INTER-TEXTUALITY
“JANE EYRE” BY
CHARLOTTE BTONTE
AND
“WIDE SARGASSO SEA” BY
JANE RHYS
By Ann and Jennifer
OUTLINING OUR PRESENTATION
1. Summarizing “Jane Eyre”
2. Comparison in terms of themes
3. Detailed comparison between Jane and
Antoinette
4. Extract Close Analysis
JANE EYRE
Jane Eyre is a famous and
influential novel by English
writer Charlotte Bronte.
It was published in London,
England in 1847 by Smith,
Elder & Co. with the title
Jane Eyre.
An Autobiography under the
pen name "Currer Bell".
SUMMARY OF JANE EYRE
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JANE EYRE IS A YOUNG ORPHAN being raised by Mrs.
Reed, her cruel, wealthy aunt. A servant named Bessie
provides Jane with some of the few kindnesses she receives,
telling her stories and singing songs to her.
Mrs Reed, and her three children (John, Eliza and
Georgiana) neglect and abuse Jane. They dislike Jane's
plain looks and quiet yet passionate character.
One day, as punishment for fighting with her bullying
cousin John Reed, Jane’s aunt imprisons Jane in the redroom, the room in which Jane’s Uncle Reed died.
While locked in, Jane, believing that she sees her uncle’s
ghost, screams and faints. She wakes to find herself in the
care of Bessie and the kindly apothecary Mr. Lloyd, who
suggests to Mrs. Reed that Jane be sent away to school. To
Jane’s delight, Mrs. Reed concurs.
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Once at the Lowood School, Jane finds that her life is
far from idyllic.
The school’s headmaster is Mr. Brocklehurst, a cruel,
hypocritical, and abusive man. Brocklehurst preaches
a doctrine of poverty and privation to his students
while using the school’s funds to provide a wealthy and
opulent lifestyle for his own family.
Brocklehurst announces to the
school that Jane is “ a liar!”
Later that day, Miss Maria Temple, the youthful
superintendent, is just and kind, allows Jane to speak
in her own defense. After Jane does so, Miss Temple
writes to Mr. Lloyd. His reply agrees with Jane's, and
she is publicly cleared of Mr. Brocklehurst's
accusation.
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At Lowood, Jane befriends a young girl named
Helen Burns, whose strong, martyrlike attitude
toward the school’s miseries is both helpful and
displeasing to Jane. A massive typhus epidemic
sweeps Lowood, and Helen dies of consumption.
The epidemic also results in the departure of Mr.
Brocklehurst by attracting attention to the
insalubrious conditions at Lowood. After a group
of more sympathetic gentlemen takes
Brocklehurst’s place, Jane’s life improves
dramatically. She spends eight more years at
Lowood, six as a student and two as a teacher.
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The narrative resumes eight years later. Jane has
been a teacher at Lowood for two years.She
advertises as a governess and is hired by Mrs. Alice
Fairfax, housekeeper of the Gothic manor Thornfield.
Jane goes for a walk and aids a horseman who has
sprained his ankle when his horse slipped on a patch
of ice, who turns out to be her employer Mr Edward
Rochester.
He repeatedly summons her to his presence and talks
with her.
Mrs Reed suffered a fatal stroke due to John’s
suicide. She asked to see her and handed her a letter
from her father’s brother, John Eyre ,notifying his
intent to leave her his fortune upon his death.
o
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After Jane's return to Thornfield, after months of
concealing her emotions, she proclaims her love for
Edward, who in turn passionately proposes to her.
Following a month of courtship, Jane's forebodings
arise when a strange, savage-looking woman sneaks
into her room one night and rips her wedding veil in
two.
During the wedding, the mysterious Mr. Mason and a
lawyer step forth and declare that Rochester cannot
marry Jane because his own wife is still alive. The
wedding is cancelled, and Jane is heartbroken.
Although Jane loves Rochester more than anything
else, she refuses to betray the God-given morals and
principles she has always believed in and chooses to
leave in the middle of the night.
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Penniless and hungry, Jane is forced to sleep
outdoors and beg for food. At last, three siblings
who live in a manor alternatively called Marsh
End and Moor House take her in. Their names
are Mary, Diana, and St. John (pronounced
“Sinjin”) Rivers, and Jane quickly becomes
friends with them.
St. John is a clergyman, and he finds Jane a job
teaching at a charity school in Morton.
St.John reveals that his uncle, who denied the
Rivers children a share of his inheritance is in
fact also Jane's uncle. St.John, his sisters and
Jane are cousins.
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Jane immediately decides to share her inheritance
equally with her three newfound relatives.
