Jane Eyre AS Revision: Mrs Reed Character Study

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  • Created by: merylx
  • Created on: 12-05-14 11:19

Mrs Reed

Fire and Ice

  • Mrs. Reed’s countenance is often juxtaposed with Jane’s. She, like both St. John Rivers and Mr Brocklehurst represent ice; they are cold, dispassionate and clinical.

  • ‘What?” said Mrs. Reed under her breath: her usually cold composed grey eye became troubled with a look like fear.’ Metaphor: ‘cold composed grey eye’, her cold nature ‘troubled’ by the ‘burning ridge of lighted heath’, Jane’s passionate nature represented by fire.

Independence vs Submission

  • “you will now stay here an hour longer, and it is only on condition of perfect submission and stillness that I shall liberate you then.” ‘submission’ and ‘liberation’ diction and juxtaposition. Overly formal language, creates distance.

  • ‘Mrs. Reed soon rallied her spirits: she shook me most soundly, she boxed both my ears, and then left me without a word.’

  • Continual displays of dominance over Jane through physical violence.

Quest for Love

  • The said Eliza, John, and Georgiana were now clustered round their mama in the drawing-room: she lay reclined on a sofa by the fireside, and with her darlings about her Me, she had dispensed from joining the group.’ Continually separated from Mrs. Reed and other other children, Jane is denied love and compassion from her family, due to their characters and her position as a dependant.

  • “Love me, then, or hate me…

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