‘A free human being with an independent will’:

The Evolution of the Female Self in the 18th and 19th Century British Novel

__________

Elizabeth Windisch

2020
 1

Table of Contents

Introduction………………………………………………………………………………………..2
Part I: Pamela; Virtue Rewarded………………………………………………………………….5
Part II: Sense and Sensibility………………………………………………………………….….13
Part III: Jane Eyre………………………………………………………………………………..19
Bibliography……………………………………………………………………………………..29
 2

Upon its release in 1847, Charlotte Brontё’s Jane Eyre incited what one reviewer calls “Jane Eyre

fever,” the effects of which ranged from relaxing “all fibers of conscience” to “exciting moral and

religious indignation” (North American Review, 355). The novel was marketed as a scandal, unsuitable

for gentlemen and ladies alike. In the perspective of her heroine, Jane Eyre, Brontё had captured a voice

of such headstrong, intelligent, and curious intensity that the likeness of which had never been created by

a writer nor read before by British readers. The book became widely read among governesses and was

said to inspire in young gentlemen – imitating the shadowy character of Mr. Rochester – the urge to

“swagger and swear in the presence of the gentler sex, and to allude darkly to events in their lives which

excused impudence and profanity” (356).

The greatest development of Jane Eyre, however, lies in its sense of self, most brilliantly imbued

in its titular character, the enigmatic Jane. This sense of self – which we today take for granted – was

largely unknown in the Victorian Age, when authority came almost solely from external sources, not from

within. Virginia Woolf remarks that Brontё’s Jane is an “untamed ferocity perpetually at war with the

accepted order of things which makes her desire to create instantly rather than to observe patiently”

(Prior, 2016). This replacement of idleness with a desire to embrace wholly one’s free will and see

oneself as a force of change is what Jane breathes throughout the novel as she roots out true morality and

faith. In the novel’s second edition, Brontё responded to criticisms of Jane, urging, “Conventionality is

not morality. Self-righteousness is not religion. To attack the first is not to assail the Last” (Prior, 2016).

Brontё challenged her society and began to imagine a powerful individualism through the defiant voice of

a woman. Joyce Carol Oates singles out a particular sentence at the beginning of Chapter Two as

encapsulating the whole of the novel: “I resisted all the way” (1988). Oates notes that the power of Jane’s

female resistance arises from her outwardly plain appearance, which lacks the rudimentary qualities of

femininity, as well as her inconsequential social position, family, and wealth. For Jane is violently

conscious of her identity as woman, lower-class, and plain, and yet she demands, or, one might say,

commands equality from everyone around her – most importantly her lover, Rochester. Brontё’s depiction

of Jane is an important milestone in the depiction of the female self in the British novel overall. Only a
 3

century earlier, Samuel Richardson’s controversial Pamela had first been put on the shelves, and it took

novels like Jane Austen’s Sense and Sensibility to pave a road towards Jane Eyre. Richardson, Austen,

and Brontё all wrote in and against the context of their respective British society, and in understanding the

historical context each writer operated in, one can gain insight into the self he or she constructed.

Brontё learned such understanding of the female self from her own experiences in life, especially

as an aspiring nineteenth-century women writer. She was a poet before a fiction writer, but when she wrote

to Poet Laureate Robert Southey seeking encouragement for her career, he famously replied: “Literature

cannot be the business of a woman’s life, and it ought not to be” (The British Library, 1837). Ten years

later, she published Jane Eyre despite his discouragement but was not without critics. A review of the novel

in the October 1848 “Novels of the Season” section of the North American Review highlights the sexism

Brontё faced:

The novel of Jane Eyre purports to have been edited by Currer Bell, and the said Currer divides

the authorship, if we are not misinformed, with a brother and sister. The work bears the mark of

more than one mind and one sex. From the masculine tone of Jane Eyre, it might pass altogether

as the composition of a man, were it not for some unconscious feminine peculiarities, which the

strongest-minded woman that ever aspired after manhood cannot suppress. It is true that the

noblest and best representations of female character have been produced by men; but there are

niceties of thought and emotion in a woman’s mind which no man can delineate, but which often

escape unawares from a female writer. (355)

The reviewer’s fixation on the author’s gender highlights that to their contemporaries, women writers of

the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries were women first and writers second. Indeed, readers used to tally

up “feminine qualities” and “masculine qualities” of a novel to determine the author’s gender (Showalter,

1977). Brontё devised her pseudonym with her sisters, who shared the surname “Bell” and chose given

names that also matched their initials. Charlotte explains in the biographic notices of her sisters composed

after their death the use of their male names: “We did not like to declare ourselves women, because we

had a vague impression that authoresses are liable to be looked on with prejudice” (Holland, 2017). Her
 4

fear was justified, for even when judged as the work of a male author, the novel was charged with

indecency. The North American Review criticizes the “authors’” suggestion that a fictional representation

of character imitates the real world in a “confound[ing] of vulgarity with truth” (357). Brontё, however,

did not shy away from the forwardness of her work in championing a true depiction of the female self.

In both her life and her fiction, Brontё thus displayed a heightened understanding of women’s

position in society. Her work marks the evolution of the expression of women’s consciousness in the

British novel. In framing this discussion of gender, I do not intend to say that Jane Eyre is only a success

because it is written by a woman – something the author herself would have vehemently opposed. After

all, to the dismay of her publishers, Brontё constantly attempted to address sexually-biased criticism in

the prefaces to her books and in letters to reviewers and journals. To an Economist reviewer, she once

wrote, “I am neither man nor woman. I come before you as an author only. It is the sole standard by

which you have a right to judge me – the sole ground on which I accept your judgment” (qtd. in

Showalter, 1977). Yet, “evolution of the self” alone would be too general, for this essay is concerned with

the development of women’s fictional representation regarding the intersecting forces of class, gender,

wealth and most reverently, romantic love.

As a novel of romantic love, Jane Eyre is wonderfully successful and numerous actors and

actresses have rose to depict the chemistry between the defiant Jane and sullen Mr. Rochester. Jean

Wyatt reflects that while love fantasies “exert a pull toward traditional feminine passivity and dependence

by promising happiness to her who sits and waits for the right man to sweep her away to the heights of

passion” and thereby “arouse the anger of feminists dedicated to the ideals of female autonomy and self-

realization,” there is an undeniable attraction for women readers of the nineteenth century (201). A

woman’s investment in romance, after all, should not detract from her individualism nor claim to

feminism. Moreover, Jane’s relationship with Edward is quintessential to an understanding of Jane – and

thus quintessential to an understanding of the female self as Brontё wrote it.

Beginning with Samuel Richardson’s controversial Pamela, I aim to first examine the portrayal of

the female self through a man’s eyes, for Pamela is important in its unique first-person female
 5

perspective, interaction with eighteenth century marriage law, and protagonist’s reaction against male

power and class. I will then delve into the pages of Jane Austen’s Sense and Sensibility to embark on a

discussion of the so-called “Cult of Sensibility” and the conflict between passion, rationality, and love

apparent in this novel. Richardson’s Pamela and Austen’s Sense and Sensibility represent logical

progressions toward the development of the female self in Jane Eyre and the British novel as a whole.

Ultimately, Brontё’s rejection of gender stereotypes and assertion of gender equality in her creation of the

female self builds on and extrapolates themes of her predecessors’ work while simultaneously setting

forth the possibility of a female self that is only Self, freed from the confines of gender and free to find an

Equal in love.

