More matter, with less art

 (original)

1980. A recurring theme in literature is the classic war between a passion and responsibility. For instance, a personal cause, a love, a desire for revenge, a determination to redress a wrong, or some other emotion or drive may conflict with moral duty. Choose a literary work in which a character confronts the demands of a private passion that conflicts with his or her responsibilities. In a well-written essay show clearly the nature of the conflict, its effects upon the character, and its significance to the work.

             Living in sin is an outdated concept to those of us living in the present, but back in the days of corsets and feathered bonnets, the idea of living as man and wife without being actually married was shocking to say the least. To a young girl raised from birth to be devoted to the Christian faith and doctrine, the very idea would be synonymous with degradation and an assurance of hell in the afterlife. To a young girl hearing this proposal from a broken man who needs her, who also represents the only chance she has at bettering her life, the idea is far more tempting. This very scenario, the choice to throw her principles away for love or to cling to them and suffer, is presented to Jane Eyre on the very day she was meant to be married, and the choice she makes defines her character and sets the moral tone of the novel that shares her name.

            Jane’s true choice is not between purity and ruin; more accurately it is the choice between her duty to herself and her duty towards Rochester. From their first conversation, in which they debate about salvation, Jane is established as Rochester’s moral compass. Her true worry when she leaves him is that he will collapse into hedonism and damn him. However, Jane still chooses to go, largely due to the philosophy she learned from Helen Burns in her childhood—that as destitute and alone as she may become, her first responsibility is to her soul. In the end, her decision to leave is her recognition of her own value to herself. Regardless of how much she loves Rochester, she realizes that she cannot be responsible for both him and herself.

Jane would not be Jane if she bent ‘the laws given by God and sanctioned by Man’ to her own desires, but that does not mean that it didn’t cause her pain to leave Rochester. Her decision also ruined any chance of gaining a second employment—she was stranded without home, income, or reference of character in an uncaring and mistrusting society. She reaches the brink of starvation, but that is where the harmful effects begin to reverse themselves. Because she leaves Rochester’s employment at the same time she ends her engagement with him, Jane is given the chance to become her own woman, and discover her own merit. Although she misses him, she constantly affirms that she would rather be free and lonely than to be a slave to love. In choosing to leave Jane proves her worth; in her time away she proves her capability.

            Jane’s happiness at the end of the work is the true indicator of the moral nature of Jane Eyre. It affirms that those who make the right choices will be rewarded. Had Jane chosen the path that Rochester wanted, she would have become subservient and morally compromised. Her happiness would have been superficial and it would have evaporated quickly. Instead, she made her own way into her own life and job, and came back as an independent woman and an equal contributor to her own marriage. Not only did she maintain her responsibility to herself as a human being, she was made aware of her ability to care for Rochester. Jane’s choices are indicative of her strength as a character, and her choice to leave Rochester turns the entire book into an argument about willpower, morality, and marriage in an era where those concepts were seemingly set in stone.

            The events in Jane Eyre are carefully structured so that any given good thing couldn’t possibly have happened if a bad thing hadn’t happened first. Had Jane never left Thornfield, she would never have met her cousins on good terms. Had Jane never left Thornfield, as a matter of fact, she would have been burnt in her bed by Bertha Mason, a punishment reminiscent of hellfire for a woman who made the wrong choice even by her own moral code. Jane gains far more than she loses from her choice to remain true to herself, but her struggles with herself along the way prevent the novel from being too preachy.