Thursday, December 18, 2014

How is Jane's resistance to being put in the red room connected with her search for personal freedom?Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre

In Chapter 1 when Jane is sent to the breakfast room away
from the Reed children and her mother, she seeks solace quietly on the window seat with
a book which absorbs her attention.  However, she is not to be left alone as the bully
John Reed enters and accuses her of reading his books, contending that "all the house"
belongs to him.  He orders Jane to stand by a door away from the mirror or windows
which may break as he throws a book at his forlorn cousin.  Since he strikes Jane in the
head so hard that she bleeds, Jane cries out, accusing him of being wicked and cruel. 
When he runs headlong at her, Jane changes from her passivity in the breakfast room to a
defensive posture in which she frantically strikes out at
John.


Because of the "fury" of her actions, Jane is
summarily sent to the red room by her cruel aunt, who scolds her for striking her "young
master."  When Jane asks, "Master!  How is he my master?  Am I a servant?" she is told
that she is actually less than a servant because she does nothing for her keep.  Once
left by herself, the remark of her aunt and other thoughts enter Jane's mind; she
wonders why she suffers constantly, always being accused and chided for things she has
not done.  Further, Jane questions why it is futile for her to try to win anyone's favor
when the other girls are indulged and John, of course, is never
punished.



I
dared commit no fault:  I strove to fulfill every duty; and I was termed naughty and
tiresome, sullen and sneaking, from morning to noon, and from noon to
night.



Like any child who
reasons, Jane does not understand her condition and feels, rightfully, that it is
unjust.  This resistance of her mind to her existing condition in the Reed household
brings Jane to thoughts of running away or, if she cannot do this, of starving herself
and dying.  And, as she is forced to endure the cruel isolation in the room of her dead
uncle, Jane's heart fills with indignation and contempt.  With such feelings about her
individual treatment, Jane begins to feel a sense of self, a feeling that will develop
as the narrative continues.

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