PART I:

Pamela; or, Virtue Rewarded

“I will bear any thing you can inflict upon me with Patience,

even to the laying down of my Life, to shew my Obedience to

you in other Cases; but I cannot be patient, I cannot be passive,

when my Virtue is at Stake!” – Samuel Richardson, Pamela,

1740

Whether or not Pamela represents the first English novel may be up for debate - Robinson Crusoe

and Le Morte Darthur have both been suggested to fit the bill – but Pamela was certainly a novel unlike

any before presented to British society. Samuel Richardson was inspired to write the novel, published in

1740, by a series of letters in which a daughter asks advice of her father upon being the victim of a young

and sexually aggressive man she serviced. Pamela, which figures from the woman’s point of view,

uniquely and controversially discoursed with eighteenth century marriage law, first-person perspective,

and heroine’s rebellion against male power and class. While both Pamela and Jane Eyre utilize first-
 6

person discourse, the novels diverge in their depiction of female autonomy and discourse with

contemporary gender roles.

The second half of Pamela, captured in the addendum to the title, stirred up most of the novel’s

controversy: “Virtue Rewarded.” Pamela, a 15-year-old lower-class servant, is the victim of several

violent sexual advances, including attempted rape, at the hands of her Master, Mister B. Yet by merit of

her Virtue – as Richardson would have it – she is “rewarded” with marriage to her wealthy, upper class

Master. Richardson intended his work to be a source of education and moral instruction, and the response

the novel garnered would suggest that he was successful in this regard (Blanchard, 93). The public went

wild for the novel, and Pamela merchandise in the form of waxworks, paintings, murals, engravings, fans,

and trading cards, along with spin-off books, illegal copies, imitations, operas, and theatrical adaptations

sold everywhere. Even Voltaire, Mozart, Goldoni and Diderot were reportedly amused by the book’s

“irritating fascination” (Turner, 70). A modern reader would cringe at the idea of a young teenage girl

marrying her sexually abusive employer, yet readers of the eighteenth century saw the subject matter in

the context of contemporary gender roles. It was, moreover, the Pamelists versus the Antipamelists, a

dichotomy in the eighteenth century dominated by sexist arguments against the fictional heroine that

subsists even in modern criticism today. Early critics deprecated the Pamela cults, while parodists

revealed their anxiety about the feminine sexuality (Turner, 72). Various critics viewed supporters of one

such parody novel Shamela as exposing a “masculine eagerness to expose, penetrate, or triumph over

Pamela (or Pamela)” which suggests that the novel or its heroine or both poses a threat to masculinity.

For his supporters, however, Richardson’s exploration of the human self and inner consciousness was

remarkable in its novelty; Diderot remarked that Richardson “brings the torch into the depths of the

cavern” in illuminating this sort of consciousness. These differences can be better understood by

examining gender difference and marriage law in the eighteenth century.

During the century preceding the era of Pamela, theories of gender difference emerged in

England. Prior to the eighteenth century, sex was viewed on a continuum and as a sociological category;

sexuality was an elastic concept, with little distinction made between biological sex and socially
 7

constructed gender (McKeon, 210). As English society gained the knowledge that there are two sexes

biologically distinct and thus “defined by nature,” gender difference became much more explicit. As

McKeon states, “Only with [this] modern system of sexuality – of sex and gender difference – is gender

sufficiently separated out from sex to take on the familiar, differential function it performs in modern

culture” (210). The emergence of gender difference was the emergence of sexual difference. It was also

the emerge of sexuality as a defining feature of personality, something manifested in all areas of society,

but notably in the insistence of dressing to discriminate genders. The hoop petticoat, for example, was

feared for its remarkable diameter (that could indeed reach up to eight feet) which – men believed – was a

private space in protest of the masculine control of their sexual and social lives (Benhamou, 2001).

Marlene LeGates calls the eighteenth century the rise of the “Cult of True Womanhood” where the overt

misogyny sustained from the time of the ancient Greeks to the seventeenth century was traded for the

image of the “chaste maiden and obedient wife” (1976). For Nancy Armstrong, Pamela engages in the

eighteenth century reinscription of the female body in the form of “rejection of the female aristocratic,

ornamental body” in exchange for “the ideal of a woman whose depths are more important than her

surface” (323). Like the emerge of gender difference, however, this focus on inner did not change existing

ideologies about femininity but instead reinscribed them.

This redefinition of gender difference coincided with the crumbling of traditional notions of

patriarchy in British society, which had previously ordered the relationship between the family and the

state. Patriarchy had until that point given to political arrangement the “natural” legitimacy of family

arrangements. Puritan thought of the seventeenth century, however, forced this implicit order to become

explicit. John Locke, one of many critics to expose the faults of the implicit order of patriarchy, stated in

his Second Treatise of Government (1690) that “Power over Subject is different than Father over his

Children, Master over Servant, and Husband over Wife” (qtd. in McKeon, 211). Furthermore, in the late

seventeenth century, an overall disenchantment with how aristocratic ideology exposed family members

to unjust patriarchal tyranny and rule of primogeniture gradually eroded the idea that birth determined

honor, worth, and wealth. As a result, the world of the family and world of the State were increasingly
 8

seen as separate spheres due to inherently different contractual and customary principles. This division

restricted the female identity to that of wife and mother, roles limited to the household, and reserved the

political world for the husband and father. At the upper-class level, this shift pushed higher class women

aspiring to bourgeois gentility to value laziness. Women’s work became female accomplishments and

cheap labor took over tasks formerly relegated to wives and daughters (McKeon, 299). In the legal world,

this new understanding of family order heralded a return to the thinking that husbands and wives were

one entity, and the husband absorbed the wife’s property upon marriage, thus subjugating the woman to

the man. Political theorists developed doctrines permitting married women to possess separate property,

but these assumptions of political theory had no real applications to the civil rights of the eighteenth-

century woman. In choosing to tell his story from the mouth of a poor servant girl in service of a wealthy

Squire, Richardson interacts with this new definition of patriarchy and woman’s role in it by allowing a

“woman” to express her view of things.

Sexual promiscuity in the summer house sets the novel in motion. In these first chapters, the

gender roles of the eighteenth century are ascribed to each character. Pamela is the virtuous, chaste

woman who must overcome the attempts of her master. She recounts to her parents in one of her many

letters the actions of her master, Mister B: “He by Force kissed my Neck and Lips; and said, Who ever

blamed Lucretia but the Ravisher only? And I am content to take all the Blame upon me; as I have

already born too great a Share for what I have deserv’d. May I, said I, Lucretia like, justify myself with

my Death, if I am used barbarously?” (Richardson, 31). From these early pages, Richardson

controversially represents the spark of Pamela’s consciousness and passionate emotions with the

immediacy of a first-person perspective. Pamela’s reference to Lucretia, the virtuous Roman matron who

committed suicide after being raped, expresses well the inequality surrounding sexual promiscuity, for

which women were blamed and condemned. Indeed, Pamela contemplates suicide later in the novel to

avoid the ruin of herself and her family. Her parents, poor farmers, are so destitute that her father is

referred to as “Goodman Andrews” rather than “Mr. Andrews.” With no social standing or wealth, all

Pamela has to arm herself with is her Virtue. “I cannot be passive, when my Virtue is at Stake!” she says
 9

(211). A Pamelist would champion Pamela’s courage in the face of such a man, while critics like Henry

Fielding would laugh at such prudery. In his novel Shamela, Fielding turns Pamela into a fortune hunter

who lures her lustful master into matrimony to parody Pamela’s implicit moral message– that a woman’s

chastity ought to be commoditized. Through this awkward championing of a woman’s chastity,

Richardson both confounds and strengthens Pamela’s voice as a realistic heroine.

