Jane Eyre: The redeemed feminine; the unredeemed masculine

   I've been reading a lot of Victorian women authors for the last eight months or so.  I've been fascinated by how they perceived the idea of woman in the time of the "cult of domesticity."  When a woman was seen as morally innocent, childlike, and the keeper of the house, what did women who dared to do something so entirely "masculine" as writing novels think of this image?

   Elizabeth Gaskell gave me many interesting women to consider.  In Cranford I met the "Amazons;" elderly women who lived quite happily without masculine involvement in their lives.  In North and South I saw how Margaret Hale attempted to better understand the issues of labor and unions to better show compassion.  She was beautiful, but if that was all, I don't think Thornton would have so completely fallen in love with her.  She challenged him.  Then in Wives and Daughters, I saw examples of the fallen feminine juxtaposed next to a young girl attempting to find a better way.  Jealousy, gossip, and flirtation are contrasted with loyalty, compassion, and a patient love.

   Gaskell was married, happily it seems.  She was a mother and had an active life as a clergyman's wife.  Her life was full before she began a literary career.  But then I come to the Brontes.  Well, come back to them, I should say.  I remember so clearly my first reading of Jane Eyre. And while I have read her other works, this is the one I read and reread.  For the moment I'll put aside the other Charlotte Bronte I read this summer, Shirley.  I'll also ignore Wuthering Heights, which I also reread this summer.  I'll even put aside one of the most feminist books every written, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall.  Let's just talk about Jane.

   She is the reason I reread this book.  When I finish, I feel like I'm missing a friend.  She is a completely real character.  A character so real that many contemporary reviewers of Bronte deemed her "unfeminine."
   After reading and thinking a great deal about what characterizes a feminine spirit, I have come to one thing.  God made women to be open, receptive, welcoming.  At my Living Waters training this summer, the thought I came to was that God chose Mary not just for a womb, but for her "yes."  That is what makes her uniquely feminine in Scripture.
   And yet, Jane's first action is a "no."  Rightly so.  In a culture that did not respect the rights of woman, Jane finds it in herself to say no to her cousin's abuse.  But she is not left a rebellious, negative spirit.  Helen Burns teaches her forbearance.  And so, as she comes to adulthood, we meet a woman who can stand up for herself, but can also bear up under much.  We meet a woman who believes in her own abilities, but isn't constantly posturing to display them for the world.  She knows who she is, and that is enough for her.  And when she is left to make a choice between easy and morality, when Rochester says, "Who would care?" she answers, "I care for myself."
   No wonder the Victorian man saw her as unfeminine.
   I see in her a redeemed feminine.  She can have an open heart but still stand up to abuse.  She can acknowledge the sins of her Aunt Reed, but still forgive her.
  But now we come to the masculine characters.  Rochester, so often seen as some kind of sex symbol (I'm guessing by girls who also enjoy Twilight) is truly in love with Jane.  Perhaps what women who find him so attractive find appealing is that he SEES Jane.  He sees her accomplishments.  He sees that she has intelligent thought.  She doesn't blend into the woodwork for him.
  And yet what does he do with this?  He manipulates her over and over again.  He lies and pretends to be a gypsy to get her to confess things in front of him she wouldn't regularly.  He brings her to tears before she proclaims she loves him.  And then there's the little problem of the wife in the attic.  Then we come to Chapter 27.  Reread it if you haven't recently.  He threatens violence.  Several times.
   Rochester's foil is St. John Rivers.  Rochester is fire.  Rivers is ice.  And he freezes Jane's soul.  She says she finds that she can not laugh or talk comfortably in the room with him.  He domineers her with his expectations and disapproval more so than Rochester's little mind games ever did.
  Rochester is finally redeemed but literally fire.  He is crippled and blinded.  Jane rises in the world financially.  Rochester is brought down.  His masculine physical strength is reduced as it becomes entirely dependent on Jane.
   Could Charlotte Bronte not imagine a redeemed version of the masculine?  Could she find no other way to prevent masculine strength from harming a feminine heart than by neutering it?
   I will continue to reread Jane Eyre, not for the plot or even so much for the romance, but for Jane herself.  But this reading saddened me.  Is it possible that Charlotte Bronte had no conception of how a masculine and feminine heart can complement each other?  Perhaps it's the Living Waters training again, but where is the Imago Dei?
"So God created man in his own image. in the image of God he created them.  Male and female he created them."