Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë - Appunti e analisi critica, Appunti di Letteratura Inglese

Scarica Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë - Appunti e analisi critica e più Appunti in PDF di Letteratura Inglese solo su Docsity! ENGLISH LITERATURE AND CULTURE 1 CHARLOTTE BRONTË (1816-1855) Charlotte Bronte is a Victorian writer that shows in her works the influences of the Romanticism and Gothic novel.  1816, Thornton, Yorkshire, the third of six children (Maria, Elizabeth, Charlotte, Emily, Branwell, Anne) of Patrick and Maria Bronte. In 1820 her father was appointed perpetual curate of Haworth, and the following year her mother died.  Her aunt, Elizabeth Branwell, came to take care of the children.  1824: the four oldest girls are sent to a boarding school for daughters of the clergy. At school, Maria and Elizabeth got tuberculosis, and died in 1825; Charlotte and Emily returned home. Until 1831, the young Brontes were educated at home.  They developed a rich fantasy life, constructing the imaginary world of Glass Town and writing little printed books.  Charlotte went as a pupil to Miss Wooler's boarding school for young ladies; she returned there as a teacher from 1835-8.  After being a private governess for the Sidgewicks, she went with Emily to study languages in Brussels, where she also taught.  During this period, Patrick Bronte went blind (Rochester in the novel), and couldn’t sustain the family > to avoid a potential poverty, Charlotte, Emily and Anne published a selection of Poems (1846) under the pen names Courier, Ellis, and Acton Bell.  Charlotte's first novel, The Professor (1857), was rejected by several publishers, and published posthumously (the story is about her life in Brussels and an older professor, Constantin Heger, she fell in love with).  Jane Eyre (1847) appeared, and was an instant success.  Branwell and Emily died in 1848, and Anne in 1849. Charlotte continued to live at Haworth Parsonage with her father.  Shirley (1849) focused on society of the time and the conflicts between working class and upper classes;  Villette (1853) gothic novel deriving from her personal experience in Belgium in 1840s; (both pseudonymously)  1854: she married her father's curate, Arthur Bell Nicholls; She died of typhus, while pregnant with a child, on 31 March 1855. Unconventional women  A prolific family in literature: Emily Bronte (Wuthering Heights, 1847 = romantic and gothic) and Anne Bronte (Agnes Gray, 1847 = on education and the figure of the governess). They had to use pseudonyms for their career. The paradox is that the one son, Branwell, was the black sheep of the family! He was an alcoholic, a drug dealer, and generally failed everything;  She works as a governess and as a teacher to be strong and independent > she refuses marriage until the age of 38;  Female protagonists reflect women’s condition in 19th century (subordination in a patriarchal world) but they present heroines that rebel against restrictions and look for independence (economic and of thought and action). JANE EYRE At first, it was a “three decker novel” (3 volumes), following the typical Victorian structure. Then, it was divided into 38 chapters, which 5 parts have a symbolic meaning for Jane’s growth: 1. Gateshead: CHILDHOOD. 2. Lowood: EDUCATION. 3. Thornfield: GOVERNESS. 4. Moor House: RECOSTRUCTION. 5. Ferndean: HAPPY ENDING. Gateshead (ch.1-4) Jane is a ten-year-old orphan, who lives with her aunt (Mrs. Reed), cousins (John, Eliza and Georgiana), servants and maids (Bessie, Abbot, Sarah etc.). Her parents and her uncle had died when she was only 1 y/o, she had nobody to rely on, and Mrs. Reed promised to take care of her, but instead behaves as an evil and brutal stepmother. In this context, she feels as an outsider, as an alien, in oppression and isolation. Her family makes her feel like she doesn’t belong there, like she doesn’t deserve it. From here, the name GATES-HEAD: the bars of a prison that keeps her trapped, closing her down, suffocating her. She then develops a strong repressed rage (frequent color red). Recurrent elements:  Gothic elements → the red room, the villain, the ghost, fear and mystery but rationally explained;  Colonial elements → vocabulary of the Empire = slave, mutiny, revolt, rebel slave, savage countries;  Fairy tale elements → Cinderella story = the step mother, the orphan, the envious sisters, the mongrel brother. CHAPTER 1 Unlike many Victorian novels, which begin with elaborate expository paragraphs, Jane Eyre begins with a casual, enigmatic