Richardson crafts a young woman’s voice and self by allowing the reader access to her most

intimate letters. These letters, however, portray Pamela as more than the ideal obedient and chaste

woman Richardson may want her to be. Jane Blanchard remarks that Pamela’s writing can be

“anecdotal, confessional, explanatory, diversionary, defensive, or persuasive; and her meta-narrative

offers insights about her character” (93). In all these forms, however, Pamela’s voice is characterized

by earnestness, wit, and an overwhelming sense of dignity despite her low status and gender. After

the first assault, Pamela muses on her rights at the hands of her cruel Master, writing, “And pray, how

came I to be his Property? What Right has he in me, but such a Thief may plead to stolen Goods?”

(Richardson, 126) Her inner conflict vacillates between asserting her own worth and conforming to

standards of respect and honor. As the novel progresses, she demonstrates great awareness of her own

position as well as an awareness of her self-expression through her writing. When Mister B attempts

to curb her writing, worried she will expose him, she defies him and continues on through the help of

other servants in the house. Following Mister B’s second attack on her, she muses,

At last he went up to the Closet, which was my good Lady’s Dressing-room; a Room I once

lov’d, but then as much hated. Don’t your Heart ake for me? – I am sure mine fluter’d about

like a Bird in a Cage new caught. O Pamela, said I to my self, why art thou so foolish and

fearful! Thou hast done no harm! What if thou fearest an unjust Judge, when thou art

innocent, wouldst thou do before a just one, if thou wert guilty? Have courage, Pamela, thou

knowest the worst! And how easy a Choice Poverty and Honesty is, rather than Plenty and

Wickedness? (Richardson, 43)

Pamela’s conversation asks for pity from the reader (both her parents and the Reader) and is also

directed inwards. Her dialogue with herself is made explicit in the meta-narration of her recollection

of her happier past and her reminder of her innocence. Jane Blanchard discusses how Pamela’s

writing evolves as the novel progresses and Pamela begins to see the letters as a source of strength

(94). Pamela writes, “It may be some little Pleasure to me, may-hap, to read them myself, when I am

come to you, to remind me what I have gone thro (which, I hope, will rather strengthen my good

Resolutions, that I may not hereafter, from my bad Conduct, have Reason to condemn myself from

my own Hand)” (51-52). Pamela expresses self-consciousness about her actions and resolves to

overcome challenges set before her. Even when Mister B orders her to stop writing, she continues,

increasingly sincere upon belief that her letters now travel in complete secrecy.

Unfortunately, Mister B intercepts Pamela’s letters. Her uncensored words reveal her true

character in all its earnestness, strength, and purity. They convert a “libertine” into a “responsible

head of household” (Harol, 211). This is where Richardson’s portrayal of the female self goes astray

and where the awkward moral message – that a woman’s virginity should be commoditized –

unravels. The foundations for this moral message are laid earlier; for example, Pamela’s parents write

to her on the subject of Mister B’s advances, framing them as “temptation”: “Your Temptations are

very great; for you have Riches, Youth, and a fine Gentleman, as the World reckons him, to

withstand; but how great will be your Honor to withstand them” (Pamela, 27). Here is the fodder for

Fielding’s parody in Shamela, a woman who must “resist” the attractions – not assault – of her

abuser. It is a true slight to Pamela’s character to reduce her conflict to resisting the supposed

“attractiveness” of a man more powerful than her. Following the intent on her person, Pamela writes,

“I think, when one of our Sex finds she is attempted, it is an Encouragement to a Person to proceed, if

one puts one’s self in the Way of it, when one can help it, and it shews one can forgive what in short

ought not to be forgiven” (Richardson, 39). Here, Pamela ascribes to herself responsibility for

deterring Mr. B’s sexual predatory behavior, but she also notes that his behavior “ought not to be
 11

forgiven.” This sentiment is echoed later when she proclaims to herself, “O Pamela, thou art

innocent!” (43). Nevertheless, Richardson negates these sentiments to introduce a truly mystifying

tale of romantic love in the second half of the novel. This is of course following the attempted rape

scene, in which Pamela recounts Ms. Jewkes saying as Mister B restrains her, “Don’t stand dilly-

dallying, sir. She cannot exclaim worse than she has done; and she will be quieter when she knows

the worst” (Richardson, 208). In many ways Mister B does silence Pamela, for here her voice is

staunched out by Richardson’s false ideas of romantic love, fed by the evolving notions of gender

roles of the eighteenth century.

In the beginning of Pamela, the young heroine voices a view of love that while ascribing to

eighteenth century ideals of romantic love, ultimately undermines Richardson’s agenda of

commoditizing female virtue. Pamela muses, “Is it not strange, that Love borders so much upon

Hate? But this wicked Love is not like the true virtuous Love to be sure: That and Hatred must be as

far off, as Light and Darkness” (Richardson, 53). Here Pamela espouses an understanding of love as

nothing close to hate. Yet, as the novel progresses, this notion of what is and is not love is seemingly

discarded. On page 213, Mister B admits, “I cannot endure the Thought of Marriage, even with a

Person of equal or superior Degree to myself. Yet I must have you; I cannot bear the Thoughts of any

other Man supplanting me. And the very Apprehension of that, has made me hate the Name of

Williams.” Hatred and jealousy mingle with supposed “love,” which in Pamela’s very words cannot

be true love. Later in the novel, Pamela’s marriage to Mister B renders his horrible attempts on her

body a mere stage in their “courtship.” Suddenly, Pamela happily listens to Mister B lecture her about

proper wifely conduct even after his past sexual misadventures are revealed. As Stuart Sim posits,

“Neither does Pamela consider there is anything hypocritical about his delivering a moral homily,

despite the differences in their respective sexual histories: marriage has the effect of absolving all his

past sins” (60). But they are in love, yes? This is what Richardson may want his reader to believe.

Even if romantic love truly exists between them, Pamela has enabled her rapist and forgiven him for
 12

what she herself says “ought not to be forgiven” (Richardson, 39). At the hands of her puppeteer,

Richardson, Pamela is elevated to the position of a woman in a bourgeois household, a consumer

rather than a contributor to the household economy as she was as a servant. Furthermore, according to

eighteenth century marriage law, Pamela is now the property of her husband. Marlene LeGates

relates this to the idealization of womanhood which enabled the shift to capitalism in eighteenth

century Britain: “The idea of the morally superior woman contributed an ideological prop to the

family seen as a means of social consolidation in an increasingly class-conscious society. The drama

of the aggressive male checked by the virtuous female is paradoxically a reaffirmation of the

patriarchal authority of the family” (Gwilliam, 104). Had the novel held to Pamela’s defiance, it

might have advocated for women’s sexual freedom and defied contemporary notions of class, male

power, and morality; instead, her agency is beholden to Richardson’s ultimate ploy to reaffirm

existing male power.

Richardson’s moral message is his failure in the eyes of Antipamelist critics, but the

contradictory aspects of the novel embodied in Pamela’s strong voice charmed readers and made his

novel a milestone in the development of the female self. As Tassie Gwilliam expresses, “Pamela is a

novel split by Richardson’s impulse to reproduce and mimic contradictory aspects of the ideology of

gender, particularly the ideology of femininity. The novel seems to set itself against hypocrisy and

duplicity, as well as disruptions of gender identity, but it cannot do without them” (104-5).

