Jane Eyre Blog Post #2

       There is a school, a sort of finishing school, that Jane Eyre is sent to by her aunt.  It's name is Lowood, and it is almost as terrible a place as the house Jane had been forced to live in for those first eight years of her life. But now she has encountered a different kind hardship. She must carry on in a place that supplies terrible food, which results in her constant hunger. She becomes increasingly cold; her wash bin is full of ice, not water. The school is for charity, it receives pay from the relatives of children who have lost their parents, but it is not nearly enough. This shows that even though Jane is an intelligent, confident, and talented girl, she is merely a burden to her society.  She is used to being scolded, but not used to having to swallow her replies. This is a lesson that only experience will be able to teach her. For she is only a child when she sees her friend, Helen, being yelled at and beaten by their tyrant of a teacher, Mrs. Scatchard. And she cannot for the life of her understand why Helen wouldn’t fight back at that woman. But Helen presents some very good-natured, and also religious reasons for holding her tongue when she is scolded, and not crying when she is hit.  She doesn’t want to be a burden to her family by causing them grief from her misbehaving. She believes that everyone must deal with the fate that God has given them, which, to me, hints at the Calvinistic beliefs. Predestination, which is the idea that one’s life is guided by fate alone and not by choice, is a very central part of that religion.

         There are more hints toward religiousness in Helen, for Jane calls her tolerance a “doctrine of endurance,” of which she cannot relate. Jane believes that one should be good to those who are good to them, and vice versa. This would permit one to strike back at those who struck them. None of those ideals play out very well with predestination, which is why Jane is so in awe when she hears Helen talking about her beliefs.  And she becomes even more shocked when Helen goes as far as to tell Jane to forgive Mrs. Reed of her cruelty, because life is too short for “nursing animosity.” It angers Jane to hear of any sort of sympathy being dealt out for her aunt, which I believe is understandable when you consider the fact that Jane is so young. Throughout this whole story I keep forgetting that she is still a child. She thinks and talks so intelligently and never seems to want to do childish things. But it is when she talks to Helen about getting back at the teacher for scolding her that her childishness shows itself. She has a temper, one of huge contrast to Helens.