remark: “There was no possibility of taking a walk that day” = the real beginning of Jane’s pilgrim’s progress towards maturity, with the cold weather representing the problems she must solve in order to attain it = she can’t go out, she’s a prisoner. For that, she remains isolated under the curtain with a book of natural history (romantic kind of landscape), far away from her family, because she’s happy only as far as she’s alone (loneliness = a way of avoiding impositions and cruelty). She is often called with derogatory nicknames, such as JOAN (p.11), “bad animal”, “rat”, “mad cat” = her identity is not recognized. John Reed (p.12) is the typical name of gothic villains, and even his appearance represents oppression. He’s just 14 y/o but he’s called Master John; he rules the house, because he’s the only man of the family = patriarchal society. He constantly bullies and abuses Jane and underlines Jane’s nonbelonging to the rich family (p.13). He throws a book to her, making her bump her head against the door and bleed, but she can only react by speaking out her rage  she is punished by being locked in the red room. CHAPTER 2 Jane is in the red room (p.16-17), which is the room where his uncle died = it functions as a punishment for female defiance of patriarchy: she’ll be freed “only in condition of perfect submission and stillness”. This event will be a trauma for all her life, and the author uses is as a paradigm for the larger plot of her novel. RED = Color of anger: “mahogany”, “red damask”, “crimson cloth”, “fawn color”. Jane doesn’t recognize herself in the mirror: “stranger little figure gazing at me”, a “real spirit” > she is nobody in herself and to them, a non-human, a non-person, a “heterogenous, useless, incapable, noxious thing” (p.19). She starts knocking and shouting but nobody opens the door, and she spends the night there. She thinks about how different she is, she’s a DISCORD, an ALIEN. She is not able to understand who she really is, she doesn’t have self-judgment, she can only look at herself through the others’ eyes. She even thinks about dramatic ways to escape: through death, trough starvation, through madness. At the ends she faints (loses senses), symbolic death. CHAPTER 3 Mr. Lloyd, an apothecary, wants to get information about Jane to admit her in his school, and the servants give him a description of her that doesn’t represent the reality. Then, she speaks for herself. She is excited but scared about going to school, because of the strict rules that girls have to respect (“genteel and precise”): it’s the first opportunity to escape but the first experience in the outside society, the unknown, she doesn’t know what to expect. In this occasion, she finally finds out the story about her parents: her father was a clergyman, and her mother had married him against the wishes of her family and friends so that she was cut off (outsider, marginalized), and then both died from typhus. CHAPTER 4 For jane, Christmas holidays passed in solitude, as always. An interview with Mr. Brocklehurst, the master of the school, had been set for January. Mrs. Reed is supposed to introduce her niece, but she doesn’t even say her name (“this is the little girl” p.38) = disrespect for her identity. First impression: she’s small, short, symbolic for unworthy. She can’t answer the question “are you a good child?” because she knows her family thinks she’s bad. He uses religion to scare her, to tell her that bad people go to hell, and gives her a pamphlet: the “Child’s Guide”, the story about the death of a naughty girl. Reference to LITTLE RED RIDING HOOD (p.39): “What a face he had, what a great nose! what a mouth! what prominent teeth!” = Mr. Brocklehurst is the wolf, that takes his prey to the woods. After she’s left alone with her aunt, Jane has an unconscious, rebellious answer: “Speak I must” (p.43-44): she tells her aunt everything she has always wanted to say her = the rage finally comes out: I WILL NEVER CALL YOU AUNT AS LONG AS I LIVE  she tastes freedom and vengeance for the first time, she feels victorious, but in some way regretting what she did. Then, Bessie announces her that she will leave in a couple of days, and she kisses her as a sign of affection. Lowood (ch.5-10) Jane receives a cultural and religious education in this institute for orphan girls. It is situated in a low forest, a very humid, unhealthy and dangerous place = poor living conditions. WOOD = fairytale of Red Riding Hood. Jane will stay 6 years as a student and then 2 years as a teacher, that will make her have enough experience to apply for the job of governess. 