Human Performance, Divine Reality: The Spectacle of Jane Eyre
Corinna Cole
By conflating the autobiographic and gothic forms in one text, Jane Eyre unites the disparate genres of realism and romance. Similarly, the novel questions through Jane’s fairy tale romance with Rochester what is realistically possible in a human relationship. Jane’s place within the novel is of the autonomous spectator, a position described by her window retreat at Gateshead: “Folds of scarlet drapery shut in my view to the right hand; to the left were the clear panes of glass, protecting, but not separating me from the drear November day”(20, Italics mine). With Jane as the spectator, the novel is correspondingly characterized by romantic (or gothic) spectacle, played out in charades and visually dramatic language. While Jane witnesses these spectacles, she is never fully separated from them and can remove her gaze, thereby collapsing the charade. Jane Eyre is thus characterized by the enchantment of spectacle and subsequent search for and reassertion of reality. I would argue the realism of the novel is one predicated on Christian beliefs, thereby allowing for the intrusion of the miraculous into a divinely created world. Jane, however, is confronted with religious spectacle as well, more subtly presented in the hypocrisy of Mr. Brocklehurst, the cold piety of St. John Rivers, and in Jane and Rochesters’ mutual worship. The final form of spectacle in the novel is the novel itself. Jane’s address to the reader breaks this spectacle and grounds both the reader and the novel in this divine realism.
As a child at Gateshead, Jane retires to the window seat to gaze outwardly at the grounds and inwardly at her imagination. The scenario juxtaposes two prevalent forms of spectacle within the novel. The first is characterized by the ornate description of actual events or objects within the text. Bronte often lavishly depicts Jane’s surroundings, as she does with the description of Rochester’s manor house, Thornfield, at Midsummer: “skies so pure, suns so radiant… the trees were in their dark prime: hedge and wood, full-leaved and deeply tinted, contrasted well with the sunny hue of the cleared meadows below” (246). The visually arresting language used to describe both setting and plot is one form of spectacle within the novel. Conversely, Jane’s gaze is often that of a spectator; for example, when Jane witnesses the arrival of the Ingrams and Rochester through the window at Thornfield she states, “Adele (Jane’s ward) flew to the window. I followed … I could see without being seen.” The arrival is then recounted elaborately, depicting Miss Ingram as “a lady … [whose] purple riding habit almost swept the ground, her veil streamed long on the breeze; mingling with its transparent folds … shone rich raven ringlets” (169). The scene goes beyond the arrival of a visiting party to depict instead an extravagant, almost royal processional. From her sequestered position, Jane is the audience to the party’s pageantry. This situation is repeated when she watches Mason arrive in the courtyard at Thornfield and as Jane gazes in at Diana and Mary Rivers through the window at Moor House. Each time, Jane’s movement away from the window breaks the drama of the scene. Although a passive player in the spectacle, she has the power to remove her gaze and thereby end the scene.
Ensconced in her window seat at Gateshead, Jane also takes pleasure in the spectacle of the imagined. With the help of Bewick’s “History of British Birds,” Jane surveys “the vast sweep of the Artic Zone,” “the quiet solitary churchyard” and “two ships becalmed on a torpid sea” (21). Likewise, Jane imposes the eldritch scenes of Bessie’s fairy tales onto her surroundings. Thus, from her stile near Thornfield, Jane watches the approach of Pilot as if he were the mythical Gytrash, a sinister fairy tale spirit in the shape of a dog: “I heard a rush under the hedge, and close down by the hazel stems glided a great dog …a Lion-like creature with long hair and a huge head” (119). The lovers’ discourse between Rochester and Jane is also conducted in terms of fairy tale, by comparing one another to mischievous imps and fairies (267, 272). The allusions are visual, conjuring images of brightly colored jewels or the pale glint of impish eyes. However, these terms also reference the popular, “pagan” superstitions that existed along side Christianity in England. Jeffery Franklin writes in “The merging of Spiritualities: Jane Eyre as a Missionary of Love”:
Jane Eyre is in some way a...representation of the hybrid religious discourse of rural England in the middle part of the nineteenth century… superstitions existed widely... pagan practices [were] prevalent on a generalized cultural basis (Franklin 470).
