Jane Eyre, Spectator of Fantasy

Abstract

This study incorporates various feminist film theories to analyze the visual constructions of the female as representation and possibilities for female subjectivity in Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre. In particular, the film theory of fantasy is relied on to explain Jane’s stance as spectator and narrator of fantasy -- the staging and playing out of various desires and wishes in tension with reality principles. As she has no illusions about sado-masochistic manipulations of society, Jane becomes spectator, to identify and resist social forces that inhibit her in image and finally assert her own look and voice. The female gaze that Jane asserts is not one of possessing the other but one of emulation and identification. Jane identifies with nourishing female figures to emulate them and distances herself from women who adhere to social conventions defining them as image. Jane wills to align her vision with men and not be contained by their looks and voice. In her relationship with Rochester, Jane shares a reciprocal look and merging of voice where both become subjects and objects of desire. It is through these various modes of identification with others that allows Jane to play out her desires and expand the self. However, Jane recognizes that the female lot of containment is one she cannot escape altogether as she becomes spectator to Rochester’s serial victimizing of women. By placing herself in other’s subject position, the most significant projection of herself in Bertha, Jane comes to recognize women’s shared destiny of manipulation. While fantasy had allowed Jane to not only indulge in the realm of passionate desires but also award her with recognition, to not only play out her romantic desires but also leave her autonomy intact through desire’s failure, it is placing herself firmly in reality that allows her to achieve substantial power to narrate and see for others -- the blind Rochester and her readers. By actively identifying with the image of subservience, the narrator masks the power that she has gained. While adhering firmly to symbolic powers, Jane’s ability to project herself into others enables her to negotiate the realm of passionate aspiration into reality. The process of Jane Rochester’s narration can thus be seen as a justification her self-fulfillment in both spheres of individual desire and social life by incorporating her sphere of fantasy within the identifiable realm of reader’s reality. Finally, as readers themselves become spectators to Jane’s narration of fantasy, they may undergo the process of synthesizing Jane’s various perspectives within their selves and see reality in a new light.