3 MAIN CHARACTERS:  Mr Brocklehurst: abject, evil and false figure. A patriarchal figure who imposes strict moral principles on the girls but does not follow these principles himself. Girls are kept in the cold and hunger to save money but he spoils his own daughters in luxury;  Miss Maria Temple: Lowood superintendent, a model teacher and a mother figure > she seems Cinderella’s fairy godmother. She’s good, decent, well-prepared. But she is too perfect, too balanced, like a temple. Model of perfection, she gives Jane a lot in terms of teachings and relationships, but creates a sense of inferiority because she can’t achieve that perfection;  Helen Burns: Jane’s best friend, a Christ-like figure, that «burns» with religious passion. For her, everything has to follow the course of events that God has decided = passive character. always ready to sacrifice and self-punishment, which is also that is also too much for Jane. She will die as a martyr due to a typhus epidemic. The little rebel, dispatched to a starvation diet in the charge of a hypocritical minister, is always at risk of falling ill, but manages to survive. The school represents the society, which is more dangerous than the family. Here, Jane’s sense of inferiority starts pushing her towards improvement and self-awareness > her loneliness is gradually turned from abandonment and marginalization into independence. CHAPTER 5 First day in Lowood. Jane observes her classmates do the everyday routine: breakfast in the refectory, lessons in the schoolroom, prayers and so on. Her state of isolation and solitude continues, but “it did not oppress me so much”. Soon she feels a sense of admiring awe towards Miss Temple, whose good appearance represents her good nature (p.57). She perfectly fits the epoch, fashion but not too much: she’s wealthy (gold watch), smart, generous, kind, “full of goodness”, and wants the best for the kids. Jane finds the courage to speak with a girl reading a book (“Rasselas”), who - we will later find out - is Helen Burns. They talk a bit about their lives and then Helen gives Jane some information about Naomi Brocklehurst, founder of the school, and the teachers (Miss Smith, Miss Scatcherd, Madame Pierrot). At the end, Jane sees Helen dismissed in disgrace (punished). CHAPTER 20 The second episode of Bertha’s violence is introduced, described as an animal’s attack. During the night, Jane is awakened by a cry > Mr Mason is bleeding in his bed, in the chamber next to Bertha’s (“She, then, was there”, p.241), who had bit him (“She sucked the blood: she said she’d drain my heart”), but Jane still doesn’t know who’s hidden in that room. He needs help with his wound, and Rochester orders Jane to take care of it with a sponge and salty water, but to have NO conversation with Mason, because he fears he will tell her all the truth. Jane wonders: “What creature was it, masked in an ordinary woman’s face and shape?” (p.243). Later that day, Rochester begins feeling guilty and talks to Jane about a terrible error he’s made (marrying Bertha), but doesn’t explain more. Now he’s in love with Jane and wants to marry her, breaking the law because his ex-wife is still alive, and wants to be justified without really being explicit. CHAPTER 21 Dreams are presentments = jane has 3 dreams with a symbolic function in anticipating her destiny>>>> 1ST DREAM: a wailing child that comes close to her and runs away (p.254) = double meaning = her newly born love for Rochester / her own childhood she still needs to come to terms with, and detach from, in order to grow up > Robert Leaven, Bessie’s husband, goes to Thornfield to tell Jane that John had committed suicide, after ruining his health, got into debt and in jail; Mrs. Reed is dying too, and wants to talk to her. Jane understands that she needs to close that chapter in order to move on, she has to reconcile with her past even if she hated her family > SHE GOES BACK TO GATESHEAD; she calls Mrs. Reed “AUNT”, even if she said she would never call her like that anymore. But Mrs. Reed cannot forget or forgive, she only needs to relieve her bad conscience, ease her mind before dying > she still abuses her verbally: “I was glad to get her away of the house”; “I wish she had died”, “A burden left in my hands”, “a sickly, whining, pining thing!” (p.267). Also, she confesses that 3 years before, Jane’s uncle John Eyre from Madeira had sent a letter asking to adopt her, but she faked her death, and never told her anything about that. Nevertheless, Jane, remembering