Franklin also notes that the practice of these superstitions was primarily confined to the lower class and it is unlikely that Jane, well educated and painfully class conscious, would find them credible (ibid.). Although she is intrigued by these magical references, Jane often dismisses them as insubstantial or childish, as she does with the Gytrash: “I was young, and all sorts of fancies bright and dark tenanted my mind … amongst other rubbish” (119). Instead, Jane is enchanted by an alternative spirituality, a charade of religion that she and Rochester create by incorporating the superstitions of the day. In retrospect, Jane remarks on her relationship with Rochester; “He stood between me and every thought of religion…I could not, in those days, see God for his creature; of whom I had made an idol”(272). Thus, Rochester becomes Jane’s love and she must flee this superstitious and pagan religion to return to an understanding of true faith, founded on Christianity (311).
Perhaps the most obvious form of spectacle in the novel is the continual recurrence of charades or performance. Adele is always offering to dance or sing for Jane and Mr. Rochester. The guests at Thornfield play at charades and Rochester disguises himself as a Gypsy woman, theatrically revealing himself to Jane with the words “the play is played out” and “Off, ye lendings,” a line from Shakespeare’s King Lear (203, 204). Visual spectacle is therefore a reoccurring theme throughout the novel. However, the descriptive language, fairy tale characters and contrived theatrics point to an essential contradiction in terms: for a “realistic” novel, the fantastic and melodramatic figure too prominently within the text. In her essay “More True than Real: Jane Eyre’s ‘Mysterious Summons,’” Ruth Yeazell notes that in the final chapters of Jane Eyre the normal laws of nature and probability are suspended in order to unite the lovers. This flagrant breach in realism is due to the novel staying “true to the vision of human experience which informs Bronte’s world, and true to the internally consistent laws by which that world is governed” (Yeazell 3). Bronte ultimately remains true to a reality based on Christian beliefs. The “internally consistent laws” of this world are divinely sanctioned and thus divine intervention does not violate the realism for which Bronte strives. Consequently, the lovers’ remarkable instance of ESP is not unrealistic; rather, it is divinely miraculous. Jane understands this when she entrusts the outcome of her relationship with Rochester to divine providence:
We know that God is everywhere...we read clearest His infinitude, His omnipotence, His omnipresence. Looking up, I… saw what countless systems there swept space like a soft trace of light… Sure was I of His efficiency to save what He had made (319).
Unlike the deceptive fairytale or religious charades, divine spectacle, seen in the natural majesty of the stars, is real and therefore trustworthy. Accordingly, human spectacle violates Bronte’s realism as it obscures this divine reality and unduly elevates human importance, as demonstrated in Jane’s relationship with Rochester. The prominence of spectacle within the text thus forms an integral part of the world Bronte wishes to construct, one that returns to a divine realism by the conclusion of the novel.
The final form of spectacle within the novel is that of religious charade or a pharisaical outward display of false religion. Although Brocklehurst’s or St. John’s pious severity does not easily enthrall Jane, these charades constitute the greatest threat to her ultimate safety and happiness. Indeed, Mr. Brocklehurst presumably has the power to socially demean Jane, break her spirit, or even physically starve and punish her. Likewise, for Jane to submit to St. John would “be almost equivalent to committing suicide” (404). During his initial inspection of Lowood, Brocklehurst reveals his hypocrisy when, in viewing a young woman’s naturally curly hair, he reacts with an exaggerated self-righteousness: “'what- what is that girl with curled hair?’…And extending his cane he pointed to the awful object, his hand shaking as he did so” (73). Brocklehurst is not only overly dramatic, but also profoundly hypocritical as both his wife and daughters are elaborately dressed with their hair falsely curled. Brocklehurst states “we are not to conform to nature: I wish these girls to be the children of Grace” (ibid). Citing this incident in his essay, Richard Benvenuto writes;
Nature and grace identify the ethical norms and interpretive principles of behavior that lay claim to [Jane]...They are the opposite directions she takes in her search for the authority to which her existence will be held answerable (Benvenuto 624).
