Is Bertha An Evil Monster?

When Jane enters Thornfield she thinks she is going to work for a woman named Mrs. Fairfax, but she does not. She works for a mysterious man name Mr. Rochester. This man is going to be an import aspect of Jane’s life. Jane works as a governess to a young girl named Adele. Jane encounters Mr. Rochester when she goes for a walk and runs into Rochester, whose horse is injured. After the encounter Jane and Rochester start to gain interest into each other. Mr. Rochester is a man with a large amount of money and Jane is a woman with very little money, the fact that she works for Mr. Rochester defies their unprofessional relationship. “Like governesses, these marriages between older men and younger women were viewed with great ambivalence during the Victorian period”(Godfrey). Both characters develop strong feelings for one another and become close to getting married but a discovery of a secret puts the marriage to a halt. After

The novel Jane Eyre is predominantly a bildungsroman, Jane’s development throughout the novel is one of the most important aspects of the narrative. During Jane’s time at Thornfield she makes huge emotional progress through her relationship with Rochester and the discovery of Bertha Mason, eventually resulting in her departure from Thornfield.

Jane Eyre is a coming of age story following a young woman and her journey of self-growth. At the start of the novel Jane is living with her aunt and three cousins. They continuously abuse her, treating her like a stranger rather than a family member. At the age of ten Jane leaves her aunt's house and attends boarding school. It is at this school where she learns lessons of forgiveness and hope from a meek young woman named Helen Burns. Subsequently studying and teaching at the school for eight years Jane decides to become a governess at the mysterious Thornfield mansion. She falls in love with the owner of Thornfield and the two make plans to marry. Nonetheless on the day of there wedding Jane discovers that Mr. Rochester is already married and that he keeps his insane wife Bertha trapped away in the attic of Thornfield. Devastated by this information, Jane flees Thornfield and nearly dies from cold and starvation. Soon after she is taken in by the Rivers, two sisters and one brother. The passing of Jane's uncle reveals that she and the Rivers are cousins. It is also revealed that this uncle has left Jane all his fortune. This in turn leaves Jane extremely wealthy. Her cousin St. John Rivers ask Jane for his hand in marriage. However Jane comes to the conclusion that she still loves Mr. Rochester. After declining St. John's proposal Jane journeys back to Thornfield. When she arrives at Thornfield Jane discovers the mysterious mansion in burnt ruins. It is revealed that the

Mary Shelley's Frankenstein is very much a commentary on the Enlightenment and its failure to tame the human condition through reason. The human condition can be defined as the unique features which mold a human being. The creature is undoubtedly a victim of this predicament. He grapples with the meaning of life, the search for gratification, the sense of curiosity, the inevitability of isolation, and the awareness of the inescapability of death. These qualities and his ceaseless stalking of his master conjure up the metaphor that he is the shadow of the Enlightenment. Indeed, the Enlightenment is represented through Frankenstein whereas the creature is the embodiment of everything it shuns. These include nature, emotion, and savagery. The two characters are understood as counterparts and yet strikingly similar at the same time. The creature is considered a monster because of his grotesque appearance. Frankenstein on the other hand is a monster of another kind: his ambition, secrecy, and selfishness alienate him from human society. He is eventually consumed by an obsessive hatred of his creation. Both characters also commit primordial crimes. Although rationality pervades through Frankenstein's endeavours, it can be argued that he becomes less human the more he tries to be God. The secret of life lies beyond an accepted boundary from which none can return. By creating life Frankenstein ironically sets the stage for his own destruction as well as that of his family. The

Although Bertha’s seclusion is a result of her insanity and unacceptable behaviour, Jane’s isolation seems to be the cause of some mental illness, throwing her into a panic attack in the red room where she believes her Uncle Reed’s ghost dwells. It must be noted, though, that Jane is a child at this point in the novel, with an active imagination. Bronte may be making a point then, that children should not be shunned for their inventiveness and imagination, as was so common in her day. However, there is a fine line, and socially acceptable age, that separates a healthy imagination from madness. There is a clear lack of this knowledge in Bertha, whom does not appear to have a firm grip on reality. Madness, however, does not merely deal with concepts of reality in “Jane Eyre.” Jane has bouts of uncontrollable speech, in which she must say what comes to her mind. Jane first loses control of her tongue in chapter IV, in which she accuses Mrs. Reed of wishing her dead, and later exclaims “I am not deceitful: if I were, I should say I loved you; but I declare, I do not love you: I dislike you the worst of anybody in the world except John Reed,” and goes on to evaluate the terrible treatment Mrs. Reed has given her, and the lack of love and compassion she has been shown while at Gateshead. In this instance, madness works in Jane’s favour. This temporary bout of mania allows Jane to finally express the