Richardson’s elevation of his protagonist’s voice is his ultimate undoing. His faulty rendition of the

female self nonetheless marks an important development in the portrayal of women’s agency in the

British novel and an important milestone on the path to Brontё’s Jane Eyre.
 13

Part II:

Sense and Sensibility

“Always resignation and acceptance. Always prudence

and honour and duty. Elinor, where is your heart?”

– Jane Austen, Sense and Sensibility, 1811

There would be no Sense and Sensibility without the Cult of Sensibility. An October 1796

Monthly Magazine describes the cult: “There was a time when the height of breeding was measured by

delicacy of feeling, and no fine lady, or gentleman, was ashamed to be seen sighing over a pathetic story,

or weeping at a deep-wrought tragedy” (Richardson, 377). Sentimentalism was a late eighteenth century

ideology generalized from theories of moral philosophers like David Hume and Adam Smith, who

believed “moral action is based on man’s characteristic sympathetic response and virtue is desirable

because it advances one’s own welfare and fulfills desire for approval” (Poovey, 307). It grew out of the

concept of “sentiment” embodied in texts such as Pamela, which aim to elicit the sympathy of the reader

for a virtuous, persecuted protagonist. Novels of sensibility, in contrast, illustrate sympathy in a fictional

hero or heroine in response to a narrative of suffering endured, allowing the reader to critique the hero or

heroine in question (Ballaster, xx). In Victorian society, the moral idea of sensibility metamorphosed into

the incorporation of sensibility as a necessary element of a socially refined and cultivated person. It

created, in essence, a mythical society where sensibility penetrated the aesthetic, ethical, economic, and

political realms of life. Inequality was reinforced because, in the minds of the rich, the poor and

dependent benefitted from the unforced benevolence of well-bred gentlemen and gentlewoman.

Sensibility, as Richard Ballaster says, “inverts to become an individualistic and self-gratifying corruption

of the valued social response and collective responsibility that sentiment engenders” (xix). Perception of

the external world became an aesthetic indulgence, and heroes of sensibility preferred dismal

surroundings and suffering so they could focus on their own experience of perception (Ballaster, xix). The
 14

Early of Shaftesbury, an influential writer of the philosophy of sentiment, argued that happiness is only

achieved by attending to feelings that arise from one’s innate moral sense; decisions were thus to be made

from the head not the heart. These beliefs echoed Roseau’s “I feel, therefore I am” and were

fundamentally in conflict with ideas such as Aristotle’s rational animal or the insistence of classical

humanism that such impulses “threaten to prove self-destructively imperious” (Shoben, 529). Such was

the extension of the cult of sensibility that in the 1790s, as Chris Jones remarks, “[O]ne’s stand on matters

such as the conduct of the private affections, charity, education, sympathy, genius became political

statements” (xix). While Sense and Sensibility was not published until 1811, the novel has all the marks

of this period in time, as Jane Austen engages with this political discourse in such a way that her “sense”

and “sensibility” become political categories for female behavior.

In Sense and Sensibility, her first published novel*, Austen engages with texts of earlier writers in

her foil characters of Elinor and Marianne and discourse with the cult of sensibility. Earlier female

authors like Sophia Lee (The Recess, 1783-5) and Jane West (Gossip’s Story, 1797) made a tradition of

the sisterly foil with their characters of Ellinor and Matilda/Laura and Marianna, respectively (Ballaster,

xviii). In her portrayal of gentry women’s exposure to sensibility, Austen arrives at a moral conclusion

that Marilyn Butler describes as “objective evidence” over “private intuition” (101). Other female authors

such as Mary Wollstonecraft in her book Vindication of the Rights of Women (1792) launch fiery critiques

on sensibility, which was particularly limiting for women. Wollstonecraft believed women were

subjugated to men through sensibility, stating that it promoted “strong attachments and instantaneous

emotions of compassion” so that their dependence on men could be preserved (277). In her work,

Wollstonecraft positions women tethered to sensibility as poor, neglectful mothers while those able to use

their full intellectual capacity appropriately educate their children.

In reality, sensibility had both positive and negative implications for women. The eighteenth-

century woman entered this new society with more function in both private and public heterosocial

spheres including shopping, visits, assemblies, dances, and masquerades. Women became more literate,

*It is unclear which novel Austen began first, but she is reported to have authored Sense and Sensibility and
Pride and Prejudice at the same time. S&S came into print first, however, with P&P published two years later.
 15

writing poetry, novels, and private letters. Furthermore, sensibility elevated women to a position of moral

superiority. As Elizabeth Barnes describes, “Women and their male allies elevated sensibility as a

standard, demanding that unfeeling men of archaic or new, competing cultures, reform themselves and

their treatment of women” (2020). On another hand, however, it was considered a cause of nervous

disorders and sexual corruptness. In Sense and Sensibility, Austen synthesizes the many faces of

sensibility to redefine engagement with the female self by contrasting various romantic engagements. In

doing so, she posits a balance in crafting the female self that draws away from the overly sensitive,

reactive qualities of a typical female character while asserting feeling does not undermine a woman’s

independence. This balance in the female self is something Brontё will later emulate and transcend in

Jane Eyre.

Austen sets up her critique of Sense and Sensibility through sisters Elinor and Marianne, who

represent the opposing forces of the title. Marianne represents the dying cult of sensibility. Elinor is the

foil to this, an embodiment of logic and reason. Austen describes them in the beginning of the novel in

such a way as to draw the distinction between them:

Elinor, this eldest daughter whose advice was so effectual, possessed a strength of understanding,

and coolness of judgement, which qualified her, though only nineteen, to be the counsellor of her

mother. Marianne’s abilities were, in many respects, quite equal to Elinor’s. She was sensible and

clever; but eager in everything; her sorrows, her joys, could have no moderation. She was

generous, amiable, interesting; she was everything but prudent. (8)

To further her distinction, Austen bestows each sister the challenge of a romantic relationship. For Elinor,

there is Edward Ferrars, and for Marianne, Willoughby. The lives of the male love interests also exhibit

parallels as each is disinherited by a benefactor and has at his whim three women to choose from.

Ballaster notes how the plot is reduced to an intellectual puzzle through the representation of the love

interests as initials. Elinor muses on her relative Sir John’s teasing of her interest in Ferrars: “The letter F

– had been invariably brought forward, and found productive of such countless jokes that it’s character as
 16

the wittiest letter in the alphabet had long been established with Elinor” (Austen, 120). Later, Elinor

catches the letter “W” on a letter from Marianne to Willoughby. Finally, Austen utilizes rudimentary

discussions of economics to ground her novel in reality, thus distancing herself from the popular Gothic

and sentimental novelists of her time. The first chapters follow mid-nineteenth-century laws of

inheritance and succession that determine the passing on of the Dashwood estate. With no sons,

Dashwood’s estate is bequeathed to his nephew, Henry Dashwood, who leaves it to his son, John. John,

however, is much less in need of the money than Henry’s wife and daughters by his second marriage,

Elinor, Marianne, and Margaret. This backdrop of money and marriage with foregrounded sisterly foils

sets the tone for a story in which ordinary concerns conflict with overly romantic dreaming.

