Jane’s struggle for freedom and equality

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Jane’s struggle for freedom and equality

About<<Jane Eyre>>

In the history of literature, there are many popular classics that deeply go into people’s souls and affect their spiritual world.After finished the book <<Jane Eyre>>,I

was deeply touched with Jane’s struggle for freedom and equality.

Jane was a young orphan growing up at Gateshead.She was raised up by her aunt Mrs. Reed who treated her unfairly.Her position in Gateshead was very low and she often suffered from all sorts of injustice.Because of beauty,her unkind cousin Georgina was condoned by everyone;because of gender,her cousin John was naturally spoiled by Mrs. Reed.Without economic foundation,male identity or beauty,Jane Eyre was excluded, insulted and suffered a double oppression of class and gender.Faced with class and gender inequality, Jane’s anger began to sprout and yearning for freedom and equality began to wake up.

After Jane was set to the school Lowood,she made friends with a girl named Helen.Meanwhile Jane endured hunger, deprivation, bullying, and Mr. Brocklehurst ‘s religious hypocrisy .Jane got tempera psychological comfort from Miss Temple and Helen ,so Jane's anger is only temporarily under their soothing silence. Her indignation against the oppressed,the passionate for self, happiness and independence has not changed. Therefore, after Miss Temple leaves Lowood, Jane also decided to leave and started a struggle for the pursuit of a new life.

She accepted a governess position at a manor called Thornfield,where she fell in love with the owner Rochester..During the interaction between him,she deeply felt that gender and class oppression had brought her inequality and shackles.Because of gender and class disparities , Rochester didn’t love Jane so much as himself.With the further development of the relationship between Jane and Rochester,Rochester’s possessive to Jane became increasingly evident.Rochester even despised Jane’s governess position.Jane became raged.In the book,she said to Rochester:“Do you think wrong!---I have as much as soul as you-and full as much heart!And if God had gifted me with some beauty and much wealth,I should have made it as hard for you to leave,as it is now for me to leave you.”When Jane knew that Rochester intended to conceal his marital relationship with Bertha in purpose to cheat on her,she became raged and decided to leave Rochester at once.After she confronted with St.John,she was oppressed by his deceptive religion.He intended to impose the crazy dedication relief on Jane to force her to marry him and to give up chasing love.

Jane was a lucky dog that she received inheritance from her uncle about 5000 pounds while Rochester’s wealth was ruined by the fire.It seemed that she was equal to Rochester.But this equality didn’t lie in gender equality --- women were still oppressed by the society and the poor were still discriminated by the rich.Jane’s success to gain freedom and equality was a coincidence to some extend.But at last,she succeeded to reach her goal by her insistence.To conclude,we have never seen that she has given up her pursuit at any time even in difficult times.As a student in modern times,I should learn something from Jane--something about insistence and noble pursuit.