Brocklehurst’s display is one of a false religious grace, and Jane easily recognizes his hypocrisy. St. John, however, understands grace but is incapable of knowing either the loving nature of God or the imperative of human love that motivates Jane: “I was sure St. John Rivers… had not yet found that peace of God” no more than “than had I; with my concealed and racking regrets for my broken idol and lost elysuim” (345). Although St. John is sincere in his belief, his religion is cold and severe. Indeed, he beguiles Jane with a vision of its lofty ideals; “Religion called – Angels beckoned – God commanded- life rolled together like a scroll …The dim room was full of visions” (408). Thus, Brocklehurst and St. John represent the spectacle of false or incomplete religion throughout the text.
Whenever spectacle appears within the text, it is almost immediately deconstructed and returned to realism. When Jane is locked in the Red Room by her Aunt Reed, she imagines that her Uncle’s ghost has come to haunt her. The adult narrator tempers the eerie quality of the scene by immediately explaining; “I can now conjecture readily that this streak of light was, in all likelihood, a gleam from a lantern, carried by someone across the lawn”(29). The assertion and subsequent dissolution of spectacle (in this case a superstitious or religious spectacle) intensify with the introduction of Mr. Rochester. Although Jane first imagines Pilot as the Gytrash, she readily admits “No Gytrash was this, - only a traveler taking the short cut to Millcote” (119). The scene is returned to the mundane, described as “an incident of no moment, no romance, no interest” (122). Yet Mr. Rochester maintains his anonymity within the scene, creating a charade of mistaken identity. Returning to Thornfield, Jane readily connects Mr. Rochester to the fallen rider on the lane and the cycle of performance lapses back into reality.
Jane and Rochester’s awakening romance is marked by a dizzying cycle of spectacle and reality. Unfortunately for Jane, she is the spectator in Mr. Rochester’s rather cruel conceit of feigning love for Blanche Ingram. She is witness to the contrived behavior between Rochester and Blanche, the game of charades, and Mr. Rochester disguising himself as a fortuneteller. Although passive, Jane’s role as the audience is a position of power as the charade is ultimately directed at her. Rochester confesses to Jane, “I feigned courtship of Miss Ingram, because I wished to render you as madly in love with me as I was with you” (261). She has the ability to end a charade by dismissing it as fanciful, as she does with the Gytrash, or remove her gaze, as she does from the game of charades, effectively ending their spell over her: “I did not now watch the actors; I no longer waited with interest for the curtain to rise” (187). While disguised as the gypsy, Mr. Rochester asks her “I wonder what thoughts are busy in your heart… with the fine people flitting before you like shapes in a magic-lantern, as if they were really mere shadows of human forms and not the actual substance” (200). Jane’s realistic and insightful response is to note that the figures tell the same tale of “courtship; and promise to end in the same catastrophe- marriage”(Ibid). She is perhaps telling her own tale and prefiguring the catastrophe that leads to her marriage to Rochester.
Similarly, Jane subverts the compelling influence of religious performance by retreating to an understanding of true religion. Jane is physically powerless to flee when Mr. Brocklehurst forces her to stand, isolated on a stool. Yet, rather than fully accept Mr. Brocklehurst’s false view of her and feel shame and self-loathing, she shifts her gaze from an inward contemplation of the wrongs committed against her towards the self-sacrificial Helen Burns. Thinking of her as an angel and a martyr, Jane perceives that Helen’s is a true faith despite the “untidy badge” that marks her as a rebellious child. Jane is thus able to break the influence of religious charade that threatens to overwhelm her spirit and prevent her from emulating the loving and accepting nature of Helen Burns. Similarly, St. John’s vision of cold and pious grace is broken when Jane flees him, triumphantly exulting “I broke from St. John; who had followed, and would have detained me. It was my time to assume ascendancy. My powers were in play, and in force” (410). While Jane regains autonomy, it is only after she entreats heaven to reveal to her the correct “path” she is to pursue, whether it is along side St. John or her beloved Rochester (409). By simultaneously removing her gaze as she flees St. John, and by recalling the divine reality of true religion in her prayer, Jane’s soul is freed from St. John’s overbearing influence as if from “Paul and Silas’s prison” (411).
