Examples Of Pathos In Jane Eyre

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People today do not know what orphans went through in 19th century England and the sadness and pain they had to endure. Pathos was felt quite a lot by the orphans of that time. The overall theme of pathos in the book Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte, is first expressed by the experiences of the orphans at Lowood. The narrative strategy of retrospective, depicts Jane's time at Lowood and the pathos expressed there. Pathos is expressed at Lowood for many reasons such as the shortage of food, the poor clothing and sleeping arrangements, the poor treatment of the orphans, and the breakout of typhus. Firstly, the lack of food given to the orphans at Lowood expresses a lot of the pathos. The children barely eat any food at the school so they are always starving. They eat little food throughout the day, the servings are even small for them. If someone were to walk into the school who was not normally there they would notice that the children were quite thin and would see the lack of food given to them. In this quote, “I devoured a spoonful or two of my …show more content…

Punishment is one of the main things that Lowood does to make its girls proper and to not be liars. One punishment is a bundle of sticks that the girls would be hit with if they got out of line, this shows that orphans at that time were treated in horrible ways. Being punished like this would make any girl depressed and carry on a sorrowful and depressing mood throughout the school. The second punishment was to be put on top of a stool and sometimes they would have to stand there the rest of the day with no food or drink and with no communication with others. “Let her stand half an hour longer on that stool, and let no one speak to her during the remainder of the day.” (pg. 82). This shows that they would be publicly disgraced for things they did. Sometimes they would be threatened with eating even smaller portions for making mistakes or doing something

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