St. John intends to travel to India to devote his life
to missionary work.
At that moment she hears what she thinks is
Rochester's voice calling her name, and this breaks
her out of St. John's influence for a moment.
o
o
When Jane reached Thornfield, an innkeeper tells
her that Rochester's mad wife set the house alight
and then committed suicide by jumping from the
roof.
Rochester saved the servants but lost his eyesight
and one of his hands. Jane travels on to Rochester’s
new residence, Ferndean, where he lives with two
servants named John and Mary.
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At Ferndean, Rochester and Jane rebuild their
relationship and soon marry. At the end of her
story, Jane writes that she has been married for
ten blissful years and that she and Rochester
enjoy perfect equality in their life together.
Rochester eventually recovers sight in one eye,
and can see their first-born son when the baby is
born.
JANE RHYS
 postcolonial author
 challenging the notion of England as a bastion of
justice and fairness:
 "England, rosy pink in the geography book map,
but on the page opposite the words are closely
crowded, heavy looking. Exports coal, iron, wool“
 Displacement  narrative moves
 internal monologue
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SOME OF THE THEMES
Misanthropy: the hatred/ fear of mankind
 Surrogate mothers: Christophine vs Bessie
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MISANTHROPY
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Both novels resemble in the way they explore the
theme of MISANTHROPY
Childhood
 Right at the beginning of the novel
 Ignored by supposed mom/ resented by moms
even
 Both find solace in engaging with herself
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“Black ants or red ones, tall nests swarming with white ants, rain
that soaked me to the skin- once I saw a snake. All better than
people
Better. Better, better than people” (P11)
With Bewick on my knee, I was then happy: happy at least in my
way. I feared nothing but interruption, and that came too
soon. The breakfast-room door opened.
CHRISTOPHINE VS BESSIE
Significance: they are comparable to
surrogate mother of Antoinette/Jane Eyre.
 both Antoinette and Jane Eyre could not
benefit from marternal love, or rather being
ignored by their mothers.
 They open the girls’ ability to perceive the
world.
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Both of them help reinforce the main theme
of the novels:
 Christophine: race, culture, color, love, romantics, obeah
and the dream world, mother-daughter relationship
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Bessie: mother-daugher relations
ENLIGHTENMENT AT SCHOOL
“Well has Solomon said--"Better is a dinner of
herbs where love is, than a stalled ox and hatred
therewith."
I would not now have exchanged Lowood with all
its privations for Gateshead and its daily
luxuries.”
(Jane Eyre)
ANTOINNETTE VS JANE EYRE
Antoinette
Jane
can assert notions of
female individuality
and self-respect
 Society of Christian
virtues
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divided between
worlds of hating races
 racial tension not only
undermines any
feelings of security
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 the immoral world
view
MARRIAGE
Antoinette
Jane
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Emotional and spiritual
satisfaction
"He put me off his knee,
rose and reverently
lifting his hat from his
brow, and bending his
sightless eyes to the
earth, he stood in mute
devotion. Only the last
words of the worship
were audible" (Brontë,
p. 382)
 moral resurrection
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Business transaction
Greed
"Everybody know that
you marry her for her
money and you take it
all. And then you want
to break her up, because
you jealous of her. She
is more better than you,
she have better blood in
her and she don't care
for money — it's nothing
for her" (Rhys, p. 152)
MORALITY AND SPIRITUALITY
Antoinette
Jane
Faith
  preserve
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evoke temptation, not
flee it
 "Christophine, if he,
my husband, could
come to me one night.
Once more. I would
make him love me"
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THE ENDINGS
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Although both Antoinette and Jane Eyre suffer in
their isolated, lonely childhood, they end up
differently.
Antoinette is jailed in Thornfield for the rest of
her life by Rochester while Jane Eyre enjoys a
happy married life with Rochester
Ironically, if we take Wide Sargasso Sea to be
prequel to Jane Eyre, both women end up
differently but in relation to Mr Rochester.
JANE
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"Reader, I married
him,"
ANTOINNETTE
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"I was in the room but
I didn't hear all he
said except 'I cannot
interfere legally
between yourself and
your husband'. It was
when he said 'legally'
that you flew at him
and when he twisted
the knife out of your
hand you bit him"
CLOSE ANALYSIS
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P115 line 16 till P117 line 16.
“In this room, I wake early …
This cardboard house where I walk at night is not
England.”
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QUESTIONS FOR EACH GROUP
1.
Identify the recurring motifs in this extract
2.
Comment on the recurring motifs that Rhys
uses to dramatize the central issues of the plot.
1.
Flames
2.
Money, gold piece
3.
Looking glass