The cycle of spectacle and reality is also played out in Rochester and Jane’s romance and plans for marriage. After all, Rochester is acting out a charade in which he plays the available and devoted lover while concealing his current marriage. The closer the novel comes to revealing the truth, the more feverish and beguiling the spectacle becomes for both the reader and Jane. The fairy tale allusions that always characterized Jane and Rochester’s relationship reach their zenith at the point when reality can only be disguised by the utterly fantastical. Thus, Rochester tries to woo Jane with jewelry and silks, describing her as beautiful and fairy-like (257). Jane is alarmed because she senses he is “either deluding himself, or trying to delude me”(Ibid). Rochester even weaves a tale in which Jane is a fairy that will steal away with him to live out their existence on the moon (265). Jane and Adele both refuse to accept this fiction, the former remarking, “Human beings never enjoy complete happiness in this world. I was not born for a different destiny…to imagine such a lot befalling me is a fairy tale- a day dream” (257). This is precisely the message of the novel; it is not realistic for a human to rise from rags to riches, overcome all societal injunctions, find her soulmate and live with him in eternal marital bliss. Rather, through the use of spectacle, Bronte presents each of these possibilities as an insubstantial fiction through which reality is asserted as the preferable and only alternative to the fantastical. Thus, Jane and Rochester can only enjoy a happiness tempered by loss within Jane’s so called “catastrophe of marriage.”
The revelation of Bertha’s existence catapults the novel into the high melodrama of windswept moors and ruinous fires. The alternation of charade and reality subsides, yet the latter chapters are characterized by the drama of Jane’s situation. In his essay, “Jane Eyre’s Reading Lesson,” Mark Hennelly observes that Jane Eyre was intended to be both a visual and a theatrical piece:
Charlotte Bronte was accustomed to read her works before her sisters and brother in the evening (…) The phenomenology of this reading performance could be as preciously private as little Jane’s poring over the lonely pictures of Bewicks History of British Birds, or as self-consciously and even self-creatively public as the extremely popular reading circle where participants sometimes created a kind of readers’ theater, in effect not unlike the charades Rochester plays with his guests at Thornfield (1).
In this respect, the novel itself is a spectacle and the reader is its audience. The visually dynamic descriptions, Mr. Rochester’s charades, and Jane’s flights of fancy are meant to beguile not only Jane, but the reader as well. The return to reality occurs when the narrator directly addresses the reader, a reminder that the novel is a story and as such is a reality distanced from the reader. Jane introduces the Millcote Inn by remarking, “A new chapter in a novel is something like a new scene in a play; and when I draw up the curtain this time, reader, you must fancy you see a room”(101). Bronte recalls the reader to his or her position as audience, witnessing the unfolding spectacle of the play. Similarly, when Jane flees Mr. Rochester in her despair, she invokes her audience with, “Gentle reader, may you never feel what I then felt! … for never may you, like me, dread to be the instrument of evil to what you wholly love”(317). This plea emphasizes the reader’s distance from the text but simultaneously contains an appeal to veracity. Jane’s situation might be unusual, but it isn’t unrealistic in its sentiments. Like Jane in her window seat at Gateshead, the reader is correspondingly protected but not separated from the text. The spectacle of the novel has the power to affect the reader profoundly and blur the distinctions between fiction and reality. Jane experiences this within the novel with Bewicks History of British Birds and the constant “reading” she does of Rochester.