jane eyre 4

In chapters eight through fourteen, Jane endures very harsh conditions at the school she attends, she is starved, mistreated and shun away by her fellow classmates when she has done nothing wrong, and even loses her best friend Helen Burns to typhoid fever. Like other mistreated, unfortunate, heroines from fairytales and children’s stories, Jane is treated very badly but she herself is just an innocent child caught up in the wrong setting, she has no guidance and no parental figure to help her grow. This story reminds me of Annie and Oliver Twist because she is poor, alone in the world, and has no one there for her, but it also seems to have a hint of Cinderella and Snowwhite because she does have some distant relatives who really don’t care much for her and don’t really want to take responsibility for her. Her friends in the story are: Helen(whom she sadly loses along the way), Miss Temple, and Mrs. Fairfax, whom she goes to live with in a place called Thornfield. She moves here with Mrs. Fairfax to be a sort of nanny to a little, French speaking, girl who Mr. Rochester is in charge of. Mrs. Fairfax describes the owner of the estate as a great stately man who is not around for a lot of the time but has good intentions and is well respected. Charlotte Bronte achieves the effect of making him out to look like the flawless romantic hero’s we all know and love by having Mrs. Fairfax tell us about him as sort of an introduction rather than having him just appear in the story and blend in like everyone else. He’s the typical knight in shining armor, the wealthy owner of a big beautiful estate who is all about helping the less fortunate.