The Importance Of Marriage In Jane Eyre

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Every young person aspires to marry or be married. It is a dream that people have throughout childhood and can also be carried into adulthood about the person they will marry, the house they will live in, the number of children they will have and how they will eventually live a happy and satisfying life. Thanks to literature, marriage has always been portrayed as a union of two lovers usually a man and a woman who are legally bound to love each other till death. In the course of the marriage contract, a man and a woman are expected to be happy, love each other, bear many and beautiful children so that they are complete and live together in harmony for the rest of their days. That is what most people have been brought up to believe, that marriage is the source of happiness. The reality is that the institution of marriage brings more sadness than happiness to a person’s life. This paper will explore the difficulties of marriage using the two extracts as evidence in ascertaining that indeed marriage brings more sadness than happiness.
Marriage has some degree of secrecy. The bride and the groom may appear stunning in their wedding suit and gown; have an expensive party and lots of friends to celebrate with, and the wedding may qualify to be called grand, but there is always some secrets about the families of the bride and the groom that are rarely let out. The secrets in fact are so serious such that if revealed the wedding would automatically be stopped. In Jane Eyre, Mr. Edward Fairfax Rochester claimed that had he known before his wedding to Bertha Antoinetta that Bertha’s mother was a mad woman locked up in a lunatic asylum, he would not have married her. Also unknown to the Mason’s, Mr. Rochester was not entirely h...

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... he results to hating all his in-laws, father and Rowland his brother (Bronte, 1847). In the Wide Sargasso Sea, Bertha Antoinetta craves for freedom. She hates that she is locked up in a room with a small window that is very high such that she would freely give all that she had just to be free (Rhys, 1996). Hatred in the two characters hearts helps in driving them farther apart from each other adding to their miserable marriage life.
In conclusion, the two stories are written in different perspectives of the main characters. The accusations by Mr. Rochester are confirmed to be true by Bertha Antoinetta herself, the difference being that she does them unknowingly. All this actions help in exposing the difficulties that exist in marriage and in considering the two stories, the argument that marriages bring more sadness than happiness to a person’s life is validate.

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