How does the stormy weather in the opening scene reflect Jane's state of mind? What do we learn about Jane's position in the household? Why is the scene of her punishment in the red room so emotional? How does the narration secure the reader's sympathy for Jane?
i feel like Jane is trapped. With her bullying cousins and wicked Aunt I feel Jane has nowhere to go and hide. Like Bill said, this stormy weather can relate to Fosters "How to Read Literature like a Professor." Ity foreshadows bad event and occurences. Jane isclose to nearly nothing in the household. She doesnt have many privledges and hardly any room to be happy. The punishment in the red room is so emotional because we feel scared for her. This little innocent girl is put into a haunted room and made to sit there in solidarity. She sees a light and supernatural elements start to take affect. We afraid for her and of course the reader is feeling sympathy for Jane. We want her to be free, somewhere better. And we cant stand to see the abusivness in the Reed's household.
ReplyDeleteI believe that the stormy weather in the beginning represents the great and deep fear and depression she has while living in the household. It seems as if Jane is always in fear of everything and everyone in the house. I think of Jane's position in the house hold is beneath a slave in the house. She seems to be the one that is always blamed for everything and hurt physically and emotionally when nothing is ever her fault. It's like she is their very own personal punching bag. The scene in the red room is so emotional because she thinks back to her uncles death and how he had told his wife to take care of Jane as one of her own, but that obviously didn't happen. Jane is very scared that the gohst of her uncle is in the room with her and she becomes afraid and distressed from all of this. The narration secures the readers sympathy because of the use of words all throught the text. Such as "but the, prepared as my mind was fr the horror, shaken as my nerves were by agitation, i thought the swift-darting beam was a herald of some coming vision from another world." In this setence I gain great sympathy for Jane because she is in great horror from what is happening to her, but no one in the house cares and you just wish that they would care just a little for her.
ReplyDeleteI do agree with the comments above me. My position, if I may add to what the others have said, I think the stormy weather shows how truly sad Jane's position is in her family's life, and in the household. Her aunt doesn't very much care about what Jane has to say, and though Jane still tries a bit, I get the feel that she's growing weaker. Not physically, but emotionally. She's to the point where to be left alone completely, to do and engage in her own thing is a sort of peace to her. She wouldn't have to worry about always doing something "wrong". I get that from this sentence in the first chapter, "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." I take that to mean that as soon as she is called, she fears of being in trouble. I pity her.
ReplyDeleteThe stormy weather in the opening scene reflects Jane's Mind as dark and clouded. She lives in a shroud of rain and gloom becuase she is a child of ten that recieves no love. Jane's postion in the household of Mrs. Reed is that of unjustly kindness and unfairnesss. She is exempt from everything having to do with Mrs. Reed and her children and is labled the problem child when she really does no harm. She is bullied by her cousins and put down upon constantly by her aunt. She recieves little effection from her nanny and therefore lives a life in exile. It breaks my heart when i read the scene where she is being punhished in the red room. It is such a significant scene because she is only ten and completely terrified whether she has a good enough reason to be or not, and noone would come to her aid. Noone comforted her and she was locked in the room alone completely petrified. The narration of janes 0age and the fear upon her is great. Bronte goes into great detail of how jane looks and feels after the frightning ordeal of the white shape. And with the textual background given of the signifigance of the room and of her uncles death the reader is sure to feel some sort of sympathy for the young scared girl.
ReplyDeleteThe stormy cloud I believe serves as a metaphor for how Jane's life begins. She lives in chaos and destruction by the cruelty of her family's cruel nature. She is treated as a dog. We know this because the can boss her around and feel no sympathy for her. And she is usually just there for show. The scene in the red room is emotional because it serves as an important factor in estabshling that gothic theme style of writing. It represents the anger she feels and is an important scene when she is haunted by the ghost of her late Uncle. The narration sets up sympathy for Jane because it describes her as a "Cinderella" type character we all pity. Her vivid description she suffers from her cousins abuse both repulse and angers us to the point we want her to have justice.
ReplyDeleteMy take on the stormy weather in the beginning is that it is symbolic of the overwhelming sense of gloom that Jane feels at the Reed's. Nothing she does is ever right, everything is always clouded over with scoldings and abuse from her cousins and aunt. We learn that Jane is very unwanted in this household. She is only there because of her deceased uncle, who, if he knew how she was treated there, would be appalled. The red room scene is so significant and emotional because the reader sees this poor little girl locked in a room with a horrible past as consequence for something she did not do. A reader can't help but feel sorry for her.
ReplyDeleteThe idea of the red room immediately reminded me of the famous Edgar Allen Poe story, “The Masque of the Red Death.” The idea of a attaching a color in a room to a specific concept, like death, is seen in both stories. Whether or not Brontë was directly influenced by Poe or the time period, it is an interesting connection. The idea of being locked in a room where someone else died, someone you value, is scary and emotional! This certainly adds to the sympathy we feel for Jane. The weather may be connected to the way Jane feels about her unfair situation. She is upset, like the stormy weather we see around her.
ReplyDeleteI definitely agree with Nicole on this one: the weather reflects Jane's feelings of being trapped. Even as a child she was subjected to social injustices by her own family because she came from less fortunate parents. This is going to sound redundant, but I think the scene in the red room was so emotional because the room was red. Red is a color often assoicated with blood and the devil and other dark spirits. It's simply a creepy color, especially since she believes that she saw a ghost while being punished in that room. The narration makes the reader sympathize with Jane because she's such an intelligent, capable, and benevolent young girl. She is always the victim in the house yet gets punished for her torment by the real wrongdoers.
ReplyDeleteIn the opening scene of Jane Eyre, Jane is being harrassed by her cousin, John. John is verbally assulting Jane and causing a storm of emotions to build up inside of her. When Jane finally errupts in verbal anger, it causes John to lash out physically and pull her hair. In response to this, Jane hits him. This causes John to scream for his mother, the widow Mrs. Reed. Mrs. Reed unrightfully finds jane as the culpret and orders he to be locked in the red room. From this, we learned that Mrs. Reed has a dislike for Jane. Later we lean that this is because jane was her husband's favorite, and that he liked her more than his own children. The emotional signifigance of the red room is great. The red room is where Jane's uncle, Mr. Reed died. While she is in the room, she can't help but think of him and becomes very overwhelmed with emotion, eventually causing her to pass out. This part of the book secures the reader's sympathy for jane by establishing a sense of pity towards her. Jane at this point in the novel has no one who loves her, and is undergoing very rough situations.
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