Helen Burns teachings, forgives her: “You have my full and free forgiveness: ask now God’s, and be at peace” (p.276). CHAPTER 22: After one month in Gateshead, Jane comes back to Thornfield: “Wherever you are is my home” (to Rochester). CHAPTER 23 The potential beginning of a new life. Rochester announces that he will marry Lady Ingram in less then a month, so Jane must find another job, and Adèle must go to school. But when Jane recognizes the necessity of departure, Rochester doesn’t want to leave her, and tries to make her stay. So Jane gives a speech on the sense of freedom, of gender equality in feeling emotions, in a way that no woman should ever address to a man: “Do you think I am an automaton? A machine without feelings? […] You think wrong! I have as much soul as you, ad full as much heart! […] EQUAL, as we are!” (p.292). Rochester kisses her. Jane: “I am no bird; ands no net ensnares me; I am a free human being with an independent will, which I now exert to leave you” (p.293). But suddenly, ROCHESTER ASKS HER TO MARRY HIM!!!!! “My bride is here, my equal, and my likeness. Will you marry me?” (p.294). At first Jane doesn’t believe him, but after hesitating, she accepts. CHAPTER 24 Jane is about to become Mrs. Rochester, and she finally sees a positive reflection in the mirror (p.297). Rochester wants to buy her many jewels and expensive things, but she remains modest, humble, because she’s not used to luxury and feels like an object = Victorian Age standard (“The more he bought me, the more my cheek burned with annoyance and degradation” p.309)  motif of the sultan and the slave (“I thought his smile was such a sultan might, in a blissful and fond moment, bestow on a slave his gold and gems had enriched” p.310). CHAPTER 25 Everything is ready for the marriage, but as Jane’s fear about the marriage intensifies, she is drawn back to her past, to reexperience the sense of terror that had begun in the red room. Signs of impediment THE NIGHT BEFORE THE WEDDING:  symbolic image of the chestnut (big, strong, solid tree, that should represent stability and marriage) > during the night the tree is split in halves by a lightening, but the base kept firm = Jane and Rochester will be separated, but they cannot part from each other permanently, their roots are attached.  >>>2° AND 3° DREAM (p.324-325) = anticipating the obstacles their (still young) love has to face, their necessary separation in order to reconstruct their lives, even if they’ll suffer, because their love needs to grow, to develop, to be taken care of: o 2° dream: “you were on the road a long way before me; and I strained every nerve to overtake you” = disparity between Jane and Rochester; “I was burdened with a little child, too young and feeble to walk” = their love is not ready to be used; o 3° dream: Thornfield in ruin (anticipates the future), still carrying the unknown little child = she can’t drop their love.  Bertha's first physical appearance (p.326): “a form emerged from the closet” > de-humanized (pronoun it, “fearful and ghastly”, “savage face”), non-identity, a monster, a Vampire (gothic element). Jane doesn’t understand who she is, she knows she’s not a servant, that’s the first time they are face to face. Betha takes Jane’s VEIL (Rochester's gift, a symbol of purity but also of Rochester's economic power = a symbol of disparity, that separates from reality), puts it over her head and turns to the MIRROR (Jane’s opposite/alter ego/evil double), then tears it in half  Jane faints from terror for the second time in her life (first = red room). Rochester keeps lying about Grace Pool, but then says that he will reveal her his secret when they have been married one year and one day, and Jane accepts. Gilbert & Gubar: “rebellious feminism” > an interpretative strategy denies Bertha’s existence as a character and favors, instead, a psycho-feminist emphasis on her role as the metaphorical expression of Jane’s unconscious desires and discontents. She’s the angry aspect of the orphan child. From Richard Chase’s point of view, Bertha could be a monitory image, rather than a double for Jane, “the living example of what happens to the woman who tries to be the fleshy vessel of the masculine élan”. The novel’s vocabulary puts them in comparison: Jane is called “bad animal” or “malicious elf”, and Bertha is described as nothing but a ferocious beast; Bertha is called “a monster” by Rochester, and Jane asks herself “Am I a monster?”; Bertha’s incendiary tendencies recall Jane’s early flaming rages. So, as complementary characters, when