Jane Eyre Presentation on Feminism
Jane Eyre Through the Ages: Postcolonial and Other Rewritings of a Victorian Novel
Jane Eyre: a feminist tract
1. Feminism- a definition : - Oxford English Dictionary Online: 1. The qualities of females 2. Advocacy of the rights of women (based on the theory of equality of the sexes
- Dictionary of Feminist Theory:
1. belief that women suffer injustice because of the sex
2. social movement that seeks equal rights for women existing inequality between the sexes in Jane Eyre
2. Women in the Victorian era
- depended upon men physically, financially, spiritually
- carried the burden of „staying in her place“ they accepted their standards
- love, honour and obey her husband
- poem presenting the role of a wife: “An angel in the House” by Coventry Patmore (1854) “Man must be pleased; but him to please Is woman's pleasure”
3. Reception in the Victorian Readership
- Victorian readers had problems with: - sexuality - coarseness (Grobheit) - „anti-Christian“ values: refusal to accept forms, costums, standards of society rebellious feminism
„ She has inherited in fullest measure the worst sin of our fallen nature- the sin of pride" (Elizabeth Rigby)
4. Charlotte Bronte or Currer Bell?
- synonym, women writers were not taken seriously in Victorian England and weren’t supposed to write * “ …assuming Christian names positively masculine, while we did not like to declare ourselves women, because we had a vague impression that authoresses are liable to be looked on with prejudice; we had noticed how critics sometimes use for their chastisement the weapon of personality, and for their reward, a flattery, which is not true praise. ( Orel, Harold: The Brontës: Interviews and Recollections. University of Iowa Press, 1997; p.135)
5. Jane‘s story
- is enclosed and escapes - struggles from imprisonment
- overcomes and deals with: 1. oppression (at Gateshead)
Jane Eyre: a feminist tract
1. Feminism- a definition : - Oxford English Dictionary Online: 1. The qualities of females 2. Advocacy of the rights of women (based on the theory of equality of the sexes
- Dictionary of Feminist Theory:
1. belief that women suffer injustice because of the sex
2. social movement that seeks equal rights for women existing inequality between the sexes in Jane Eyre
2. Women in the Victorian era
- depended upon men physically, financially, spiritually
- carried the burden of „staying in her place“ they accepted their standards
- love, honour and obey her husband
- poem presenting the role of a wife: “An angel in the House” by Coventry Patmore (1854) “Man must be pleased; but him to please Is woman's pleasure”
3. Reception in the Victorian Readership
- Victorian readers had problems with: - sexuality - coarseness (Grobheit) - „anti-Christian“ values: refusal to accept forms, costums, standards of society rebellious feminism
„ She has inherited in fullest measure the worst sin of our fallen nature- the sin of pride" (Elizabeth Rigby)
4. Charlotte Bronte or Currer Bell?
- synonym, women writers were not taken seriously in Victorian England and weren’t supposed to write * “ …assuming Christian names positively masculine, while we did not like to declare ourselves women, because we had a vague impression that authoresses are liable to be looked on with prejudice; we had noticed how critics sometimes use for their chastisement the weapon of personality, and for their reward, a flattery, which is not true praise. ( Orel, Harold: The Brontës: Interviews and Recollections. University of Iowa Press, 1997; p.135)
5. Jane‘s story
- is enclosed and escapes - struggles from imprisonment
- overcomes and deals with: 1. oppression (at Gateshead)