I read it for the first time and to be honest…..
I didn’t find it to be anything special. But I know it’s considered a brilliant novel, on par with the other great works of the period. So I assume I’m the problem here, and I potentially didn’t focus on the right parts or themes when reading.
I love Austen and I also enjoy Dickens. I read old books, so it’s not the language or anything like that. When I first read Mansfield Park I didn’t like it so much, but when I re-read it and focused more on the social commentary, I absolutely loved it and recognised it was absolute genius. I looked for the wrong things when reading.
So if I re-read Jane Eyre, can someone please tell me different themes to look out, what to focus on to truly appreciate it? To be clear, I understood the basic messages of the book, on judging the poor, different ways of practising religion for different people, the place of the woman, the contrast of St John and Mr Rochester etc.
What should I be focusing on when I re-read?
by Letoeles
5 Comments
love is blind
Honestly I’m just all about that subtle heat/build up of the Jane-Rochester relationship. If you read it right it can give you Darcy-Elizabeth levels of hotness. (But I know that’s probably not the academic answer you’re looking for)
Read it again, paying close attention to the myriad uses of the homophones of Eyre (heir and air) and how they move the story forward and underline it with deeper meaning.
Think of it as a proto-feminist novel. It’s more than the “place of women” but how Jane worked both within and outside that place, challenging commonly accepted ideas of women. Also look for themes of found family.
An idea occurred to me a few years ago, and maybe it’s not original or maybe it’s a little…controversial, but the surface view of Jane and Edward’s love story is this great, two souls finding each other regardless of their status in society, but they only really end up together after the woman was raised up (inheritance) and the man was brought down (injuries, total destruction of Thornfield Hall) which then makes them more…socially even, so to speak.
So yes, love is blind, love can transcend social position, and so forth however I can’t help but think that those two plot points were deliberate, and for that reason, as a commentary on “sure, romance, true love, soulmates, other halves, etc, but let’s be real, here”. Said as a fan of all the Brontë sisters’ works, Jane Austen, and so forth. Doesn’t diminish anything for me, just a thought I had.