Rather than the intimate first person view such as Richardson uses in Pamela, Austen crafts her

tale using a third person omniscient perspective that dips in and out of the lives of many characters. This

omniscient point of view lends a rather candid tone to the novel, emphasizing the author’s desire to assert

“objective evidence” over “private intuition” while still allowing for an intimate interaction with her

characters. It is through precise descriptions of the goings on in the lives of the Dashwood women that the

characters of the sisters are illuminated. Elinor, for example, is consulted by her mother for her “steadier

judgement” when looking at new houses, an acute statement that asserts how highly her sense is admired

if it usurps that of her mother (16). She is also elucidated through description of her love interest. Her

mother recounts after meeting him: “Edward Ferrars was not recommended to their good opinion by any

peculiar graces of person or address. He was not handsome, and his manners required intimacy to make

them pleasing. He was too diffident to do justice to himself; but when his natural shyness was overcome,

his behavior gave every indication of an open affectionate heart” (17). Austen thus reveals what things the

reserved character of Elinor truly values. Likewise, Elinor’s temperance is held against her sister’s

assertion of her own interests in a man. “He admires as a lover, not as a connoisseur,” Marianne says

critically of Edward. “To satisfy me,” she continues, “those characters must be united. I could not be

happy with a man whose taste did not in every point coincide with my own. He must enter into all my
 17

feelings” (19). Austen directly criticizes Marianne and repeatedly paints Elinor as the far more rational,

careful, level-headed one. When Elinor reveals her doubts about Edward – that she likes him but is

worried about their differing financial situations – Marianne is shocked to find “how much the

imagination of her mother and herself had outstripped the truth” (23). Their imaginings, of course, were

that the two were engaged, yet as the novel unfolds the happenings all justify Elinor’s doubts. Elinor’s

voice, moreover, is the voice of Austen.

Austen continues the novel’s critique of sensibility while progressively affirming second

attachments in love. Marianne falls in love with Willoughby, who while sharing her interests in dance,

music, and art is not as honest as he may seem; his glittering surface hides many lies. In contrast, her

other suitor, the older Colonel Brandon is rather plain on the outside but an honest, kind man on the

inside. Elinor, noting his mild manners, expresses compassion: “[H]is reserve appeared rather the result of

some oppression of spirits, than of any natural gloominess of temper. Sir John had dropt hints of past

injuries and disappointments, which justified her belief of his being an unfortunate man, and she regarded

him with respect and passion” (51). When Willoughby denounces Brandon as “the kind of man whom

every body speaks well of, and nobody cares about; whom all are delighted to see, and nobody

remembers to talk to,” (52) she defends Brandon against this shallow judgment, noting his worldliness,

intellect, and good nature. Brandon is much like Edward Ferrars and much closer in disposition to herself.

Furthermore, Elinor is sympathetic to Brandon’s earlier disappointment in love when he asks her of

Marianne’s opinion of second attachments. Elinor’s acceptance of Brandon paints Austen’s realistic view

of love and rejection of senseless romantic dreaming such as Marianne practices. Yet, as consistently as

Austen rejects sensibility, she is equally as consistent in her compassion for those who fall to its power.

When Marianne is slighted by Willoughby, Elinor feels the utmost compassion for her sister,

even though she warned Marianne of forming too quick an attachment to him. She expresses her

compassion for her sister’s “violent sorrow” guessing that she is likely “not merely giving way to [her

sorrow] as a relief, but feeding and encouraging [it] as a duty” (78). Indeed, Marianne spends the next few
 18

days playing and reading only the pieces of music and literature that she indulged in with Willoughby to

rub salt in her emotional wounds. This feeding and encouraging of her sorrow is Marianne’s indulgence

in sensibility; she must experience her sorrow to feel self-gratification. Edward Shoben remarks how in

Marianne Austen “demonstrates how the self, divorced from culture and unrestrained by internalized

norms of judgment and conduct, becomes cripplingly alienated and unbearably lonely” (533).

To her fictional companions and perhaps to many critics, Elinor’s character may seem rather cold

and indifferent, yet her inner life is blooming with empathy, intelligence, and emotion. Through her eyes

the reader witnesses the events of the story and it is Elinor’s thoughts and feelings that are the true heart

of Sense and Sensibility. As Edmund Wilson notes,

The reader has his own experience of the world of Sense and Sensibility mediated by hers. If he

is moved, it is largely because she is, too; and Austen’s device permits him to become aware of

Elinor’s compassion and her capacity for love, the cost in effort of her principled control of her

strong passions, her susceptibility to anxiety and conflict, and the affective intensity that

energizes her adherence to traditional values and her attempts to bring her impulses into

congruence with them. (qtd. in Shoben, 536)

Certainly, there is as Shoben notes a “cost” for her strict adherence to her values – especially in regards to

her adventures in love. Upon Edward Ferrars’ return to the Dashwood women, he greets Elinor in a rather

cold and indifferent manner. Elinor reflects, “His coldness and reserve mortified her severely; she was

vexed and half angry; but resolving to regulate her behavior to him by the past rather than the present, she

avoided every appearance of resentment or displeasure” (88). Elinor, however, makes no show of her own

happiness upon seeing him; in many ways, she has given him just as little indication of her sentiments.

Her cautious attitude toward Edward is ultimately for the good in light of the revelation of his existing

engagement to Lucy Steele. In this moment, Elinor’s sadness materializes. “Her heart sunk within her,

and she could hardly stand; but exertion was indispensably necessary, and she struggled resolutely against

the oppression of her feelings, that her success was speedy, and for the time complete” (129). Her self-
 19

discipline in the face of such heartbreaking news and pity for both Lucy and Edward – who are both

under duress due to the attachment – ultimately leads to her own happiness. After Edward reveals the

engagement is broken off, she rejoices, “As soon as the door was closed, [she] burst into tears of joy,

which at first thought would never cease. Edward, who had till then looked anywhere rather than at her,

saw her hurry away, and perhaps saw – or even heard, her emotion” (335).

Like Pamela, Elinor has a rich inner consciousness with her own moral compass, however this

consciousness does not fall victim to the hand of her author nor the popular whims of society. Her female

self is one that defines itself against and asserts itself in a larger cultural backdrop. Edward Shoben posits,

“For Austen, the effective self must be found through losing it in the larger social life of institutions, of

traditions, and of inherited if critically evaluated principles.” (538). Austen uses marriage as a tool to

represent “the fusion of individual and social destinies” acknowledging that this civil union “serves as an

institutional device for the management of that tension between the imperious demands of selfhood and

the inescapable requirements of cultural membership out of which loneliness emerges” (Shoben, 538).

Ultimately, her ideal female self is intelligent, rational, and empathetic with an acute awareness and

insight into the world around her. Austen’s depiction of a rational female self, especially regarding

marriage, is vastly different than that of Pamela, but still short of what Brontё would view as an ideal

portrayal of the female self.

Part III:

Jane Eyre

“I am no bird; and no net ensnares me;

I am a free human being with an independent will.”