Bertha kills herself, the angry orphan child dies with her; the “wailing little child” of her dream will roll from her knee, the burden of her past will be lifted, and she will wake up from the nightmare that is her life. CHAPTER 26 Once again Jane doesn’t recognize herself in the mirror (p.331), she can’t identify herself as the bride. They’re in the church, and when the priest says if there’s anyone against the marriage, Mr. Mason’s lawyer, Briggs, proves that Rochester is already married from 15 years ago to Bertha Antoinetta Mason (p.334-335). Now Rochester has to confess, but he says his own truth, his side of the story > Bertha is guilty of being mad, coming from a family with hereditary trait of madness, but he was unaware of this and found himself trapped. Bertha represents THE COLONIAL OTHER, she’s not the typical Victorian woman = ALL THE NEGATIVE TRAITS OF THE STANDARDS, OPPOSITE OF JANE: Jane is poor, little, pale, neat, quiet ≠ Bertha is rich, large, sensual, extravagant. Rochester wants to prove that he cannot be considered married to this woman, for her not being exactly a human being, and they go see Bertha > her description is like an animal in a zoo cage, a savage beast caught in a cave, “a clothed hyena” (p.338-339). The place = dark, oppression, suffocated, hidden, like buried alive. Bertha’s strangeness erases Jane’s oddness = so far Jane had been the marginalized one, but now all these negative elements are absorbed by Bertha, Jane’s qualities are given back, English superiority towards colonialized people. The precondition for the marriage were not good at all, the interruption was unavoidable, Rocher wants to stay with her only seeing her as the opposite of his error, the solution to the problem, a way to forget Bertha, to get out of a terrible mistake > THE REAL Jane finds out the relationship between her uncle John Eyre and Mr. Mason: Mr. Eyre, which is now sick in bed, had been the Funchal correspondent (representative of a business) of Mr. Mason’s house for some years. Upon learning of the marriage, Mr. Eyre implored Mr. Mason to stop it. CHAPTER 27 Jane remains silent for a long time. She is convinced by ROCHESTER’S EXPLANATIONS (p.351-359)> in Jamaica, he had been forced by his aristocratic family to marry Bertha, because his avaricious father didn’t want to divide his property and gave all the money to his elder brother, Rowland. Rochester never loved her, and when he realized that Bertha was mentally ill, after his father and brother died and he had enough money, he decided to go back to England and lock her in Thornfield’s third story, finding a servant to take care of her (Grace Pool). After that, for ten years, he travelled across Europe looking for the companionship of a mistress: first Céline, then Giacinta (Italian), then Clara (German), but none of them was perfect, until he got to know Jane > their first meeting was like a fairytale, with mythic elements (twilight, rising moon, “lion like” dog, Romantic scene). Jane is not blaming Rochester for his behavior, she indirectly supports the side of Rochester, she sees through his eyes, biased approach = she is absorbed by the historical context, she pities Bertha as an inferior (“she cannot help being mad” p.347). Rochester proposes to runaway together to France, Jane is very tempted at the beginning, but then refuses, not because she’s disappointed, but because she doesn’t want to lose her independence (not being married, she would become his mistress). FEMALE PRIDE, SELF RESPECT, DIGNITY >>>>>>> she runs away. She finally finds comfort and strength in the female and MATERNAL IMAGE OF THE MOON (p. 319, 320, 329, 367) = even Nature is her mother (p.372 = Romantic theme). The Indian moon was like a cannon ball, instead the English one gives safety. Marsh End (ch.28-35) Regenerating period - Self-reconstruction - Re-birth - Re-gaining possession of herself. She is about to reach the goal of her pilgrimage (Marsh End = the end of the march): maturity, selfhood, independence, economic and social growth = she’ll climb the social ladder without having to marry a man. She feels like a bird whose wings had been cut, even if before (ch.23) she said “I am no bird, and no net ensnares me” = she has lost confidence in herself, the symbol of strength and independence has become symbol of impotence and fragility. After travelling for 2 days, and being again an outsider, Jane collapses in anguish and weakness in front of Moor House (“more house”) and is rescued by the Rivers, who instantly become her family: St John and his 2 sisters