Jane Eyre

Plot Summary

The narrator and main character, Jane Eyre, is a poor orphan. The opening chapters introduce the reader to her joyless life as a child. Her wealthy relatives have agreed to take care of her after her parents' deaths. However, the widowed Mrs. Reed and her three spoiled children are unkind to Jane and never fail to emphasise how Jane is below them. Jane is a plain, quiet, and intelligent girl with a passionate soul and an occasional tendency to inappropriate honesty and direct outbursts. This, combined with the fact that she sometimes has "visions" or very vivid dreams, certainly does not help to secure her relative's affections. (See also Brontë's novel Villette, in which Lucy Snowe shows similar tendency to visions/the supernatural or possibly hysterics.)

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Tensions escalate, and Jane is sent to Lowood, a boarding school run by the inhumanely strict Mr. Brocklehurst. Jane is branded a liar, which hurts her even more than malnutrition and cold. But Ms. Temple, the headmistress Jane admires, later clears her of these charges. She also finds a friend in Helen Burns, who is very learned and intelligent, has a patient and philosophical mind, and believes firmly in God. While Jane responds to the injustices of the world with barely contained burning tempers, Helen accepts earthly sufferings, including her own premature death, with calmness and martyr-like attitude.

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After a serious epidemic, the conditions in Lowood improve; Jane slowly finds her place in the institution and becomes a teacher. When Ms. Temple marries and moves away, Jane decides to change careers. She is desperate to see the world beyond Lowood. She advertises and soon secures a position as a governess in Thornfield Hall.

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Life at Thornfield is very quiet at first. Jane teaches a young French girl, Adele, and spends time with the old housekeeper, Mrs Fairfax. But everything changes when the owner of the manor — brooding, Byronic, fiery Mr. Rochester — arrives. He and Jane slowly get to know and respect each other. Mr. Rochester creates an elaborate set-up by seemingly courting a proud local beauty, Ms. Blanche Ingram. Finally, after suffering over this in silence, Jane protests; Mr. Rochester then admits to her that his courtship of Ms. Ingram was a ruse to arouse Jane's jealousy and that it is Jane whom he truly loves. Jane returns his feelings, and she and Mr. Rochester get engaged despite their differences in social status, age, and experience. Jane is young and innocent at 19 years old, while Rochester is nearly 40, worldly, and thoroughly disillusioned. But they complement, respect, and bring out the best in each other. Jane is detemined to stay modest, plain, and virtuous, and Rochester is almost equally determined to offer her expensive presents and finery. Jane has the moral high ground, though, and the weeks before the wedding are spent mostly as she wishes.

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The wedding ceremony is famously interrupted by a lawyer, who declares that Mr Rochester is already married. His mad wife Bertha Mason, a Creole from Jamaica, lives in the attic of Thornfield Hall, and her presence explains all sorts of mysterious events that have taken place during Jane's stay in Thornfield. Repentant, Mr. Rochester offers to take Jane abroad to live with him anyway, but Jane is not willing to sacrifice her morals or self-respect for earthly pleasures, let alone the status of mistress, even though Rochester insists Jane will break his heart if she refuses him. Torn between her love for Rochester and her own integrity, Jane flees Thornfield in the middle of the night, with very little money and nowhere to go.

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She wanders for a few days and finally finds safe haven, under an alias, with a vicar, St. John Rivers, and his two sisters. They bond, and in due course Jane is given a position as village schoolteacher. She finally leads an independent life in her own little house. Later, St. John learns Jane's true identity, and, in an incredible coincidence, it transpires that St. John and his sisters are actually Jane's cousins. Jane also conveniently inherits a large sum of money from an uncle who lived abroad. The cousins are left without inheritance because of an old family feud, but Jane promptly splits the money so that all four of them are now financially secure. This gives St. John the means to pursue his true calling, to go to India as a missionary. He asks Jane to marry him and to accompany him to India. Now Jane has the opportunity to choose a husband of high morals, but she knows St. John does not truly love her. This is the opposite of the situation she had with Mr. Rochester. Pressured by St. John, Jane nearly succumbs to his proposal, but at the last minute, she hears Rochester's voice calling her in the wind, and she feels she must respond to that call.

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She travels immediately to Thornfield Hall, only to find it abandoned and ruined by a devastating fire. She learns that Mr. Rochester, who lost a hand, an eye, and the sight of the other eye as a result of trying unsuccessfully to save Bertha from the flames, lives nearby at a house called Ferndean. Jane goes to him, they reconcile, and she marries him. She writes in the perspective of ten years after their marriage and tells of their firstborn son. Eventually Mr. Rochester gains part of one eye's sight back and is able to see the child. Jane's long quest to find love and a sense of belonging is finally fulfilled. The book doesn't end with their story, however, but with a look at the noble missionary death of St. John Rivers far away in India, which might represent the righteousness of the path Jane hasn't taken.

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