Charlotte Brontё, Jane Eyre, 1847

Three decades after Jane Austen published Sense and Sensibility and more than a century after

Richardson published Pamela, Charlotte Brontё unveiled Jane Eyre to the world. Certainly, Brontё was
 20

aware of these other novels in her crafting of Jane Eyre. In fact, she explicitly references Pamela in Jane

Eyre. As a young girl at Gateshead, Jane is privy to Pamela through her nursemaid: “Bessie...fed our

eager attention with passages of love and adventure taken from old fairy tales and older ballads; or (as at a

later period I discovered) from the pages of Pamela, and Henry, Earl of Moreland” (Brontё, 3). Critics of

Jane Eyre often compared the two novels – not always in a complimentary manner. In an 1848 review

published in the Quarterly Review, Elizabeth Rigby declares Jane Eyre “merely another Pamela”

(Holland, 2018), a remark that Brontё expressed to cause her great distress. As for Jane Austen, Brontё

had read her work and while admiring her writing, found it lacking. In an 1850 letter to W.S. Williams,

she reveals her thoughts after reading Austen’s novels:

Anything like warmth of enthusiasm; anything energetic, poignant, heart-felt, is utterly out of

place in commending these works; all such demonstrations the authoress would have met with a

well-bred sneer, would have calmly scorned as outre and extravagant. She does her business of

delineating the surface of the lives of genteel English people curiously well; there is a Chinese

fidelity, a miniature delicacy in the painting: she ruffles her ready by nothing vehement….the

Passions are perfectly unknown to her; she rejects even a speaking acquaintance with that stormy

Sisterhood; even to the Feelings she vouchsafes no more than an occasional graceful but distant

recognition. Her business is not half so much with the human heart as with the human eyes,

mouth, hands and feet; what sees keenly, speaks aptly, moves flexibly, it suits her to study, but

what throbs fast and full, though hidden, what the blood rushes through, what is the unseen seat

of Life and the sentient target of Death – this Miss Austen ignores. (Holland, 2018)

Brontё takes issue with Austen’s lack of passion and indulgence in feeling. One can hear the sarcasm in

her voice as she talks of Austen scorning any commendation of her works, a witty remark that references

Austen’s rejection of feeling in Sense and Sensibility. For Brontё, Austen has gone too far in eliminating

“heart” in her work. Critics like Rigby, however, would suggest that Brontё has tipped the scale too far in

terms of passion and merely returned to archaic notions of the female self such as written in Pamela. This

is not the case. Rather, Brontё has synthesized elements of both novels in favor of a more drastic version
 21

of the female self.

Brontё conceals Jane’s voice in no way. Jane speaks not through an invisible narrator nor through

letters but instead through her own first-person perspective, leading the reader from her early days as an

unwanted Orphan to her eventual marriage to Rochester. Brontё’s choice to tell Jane’s story as a

Bildungsroman*, a coming-of-age novel that centers around a sensitive individual going in search of

answers to life’s questions with expectation that these will result in gaining worldly experience, allows for

a deeply psychological and intimate portrayal of her heroine’s consciousness. As Joyce Carol Oates

points out, the long journey of Jane may be rightly described by her phrase in Chapter Two – “I resisted

all the way” – when she is punished for standing up to her abusive cousin. At Gateshead, Jane cultivates

her intelligence with books, her source of strength against the cruelty of her relatives who despise her. All

the while, her self-defense is perceived as misbehavior; her earnestness and honesty as deceit. When she

is exiled to Lowood girls’ school, overseen by the evil Mr. Brocklehurst, it is under the impression that

she is a liar, as her aunt labels her. The tensions in Jane’s life are challenges to the society of nineteenth-

century Victorian society, which was hierarchically organized by gender and class. Jane is an orphan

raised in a wealthy, aristocratic household but has no wealth herself. She is thus subjugated through her

lower-class status and her gender, which positions her as inferior to all men. Furthermore, Jane is in

conflict with the dominant religion of the Victorian age, Christianity as is evident later in the novel.

Progressing into her years as a young adult, Jane is increasingly self-aware as well as unwilling to

yield to what she views to be unjust. At Lowood, she and the other girls endure harsh conditions; they are

underfed, overworked, and subject to rigorous lessons from sunrise to sundown. After dropping her slate

one day, Jane is singled by Brocklehurst, who, furious, orders her to stand on a stool as he publicly

pronounces her a liar and forbids the other students to speak to her. Jane is angered and humiliated by this

treatment, while her friend urges her to “observe what Christ says” (54). In response, Jane replies on the

contrary:

“If people are always kind and obedient to those who are cruel and unjust, the wicked people

would have it all their own way; they would never feel afraid, and so they would never alter, but

*The term Bildungsroman is a fusion of the German words Bildung (“education”) and Roman (“novel”).
Philologist Karl Morgenstern first coined in the term in 1819.
 22

would grow worse and worse. When we are struck without a reason, we should strike back again

very hard; I am sure we should – so hard as to teach the person who struck us never to do it

again” (54).

Helen tells her that “Heathens and savage tribes” hold such a view. Indeed, Jane will voice what many

critics call “pagan” sentiments throughout the novel, especially in descriptions of Edward and Jane’s

encounters. The first time Jane sees Edward approaching with his Newfoundland dog Pilot, she compares

the dog to “[a] North-of-England spirit, called a ‘Gytrash’; which in the form of horse, mule or large dog,

haunted solitary ways, and sometimes came upon belated travelers.” She continues, saying that Edward,

“broke the spell” upon his appearance (111). Likewise, Rochester later tells her she has “the look of

another world” and expresses he almost believed she had “bewitched [his] horse” (121). He will continue

to refer to her as “fairy,” “dream of a shade,” “mere spectre,” “elf,” “sprite,” “vision,” and “changeling”

throughout the novel*. The primary religion of Jane Eyre is still Christianity; Jane herself is in the

shadow of the religion throughout her school days at Lowood and again when she meets St. John Rivers.

Yet, the prolific supernatural elements draw enough attention to warrant one critic of Brontё’s time to

label Jane Eyre an “anti-Christian composition” (Franklin, 458), something the author adamantly

rejected. Jeffrey Franklin suggests that Brontё represents the fusion of religious discourses prominent

(but certainly not widely accepted) in the mid-nineteenth century and, furthermore, that the supernatural is

a conduit towards Jane’s independence and self-direction (463,471).

There is something indisputably enigmatic and powerful in discourse with such mysterious

elements which linger as Jane enters another transformative phase for her: falling in love. Edward and

Jane speak to one another candidly. In their first meeting, as they vacillate from one topic to another, it is

obvious that her minds are well-suited for another. Listening in on their dialogue, Mrs. Fairfax catches

quite an earful, “[She] had dropped her knitting, and, with raised eyebrows, seemed wondering what sort

of talk this was” (122). Their conversation has steered into the realm of spirits as Rochester accuses Jane

of bewitching his horse. They thus communicate very much on a different spiritual plane. Rochester

observes of Jane, “There is something singular about you. You have the air of a little nonnette; quiet,

*Refer to pages 78, 179, 330, 75, 215, 296, 226, 230, 382, 386
 23

grave, and simple…and then when one asks you a question, you rap out a round rejoinder, which, if not

blunt, is at least brusque” (131). He is not put off by her behavior, however, and asks her to speak

honestly with him and “dispense with a great many conventional forms and phrases” (135). Jane’s first

impression of him is his pride and confidence. After they are better acquainted, she observes, “I believed

that his moodiness, his harshness, and his former faults of morality had their source in some cruel cross of

fate. I believed he was naturally a man of better tendencies, higher principles, and purer tastes (148). Like

Elinor of Sense and Sensibility, Jane is compassionate in her assessment of Rochester. Like Elinor, too,

she is careful not to let her heart wander too far. When she learns of the beautiful Blanche Ingram that

Edward is acquainted with, she reflects, “I looked into my heart and endeavored to bring back with a strict

hand such as had been straying through imagination’s boundless and trackless waste, into the safe fold of

common sense” (161). She further chastises herself for her feelings towards Rochester and endeavors to

draw a portrait of herself and compare it to that of Blanche to remind herself of her own “insignificance.”