While Jane’s time at Gateshead demonstrated her immense sadness, Jane’s time at Thornfield reveals her sadness through depression, as it begins to evolve into anger and an internal struggle. Her correlation with madness and anger begins to appear when she goes into the attic. She states “I climbed the three staircases, raised the trapdoor of the attic, and having reached the leads looked out afar over sequestered field and hill, and along the dim skyline- that then I longed” (Bronte 114). Jane is trapped inside herself. She longs to escape from her emotions and internal struggles, yet cannot. The attic, the abode of Mr. Rochester’s insane wife, houses Jane’s emotions. She climbs up to the attic and views the world beyond it. She

The two women are not acting as they should to the standards of society set for them within their timeline. Additionally, these two women are also women that Rochester shared feelings for. Bertha is someone he believes seduced him with adventures and wittiness, while hiding her true nature. While Jane, uses her wit and knowledge

Before she can become Rochester 's wife, Jane must prove her acceptability based on class. Does she have an upper-class sensibility, despite her inferior position at Thornfield? For example, when Bessie sees Jane at Lowood, she is impressed because Jane has become "quite a lady"; in fact, her accomplishments surpass that of her cousins, yet they are still considered her social superiors based solely on wealth. The conversation emphasizes the ambiguities of Jane 's family 's class status and of the class system in general: Should a lady be judged based on academic accomplishments, money, or family name? The novel critiques the behavior of most of the upper-class characters Jane meets: Blanche Ingram is haughty and superficial, John Reed is debauched, and Eliza Reed is inhumanely cold. Rochester is a primary example of upper-class debauchery, with his series of mistresses and his attempt to make Jane a member of the harem. In her final view of Thornfield, after Bertha has burned it down, Jane

If we had known who (or what) Bertha was from the beginning and why she was acting in such a crazed, psychopathic way, the novel would lose a lot of its Gothic vibe- there would be no mystery behind her bewildering actions. In fact, it's likely that the entire course of the story would have changed, as Jane would have found out that Rochester was married before he had proposed, and the opposite of such ends up becoming a major plot point later in the novel. In a different twist, if Bertha had committed less brutal acts, it wouldn't have accurately portrayed Jane's bottled-up emotions or future negative events as well as they did with the vehement events that actually took place. For example, if Bertha had simply tried on Jane's veil on the

With an attempt to distinguish between the old and the new, Charlotte Bronte creates the character of Bertha Mason as the exhibition of female repression and desire frequently found in the East. Bertha Rochester is the emblem of Eastern society, one which the British see as static and barbaric, and Jane Eyre is representative of the Western Civilization. In Reaches of Empire, Suvendrini Perera argues that "if the barely human prisoner caged in the Thornfield attic is the truest expression of women's anger and aspiration . . . [it is overlooked] that she is also the racial Other incarnate - a bestial, violent creature with an inordinate sexual appetite, caught in the colonized West Indies and confined 'for her own good' by a master who has appropriated both her body and her wealth" (82). If the reader only sees Bertha as the surrogate of Jane, one neglects to take note of the enriching importance of the text's suppression of Bertha. Charlotte Bronte presents Bertha as a sexually vigorous woman. This can be seen when Rochester indirectly describes

