Jane Eyre, the quintessential Victorian novel, was written at a time when England’s reaches left no continent untouched. This novel embodies this period of England’s power, as it is marked by Victorian themes of imperialism, gender, race and class. While Jane Eyre reinforces these Victorian ideals, Wide Sargasso Sea uses the history of the powerless Bertha and the images of emancipated Jamaica to reinterpret the impact of British colonialism.
Though Bronte has thoughtful moments of critique for the Victorian lifestyle herself, her portrayal of colonialism enhances the racial and socio-economic relationships that plague Victorian England and its colonies. Jane herself dances on the marginal line between her identities as a woman and a British
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Bertha, Rochester’s crazy first wife is turned into a monster. “What it was, whether beast or human being, one could not, at first sight, tell: it groveled, seemingly on all fours; it snatched and growled like some strange wile animal” (Bronte 338). This description mimics colonial literature that dehumanizes the uncivilized natives creating a justification for their conquering. She is a savage, voiceless, and dangerous. Rochester relinquishes all personal responsibility when he claims, “Bertha Mason is mad…you shall see what sort of being I was cheated in espousing” (Bronte 337). Rochester even argues that his treatment of Bertha is not only justified, but generous, that she is unfit to live on her own, and he is simply providing care for her as a dutiful husband. This argument mirrors the Victorian notion that native people of the British colonies were savage, mad, and subhuman, and they required the religious and social assimilation to western customs. This argument has been used historically to reinforce the exploitation that defines …show more content…
The time period was selected carefully for its historical implications, as Jane Eyre takes place in the early 1800s, making it unlikely for the 15 year prequel to Jane and Rochester’s romance to have occurred so many years later. Wide Sargasso Sea isolates Antoinette as the daughter of a former slave owner just after the emancipation of slaves in Jamaica. Immediately, we notice that the power has transferred from the white man to the black man, or at least in the case of Antoinette’s family, who is no longer a part of the affluent white community. Their position has deteriorated to the point that their home is conquered and destroyed by former slaves, Pierre is killed, and they are tormented by judgment: “’Look the black Englishman!’ ‘Look the white niggers!’” (Rhys 42). This reversal of power provides a strong contrast to the more traditional white, male, Eurocentric positions of power that Bronte depicts and functions as a reimagining of
In Wide Sargasso Sea, Rhys gives new life and identity to Bronte’s Bertha Mason as the protagonist Antoinette Cosway. The novel opens to Antoinette’s narration, “They say when trouble comes close ranks, and so the white people did. But we were not in their ranks. The Jamaican ladies had never approved of my mother, ‘because she pretty like pretty self’ Christophine said”. In those first sentences, Antoinette faces issues of identity within two cultures. She distinguishes herself from the white people, referencing that in that society there is a hierarchy of power among the white creoles. Her rank limits her ability to claim whiteness, for she is the daughter of a now impoverished family. However, in noting Christophine, who serves as the only mother-like figure hints that Antoinette’s beliefs are shaped by those of the black society she...
The inability to have control and excessive control in the novel ultimately leads to the downfall of Antoinette and Rochester’s marriage which is seen as inevitable. The theme is presented in the novel culturally, socially and mentally. Rhys’s purpose in reacting to these topics is to identify the contextual issues within the novel, such as the struggle for control and power surrounding women’s role in society and traditional conventions within marriage.
According to Jane’s point of view, her foil, Bertha, is mirrored as an insane and unstable woman to the reader and herself who is an obstacle in her way of her unity with Mr. Edward Rochester. Jane doesn...
...ing novels of their time. They both revise aspects of their era, that would rarely, if ever, have been touched on. Wide Sargasso Sea having the double revision of challenging Jane Eyre, as well as social beliefs. “The devices that connect the two texts also rupture the boundary between them. Although this rupture completes Rhys’ text, it results in a breakdown of the integrity of Bronte’s.” As much as Bronte’s text was revolutionary of her time, so too was Rhys’. Time changed and what was once revolutionary became simplified and unbelievable. The fact remains, that without Jane Eyre, there would be no Wide Sargasso Sea, the two text’s are mutually exclusive, and just as revolutionary now as when they were written.
In Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë clearly demonstrates the relationship between sexuality and morality in Victorian society through the character of Bertha Mason, the daughter of a West Indian planter and Rochester's first wife. Rochester recklessly married Bertha in his youth, and when it was discovered shortly after the marriage that Bertha was sexually promiscuous, Rochester locked her away. Bertha is called a "maniac" and is characterized as insane. Confining Bertha for her display of excess passion reinforces a prevalent theme in Jane Eyre, that of oppressive sexual Victorian values. Bertha's captivity metaphorically speaks on the male-dominated Victorian society in which women are inferior and scorned for acts of nonconformism.