Diana and Mary > their names suggest the ideal of female strength for which Jane has been searching (Diana the huntress and Mary the virgin mother); the brother represents the disguised misogyny of St. John the Baptist. Jane uses the fake name JANE ELLIOT = alias, other identity (p.387), she “fears discovery above all things”. She implores St John to find her a job, she wants to feel useful, and not live in dependency. She is now a “half frozen bird” (p.400), meaning that she’s trying to rebuild herself but this process will be long and difficult. Thanks to the help of St John, Jane finds a job running the charity school in Morton town. It is not a prestigious job, but Jane is grateful. A series of events make her life a new start > St John receives a letter by Mr. Briggs, telling that Jane’s uncle, John Eyre from Madeira, was dead, and she was now rich with all his heredity (p.440). But St John reveals another, more stunning secret: THEY ARE COUSINS! (p.444) Now Jane is even happier: “the wealth did not weigh on me: now it was not a mere bequest of coin – it was a legacy of life, hope, enjoyment” = that’s the real wealth for her, affection, family, love, she almost doesn’t care about money  she insists on dividing the £20.000 among her cousins and her, £5000 each. Later on: “my present life was too purposeless; I required an aim”. Morton school was closed. St John asks Jane to marry him and follow him in India as a missionary (p.464-465), where he is about to go to educate native children (colonial mission). His self-abnegating rejection of the worldly beauty Rosamund Oliver is disconcerting to the passionate and Byronic part of Jane, but It shows that he practices what he preaches. It would be a spiritual and sterile marriage devoted to a missionary life to bring English civilization and Christianity > very different from Rochester: St John offers Jane a legal, legitimate union, NOT based on sin or passion or pleasures. Rochester represents the fire of her nature, St. John represents the ice (“hard man”, “a cold cumbrous column” = a pillar of patriarchy just as Brocklehurst was), but Jane has struggled all her life against the polar cold of a loveless world. In fact, it would be just another fake marriage. Jane understands she’s just a tool for St John and his missionary cause (p.466-467) > to Suvendrini Perera, this calls a “vocabulary of oriental misogyny”, in particular to the practice of sati = the immolation of Hindu widows on the funeral pyres of their husbands. She refuses the proposal because she isn’t in love with St John, and she doesn’t approve of his idea of love as a duty → the civilizing mission is not rejected, but Jane accepts only at the condition of being treated like a sister. >>> But John thinks that not being married would give a bad example. BEFORE: “I could not resist him” (p.461) > THEN: “I might resist”. >>> SCORN towards St John (p.471). When Jane feels the pressure of St John’s insistence on marrying him, she hears a sign from fate → she hears Rochester’s voice calling her name from a distance (p.483) and telling her to go back to Thornfield. And she decides to go. Ferndean (ch.36-38) Happy ending, everything finds a resolution. The story is set in a house outside society, merged in nature, more modest than Thornhill, where Rochester lives in isolation. Only out of the rules of society can Rochester and Jane be happy together. Jane feels like the messenger-pigeon flying home” (p.487), she is ready to start a relationship because she has a new position and is no more inferior nor excluded: she has a family (stable social condition, belonging); she has an income (economic stability); she’s no more lonely and poor (the weak and wailing child of her dreams). She has become a thoroughly independent woman and she can be equal to Rochester, even if Bertha is still alive; SHE FINDS THE HOUSE IN RUINS (p.489), as she had dreamt before. Nobody is there. A man from the village tells the story of a fire (caused by Bertha) (p.491-494), Rochester saved the life all the servants, tried saving Bertha (evolution = he regains his position as a hero) but she killed herself jumping from the roof = tragic ending, but she’s no longer an obstacle = her sacrifice makes Jane and Rochester free to be reunited. Talking to Rochester, who is very happy to see her, they find out that they both heard each other’s voice in that Monday night, like an echo, a meeting of their spirits and souls, a telepathic communion (it recalls Jane’s speech in ch.23: “my spirit addresses your spirit…. Equal-as we are!”).