advocating for emotional and moral equality between men and women. Through Jane’s resistance to patriarchal authority, particularly in her relationships with Rochester and St john rivers, Bronte exposes how traditional gender roles often reduce women to positions of dependancy or submission within love. However, Jane consistantly asserts her autonomy, insisting that genuine love must be founded on mutual respect rather than dominance or insisting that genuine love must be founded on mutual respect rather than dominance. while Rochester initially embodies masculine control and power, his eventual physical and social decline enables and reconfiguration of their relationship into one of balance and equality. In contrast,St john represents an extreme model of masculine authorityy rooted in duty rather than affection, further reinforcing Bronte’s critique of loveless unions. Thus, Bronte uses gender not only to reveal the constraints placed upon women, but to redefine love as a partnership grounded in equality and integrity, reflecting jane’s journey towards both emotional fulfillent and independance

context

• victorian gender ideology incorporated the belief that the male and female abilities and behaviours were inherent and that the reduced intelect of a women could not comprehend and achieve what a man could

first encounter: “man and horse were down, they had slipped on the sheet of ice”

• historically, men tend to save women in literacy texts, but in Jane eyre, Jane takes on the role as Mr Rochesters savior when he falls of his horse and twists his ankle

• this scenario creates a strong contrast to the stereotypical romantic notion of damsel in distress that should be saved by a heroic knight on a horse. The subversion of gender roles n this example is based on the man in the horse being in distress and in need of assistane from the women at foot, rather than the other way round

• it could also be argued that this is an example of Jane asserting her free will

• it seems important that what is taking place is not a one-sided feminization of a man, nor a simple assertion of female identities, but a reversal of gender roles.

Rochester: “i will attire my Jane in satin and lace”

Jane: “sir..and i shall not be your Jane Eyre any longer… A Jay in borrowed plumes”

• sharp juxtaposition to the victorian notion that women are illogical creatures who cannot contain their emotions, whilst men are rational and practices at times

• Mr Rochester is carried away by emotions and romantic symbols such as lace

• Jane refuses this and the act of refusal can be considered an act of rebellion against her contemporary society and can therefore be an explanation as to why victorian critics describe Jane Eyre as “rebellious”

• “sir”: symbolic of how Jane feels they arent equals due to status- later after separation they are equals

• “i shall not be your Jane eyre any longer”:foreshadowing separation because after he tries to marry her and dress her in a “priceless veil” she is no longer his

• “a jay in borrowed plumes”: metaphor is symbolic of how jane feels before the wedding she feels unsure and scared due to class difference but also she feels a fear of losing her autonomy-symbolism of bird and freedom

Rochesters marriage to Bertha: “the continued outbreaks of her violent and unreasonable temper”

• historically, marriage was constructed as a way for men to claim ownership whilst women were used as leverage in geopolitical trading affairs

• in Mr Rochester’s first marriage to Bertha, he is depicted as leverage as he is being persuaded into a loveless marriage for the sake of financial gain of his father and brother

• this means that Mr Rochester in this scene is taking on the roll of a women whose marriage is being arranged against his will

• this victimization could be considered an insult to victorian men, who according to Ruskin were powerful and active, not weak and defeated victims

• Further,Bertha is described as masculine in her traits: “she was a big women, in stature almost equating her husband”

St Johns proposal: “if i join St John, i abandon half myself”

• in contrast to Mr Rochester Jane refuses to be vctimised into marrying a man that she does not want to.

• Jane declines St Johns marriage proposal despite him being a righteous man of god because she that it would be a loveless marriage

• it was highly unorthadox for women to refuse a hand in marriage in victorian times, unless she had several suitors to choose from

• jane does not care about victorian ideologies or social ettiquite when she refuses St Johns proposals of entering a loveless marriage

• thus, arguably the novel Jane Eyre contradicts victorian ideologies in the sense that it suggests that women are entitled to refuse marriage proposals