In Blanche, Jane sees all the obstacles of her time that divide her and Edward: wealth, class,

culture, and feminine beauty. Jane sees these things (all of which she lacks) and believes there is no

overcoming them. Nevertheless, she intuits that in some manner she and Edward are on level ground: “He

is not to them what he is to me,” she thinks as she observes Edward among Blanche and her companions.

“He is not of their kind. I believe he is of mine. I understand the language of his countenance and

movements; though rank and wealth sever us widely, I have something in my brain and heart, in my

blood and nerves, that assimilates me mentally to him” (177). Jane is thus aware of her own equality in

some way to a man who in the eyes of all other society is far above her; furthermore, she recognizes that

she is above Blanche in some capacity. Jane remarks that Blanche is “unoriginal” and does not know “the

sensations of sympathy and pity; tenderness and truth were not in her” (187). She recalls Blanche’s scorn

of Adele, Rochester’s ward, with disgust. Edward is likewise aware of their suitability for one another and

equally knowledgeable of the barriers between them. Dressed as a sybil, he is able to speak to Jane on

their own “supernatural plane” to glean her thoughts on him and Blanche. Edward plays the part of the

fortune teller interpreting his client’s countenance, cleverly remarking on her character all the while, “As
 24

to the mouth, it delights at times in laughter; it is disposed to impart all that the brain conceives; though I

daresay it would be silent on much the heart experiences” (203). He is right. Though the reader is privy to

Jane’s complexity of thought and vivacity of feeling, those around her view her as reserved and shy.

When it matters most, however, Jane is not afraid to use her voice to assert her value and

opinions. When Edward speaks of leaving and feigns ignorance of why she is upset, she expounds a

passionate response:

Do you think, because I am poor, obscure, plain, and little, I am soulless and heartless? You think

wrong! – I have as much soul as you, - and full as much heart! And if God had gifted me with

some beauty, and much wealth, I should have made it hard for you to leave me, as it is now for

me to leave you. I am not talking to you now through the medium of custom, conventionalities, or

even of mortal flesh: - it is my spirit that addresses your spirit; just as if both had passed through

the grave, and we stood at God’s feet, equal, - as we are! (258)

Edward agrees, “As we are!” Jane continues, insisting she leave, “I am a free human being with an

independent will!” (258). Edward replies, assuring her of her power: “And your will shall decide your

destiny” (258). He professes his love for her and asks her hand in marriage – which she accepts after

much disbelief. And yet, no sooner are they walking down the aisle than their happiness is shattered by

the revelation of Edward’s existing marriage to the mentally ill Bertha. Different critics have different

theories as to the revelation of Edward’s madwoman in the attic. Some suggest that Bertha represents the

horror of Victorian marriage. Jean Rhys explores this in her 1966 prequel novel Wide Sargasso Sea,

describing Edward and Bertha’s marriage from the point of view of Bertha, whose true name is

Antoinette Cosway. Bertha’s confinement would then be a representation of the lack of autonomy and

freedom in marriage, a threat to a woman’s mental health. Of course, this is also the place where critics

compare Jane to Pamela; both are confronted with the former affairs of their lovers. Jane’s path, however,

diverges far from that of Pamela.

Before Jane leaves Thornfield, she reflects: “Who in the world cares for you?” (325). She wavers

in her resolution to separate from Edward. For so much of her life, she has been lonely, unloved, and

unwanted, but now there is someone who loves her so completely. She finds herself in turmoil trying to

decide what is the right course of action. Then, a thought: “I care for myself. The more solitary, the more

friendless, the more unsustained I am, the more I will respect myself. I will keep the law given by God”

(325). Jane finds strength from within, asserting her love and respect for her own self. Her resolution is in

hand with her devotion to her faith; this theme will continue at the house of her cousins. Pamela’s

endurance and virtue is smothered by her marriage to her abuser, Mister B; Jane’s journey does not end

with a quaint little marriage. When Jane learns of the Other Woman, she refuses to subject herself to such

humiliation as being a mere mistress to the man she loves. Furthermore, in her moments of clarity after

the revelation of Bertha, Jane considers how she would have entered the marriage as largely dependent on

Edward by marrying above her current status, and this dependence she shirks as a loss of respect for

herself that she must avoid at all costs.

Deceived by the man she loves most, Jane abandons Thornfield for the unknown, where, alone,

she will reach her penultimate transformation. This segment of the novel is bountiful in its depiction of

Gothic landscape, which Brontё employs to paint the tumultuous state of Jane’s mind. Throughout the

novel, the landscape has been there, painting Jane’s emotions for the reader. On page 1, as Jane sits on the

windowsill seeking refuge from her cruel relatives there is “the cold winter wind with it clouds so somber,

and a rain so penetrating.” Admiring the moon outside Thornfield in the moments before she first meets

Edward, Jane recalls the strange silence that overcomes the grounds: “[T]here was not a holly, not an

evergreen to rustle, and the stripped hawthorn and hazel bushes were as still as the white, worn stones

which causewayed the middle of the path” (110). When Edward and Jane declare their love for one

another in the orchard it is in the midst of a midsummer night: “Where the sun had gone down in simple

state – pomp of clouds – spread a solemn purple, burning with the light of red jewel and furnace flame at

one point, on one hill peak, and extending high and wide, soft and still softer, over half heaven...[The
 26

orchard] was full of trees, it bloomed with flowers” (252-3). Likewise, when Edward’s dishonesty is

revealed, the orchard in the chestnut is struck by lightning – the fracturing of Jane’s heart. Now, Brontё

takes this landscape which has always framed Jane’s journey and plunges her into it. Abandoning

Thornfield, Jane finds her way to the barren crossroad of Whitcross by carriage, and then – she is alone.

“I have no relative but the universal mother, Nature,” Jane thinks. “I will seek her breast and ask repose”

(331). For three days and three nights, she traverses across heath, moor, and bog sleeping in the grass and

begging those she stumbles upon for food. Night falls again; this time, she perceives a light, “shining dim,

but constant, through the rain” (339) and follows it to the home of her cousins. The Biblical references are

no mistake, but they are again mingled with pagan elements as Jane mistakes this (heavenly) light for an

ignis fatuus* – a ghostly light seen by travelers. Having faced physical hardship in her flight through the

wilderness and mental pain through her self-imposed separation from Edward, Jane has entered a new

stage of self-growth and independence.

Among her cousins, Jane finds a sense of belonging among those who are equal to her in intellect

and in position. She is given her own cottage and oversees the village-school, remarking of her new life:

“To live amidst general regard, though it be but the regard of working-people, is like ‘sitting in sunshine,

calm and sweet:’ serene inward feelings bud and blossom under the ray” (376). Furthermore, Jane comes

into a grand fortune which her uncle, John Eyre, left her. Jane delights in her new companions, fortune,

and job, but her mind is still heavy with thoughts of Edward. St. John emerges as a powerful foil to

Edward. Handsome, young, harsh, and critical, he is the opposite of Edward’s passionate, indulgent

personality. Jane finds him far too cold and self-denying. She refuses his proposal of marriage because

there is no love between them. She reasons, “He prizes me as a soldier would a good weapon; and that is

all. Can I bear the consciousness that every endearment he bestows is a sacrifice made on principle? No;

such a martyrdom would be monstrous” (416). To John, she says, “I scorn your idea of love!” (420). It is

not long before she hears the voice of Edward on the wind calling her name. Jane returns to Edward a rich

woman, an “independent woman” as Edward calls her. Jane boasts of her newfound power, saying, “I can

*Ignis fatuus: literally “foolish fire”; a light that often appears at nighttime over marsh or bog and is attributed to the
combustion of gas from decomposed organic matter
 27

build a house of my own close up to your door” (438). Edward himself is maimed by the fire that

consumed Thornfield. He relies on Jane for everything; blind, he must use Jane as his eyes. He and Jane

marry quietly. “Reader, I married him”: this is the first line of the final chapter. In this phrase, Jane

reveals herself in her new position as a wife and mother, looking back on the events of her past.