The powerful male roles, such as Edward Rochester, seen throughout the novel represent Great Britain, while the weaker female roles, such as Bertha Mason, represent the imperialized countries. In chapter 14 of Jane Eyre, Mr. Rochester demonstrates his assertive dominance to Jane when he asks, “Do you agree with me that I have a right to be a little masterful, abrupt, perhaps exacting, sometimes, on the grounds I stated, namely, that I am old enough to be your father, and that I have battled through a varied experience with many men of many nations, and roamed over half the globe” (Brontë 152). Rochester demonstrates the power of Great Britain here by claiming that he has the given right to take control and be the ruling figure just like Great Britain did to weaker countries. Bertha Mason parallels the countries being colonized because she is depicted as weak and someone who needs to be isolated and controlled. In "'Reader, I Buried Him': Apocalypse and Empire in Jane Eyre.", Tracy agrees that “many critics rightly place Bertha at the centre of the novel’s signifying systems, since social, cultural, imperial, and religious concerns are encoded in her relationship with Rochester”. This becomes evident in chapter 26 of Jane Eyre when Rochester is explaining Bertha’s character to Jane. Rochester states that “Bertha Mason is mad; she came of a mad family; - idiots and maniacs through three

At the start of the novel the reader knows nothing about Bertha mason. She does not make an appearance till Jane becomes aware of a “strong smell of burning” coming from Rochester’s room. Although she suspects Grace to have caused it, we find that Bertha set fire to his room. Rochester simply tries to hide her existence because he wants nobody to know of her, but cannot get rid of her. But that appears at this time it seems because Jane is troubled, a sort of doubling image. Bertha is constantly seen as an obstacle standing in Jane and Rochester's way of happiness and marriage. Her instability is illustrated in an extremely animalistic manner. Bertha threatens to “drain [Mason’s] heart”, similar to an evil being or vampire (ch.20). Again, Bertha is described as the polar opposite of Jane, as someone who acts out against typical norms and does how she pleases. So

The powerful male roles, such as Edward Rochester, seen throughout the novel represent Great Britain, while the weaker female roles, such as Bertha Mason, represent the imperialized countries. In chapter 14 of Jane Eyre, Mr. Rochester demonstrates his assertive dominance to Jane when he asks, “Do you agree with me that I have a right to be a little masterful, abrupt, perhaps exacting, sometimes, on the grounds I stated, namely, that I am old enough to be your father, and that I have battled through a varied experience with many men of many nations, and roamed over half the globe” (Brontë 152). Rochester demonstrates the power of Great Britain here by claiming that he has the given right to take control and be the ruling figure just like Great Britain did to weaker countries. Bertha Mason parallels the countries being colonized because she is depicted as weak and someone who needs to be isolated and controlled. In "'Reader, I Buried Him': Apocalypse and Empire in Jane Eyre.", Tracy agrees that “many critics rightly place Bertha at the centre of the novel’s signifying systems, since social, cultural, imperial, and religious concerns are encoded in her relationship with Rochester”. This becomes evident in chapter 26 of Jane Eyre when Rochester is explaining Bertha’s character to Jane. Rochester states that “Bertha Mason is mad; she came of a mad family; - idiots and maniacs through three

Towards the end of the book, Rochester redeems himself to be made worthy for Jane. When Jane leaves Rochester, he is left with his mentally insane wife. Although, we have the impression that Rochester is a cold, harsh man, Charlotte soon portrays us that he is brave and is kind. We know this because, soon after Jane leaves, Bertha sets Thornfield Hall on fire, and then tries to jump off the roof. Rochester tries to stop her,

In Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre, the character Bertha Mason is a manifestation of the feelings that Jane cannot express, and thus acts as an alter ego. Every time Bertha acts, it is predicated by a strong emotion or what should have been a strong emotion on Jane’s part. In the Victorian Era, women were expected to follow strict rules and isolate themselves from the outside world. In order to be the “angel in the house,” women were expected to obey and not question their fathers and husbands. Societal expectations dictate that Jane cannot show the full extent of her emotions, particularly when Mr. Rochester is involved. As a result, she does not do so, and they come out in the form of Bertha Mason. Throughout the novel, some sort of action by Bertha closely follows Jane’s musings on her frustrations, her discontent, or her anger. When Jane recognizes her emotions, Bertha’s expression is mild. However, Jane fails to recognize fully her emotions in multiple cases and Bertha responds violently. Because Bertha represents emotions that Jane possesses but represses in order to meet societal expectations, Bertha and these emotions must be removed before she can marry Mr. Rochester. Therefore, Bertha is a key character because she represents an important aspect of Jane and prevents Jane from fulfilling societal expectations.