Charlotte Brontë's 1847 novel Jane Eyre depicts the passionate love Jane Eyre and Edward Rochester have for each other, and as Bertha Mason stands in the way of the happiness of Brontë's heroine, the reader sees Mason as little more than a villainous demon and a raving lunatic. Jean Rhys' serves as Mason's defendant, as the author's 1966 novella Wide Sargasso Sea, a prequel to Jane Eyre, seeks to explore and explain Bertha's (or Antoinette Cosway's) descent into madness. Rhys rejects the notion that Antoinette has been born into a family of lunatics and is therefore destined to become one herself. Instead, Rhys suggests that the Cosways are sane people thrown into madness as a result of oppression. Parallels are drawn between Jane and Antoinette in an attempt to win the latter the reader's sympathy and understanding. Just as they did in Jane Eyre, readers of Wide Sargasso Sea bear witness to a young woman's struggle to escape and overcome her repressive surroundings. Brontë makes heavy use of the motif of fire in her novel and Rhys does the same in Wide Sargasso Sea. In Rhys' novella, fire represents defiance in the face of oppression and the destructive nature of this resistance.
Many people have come up with visons of what a Utopia could be, giving their perspective on what they think is wrong with the world and how they feel that they could improve it. With each person’s perspective, there was always the aspect of women. What would their role in society be? In Herland, by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, and in Nineteen Eighty-Four, by George Orwell, they show two very unique forms of Utopia. Orwell actually looks at what exactly the world should not be like.
Wide Sargasso Sea is unique from Jane Eyre and Mansfield Park in that the issue of race plays a huge part in how the characters themselves relate to themselves and their place within their society. Its unique nature comes from the way the story is written from the point of view of the characters themselves rather than the author. The writing style within the novel shows how racial stereotypes and prejudices influenced portraying people of color within 19th century writings and attitudes.
In Wide Sargasso Sea, Jean Rhys confronts the possibility of another side to Jane Eyre. The story of Bertha, the first Mrs Rochester, Wide Sargasso Sea is not only a brilliant deconstruction of Brontë's legacy, but is also a damning history of colonialism in the Caribbean.
Rochester is a mimic of the occident despite being a member of the society. He is ‘almost the same’ but patriarchal structures meant that the younger son would not gain as much as the first born, and so he is victimized by his difference, just as Antoinette is. Sylvie Maurel believes that by ‘marrying Antoinette, Rochester is by no means creating his own story. As a penniless younger son, he is pressurized by his family into an arranged marriage with a presumably wealthy creole.’ Unlike Annette’s second husband, Mr. Mason, Rochester does not travel to Jamaica in order to ‘make money [off old estates] as they all do’ (p. 13), he does so to please his father.
... self worth against the material dominance in the society. Characters such as Mr. Rochester and Sarah Reed are what they are because they represent the wealthy class in the society. The postcolonial discourse in Jane Eyre is mainly anchored on the active portrayal of the British culture as essentially superior to the Eastern cultures and the French culture. To bring out the salient features of this discourse, the author has used themes and characterization efficiently.
Jane’s education at Lowood provides a foundation for her rise through the ranks of society and alters the predetermined course of action for Victorian women. Consequently, Jane is raised among a class higher than her own with the Reeds’, and although they are family, they make sure Jane understands her social position is not on the same level. Ironically, Jane is afforded the ability to go to a private school at Lowood and receive an upper class education. “Gendered performances become acts that are increasingly tied to material wealth, and the text suggests that only the middle and upper classes can afford the costly performance of gender” (Godfrey,...
In this scene, Jane exclaims “You sir, are the most phantom-like of all: you are a mere dream” (Bronte 283). Through this quotation, Jane’s resolve to distinguish between truth and an apparition is evident. Further, Bronte’s certainty is exemplified through the characterization of Jane demonstrating to the readers his desire to stay true to cultural attitudes at the time. Although Jane first perceives Bertha’s appearance to be a dream, she eventually believes this to be reality even with Rochester trying to convince her otherwise.
The novel Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte and Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys were produced at different times in history. Indeed, they were created in different centuries and depicted extensively divergent political, social and cultural setting. Despite their differences, the two novels can be compared in the presentation of female otherness, childhood, and the elements that concern adulthood. Indeed, these aspects have been depicted as threatening the female other in the society. The female other has been perceived as an unfathomable force that is demonic in nature but respects these enigmatic threatening characters. The female other has been portrayed as intensely alienated while grows knowing that their actions are subject to ridicule, rumor,
Women, in all classes, were still living in a world which was misogynistic and male-dominated. Their purpose in life was to produce male heirs and maintain the home by hiring and overseeing servants. It was also taboo for one to marry significantly below one’s social class. This is one reason that Jane is not a conventional heroine for the society of her time. Although, as a governess, she is not considered to be as low as a housemaid, she is still part of the hired help in the house. This is why it is unconventional for her and Mr Rochester to be in a relationship. Yet this is not as peculiar as how Jane Eyre ends their relationship due to her sense of betrayal. It would have been considered extremely foolish for a working-woman’s sense of betrayal to end and turn down a man of great wealth.