I know what it is to live entirely for and with what I love best on earth. To be together is for us to

be at once as free as in solitude, as gay as in company. We talk, I believe, all day long; to talk to

each other is but a more animated and an audible thinking. All my confidence is bestowed on

him, all his confidence is devoted to me; we are precisely suited in character – perfect concord is

the result. (464).

Jane’s marriage is not one of complacence or oppression. Her marriage is founded on trust, equality, and

like-mindedness.

Some critics may take issue with Edward and Jane’s difference of age or with Edward’s status as

Jane’s former master, but in the context of the Victorian age, the relationship between Edward and Jane is

still progressive. Furthermore, Brontё’s creation of Jane Eyre is even more impressive in light of the

development of the British novel since the genesis of Pamela in 1740. Richardson’s novel is certainly

innovative in its use of a first-person female voice which rallied against her abusive master. Yet, his

attachment to eighteenth century gender norms ultimately sullies his heroine’s character. Austen’s Sense

and Sensibility, in turn, is remarkable in its creation of a rational yet empathetic female self. Brontё’s

charge of a lack of passion, however, is illuminated in the complex psyche of Jane Eyre. No reader can

deny the depth of acquaintance she gains following Jane from her moments at Gateshead as a child to her

wedding to Edward as an independently wealthy and accomplished woman. Furthermore, Jane is not

weighed down by either patriarchal norms nor by a need to subvert feeling to insist her independence.

Brontё puts forth a female self in Jane Eyre that is at once passionate and rational, humble yet respected,

kind but proud. When Jane turns away from Edward, it is for love – love for him, certainly, but more so

for love of herself. For critics of Jane’s choice in an older man, Jane does meet a suitable younger man in
 28

St. John, but it is in Edward that she finds her equal in intellect, temperament, and passion. Jane’s

insistence on her love for Edward is an insistence that she is not weakened by the ability to feel and an

insistence that she is free to love– and has a right to love – whomsoever she chooses. Brontё’s decision to

unite Jane and Edward only when Jane has wealth humors contemporary Victorian ideals that might

otherwise separate them, but Jane has always been Edward’s equal, even as merely his servant. “It is my

spirit that addresses your spirit. We stood at God’s feet, equal!” Jane herself says in the orchard scene.

“Spirit” to “spirit” is how Jane and Edward communicate, not woman to man. In her romantic relationship

with Edward, Jane is addressed for her Self alone, liberated from her gender. It seems no coincidence that

Brontё has created this revolutionary Self in a landscape often imbued with notions of fantastical pixies

and fairies, for the everyday Victorian woman could only dream of such liberation, but perhaps in reading

Jane Eyre a nineteenth century woman might have gleaned herself in the novel’s heroine and felt that she,

too, is a “free human being with an independent will.”

Bibliography

Austen, Jane. Sense and Sensibility. Edited by Ros Ballaster and Tony Tanner, Penguin Classics,

2008.

Armstrong, Nancy. Desire and Domestic Fiction: A Political History of the Novel. Oxford

University Press, 1989.

Barnes, Elizabeth. “Sensibility.” Encyclopedia.com, Encyclopedia.com, 22 Nov. 2020,

www.encyclopedia.com/history/modern-europe/ancient-history-middle-ages-and-

feudalism/sensibility.

Blanchard, Jane. “Composing Purpose in Richardson's ‘Pamela.’” South Atlantic Review, vol.

76, no. 2, 2011, pp. 93–107. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/43050924. Accessed 24 Nov.

2020.

Brontë, Charlotte. Jane Eyre. Barnes & Noble Books, 1993.

Franklin, J. Jeffrey. “The Merging of Spiritualities: Jane Eyre as Missionary of Love.”

Nineteenth-Century Literature, vol. 49, no. 4, 1995, pp. 456–482. JSTOR,

www.jstor.org/stable/2933729. Accessed 24 Nov. 2020.

Gwilliam, Tassie. “Pamela and the Duplicitous Body of Femininity.” Representations, no. 34,

1991, pp. 104–133. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/2928772. Accessed 24 Nov. 2020.

Holland, Nick. “Jane Austen And Charlotte Brontë.” Anne Brontë, In Search of Anne Brontё, 16

Dec. 2018, www.anneBrontё.org/2018/12/16/jane-austen-and-charlotte-Brontё/.

LeGates, Marlene. “The Cult of Womanhood in Eighteenth-Century Thought.” Eighteenth-

Century Studies, vol. 10, no. 1, 1976, pp. 21–39. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/2737815.

Accessed 28 Nov. 2020.

McKeon, Michael. “Historicizing Patriarchy: The Emergence of Gender Difference in England,

1660-1760.” Eighteenth-Century Studies, vol. 28, no. 3, 1995, pp. 295–322. JSTOR,

www.jstor.org/stable/2739451. Accessed 24 Nov. 2020.

Poovey, Mary. “Ideology and ‘The Mysteries of Udolpho.’” Criticism, vol. 21, no. 4, 1979, pp.

307–330. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/23102716. Accessed 24 Nov. 2020.

Prior, Karen Swallow. “How 'Jane Eyre' Helped Popularize the Concept of the Self.” The

Atlantic, Atlantic Media Company, 3 Mar. 2016, ‘

www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2016/03/how-jane-eyre-created-the-modern-

self/460461/.

Richardson, Samuel. Pamela. Dent, 1976.Shoben, Edward Joseph. “Impulse and Virtue in Jane Austen:

Sense and Sensibility in Two Centuries.” The Hudson Review, vol. 35, no. 4, 1982, pp.

521–539. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/3850948. Accessed 24 Nov. 2020.

Showalter, Elaine. A Literature of Their Own: British Women Novelists from Brontë to Lessing.

Virago, 2009.

Souther, Randy. “Jane Eyre: An Introduction.” Celestial Timepiece, Wordpress, 5 Jan. 2016,

celestialtimepiece.com/2015/01/27/jane-eyre-an-introduction/.

Southey, Robert. “Letter from Robert Southey to Charlotte Brontё, 12 March 1837.” The British

Library, The British Library, 6 Feb. 2014, www.bl.uk/collection-items/letter-from-robert-

southey-to-charlotte-Brontё-12-march-1837.

The North American Review, vol. 67, no. 141, 1848, pp. 354–369. JSTOR,

www.jstor.org/stable/25104534. Accessed 24 Nov. 2020.

Wyatt, Jean. “A Patriarch of One's Own: Jane Eyre and Romantic Love.” Tulsa Studies in

Women's Literature, vol. 4, no. 2, 1985, pp. 199–216. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/463696.

Accessed 24 Nov. 2020.