What I like about this activity is that it can help to move the discussion on from focusing on Jane’s response (not that this isn’t important of course but I’m assuming you will discuss this first anyway) – to Rochester’s orchestration of the event. I think there’s enough here to suggest that Bronte’s presentation of Rochester is not uncomplicated or designed to create reader’s sympathy alone. Hopefully, this will get students to think of other moments in the novel when characters are paraded or exhibited. More anon.
Direct students to the passage in which Rochester reveals Bertha to a bewildered Jane (it’s immediately preceded in the narrative by her account of the aborted wedding). This is the first and only time Jane encounters Bertha face to face.
So assuming a feminist and post-colonial lens has been applied to this section of the novel already, students will focus on Bronte’s presentation of Rochester in the scene.
Questions:
In what way does Rochester’s commentary - before and after the description of Bertha – influence a reader’s response to Bertha?
Why do you think Bronte chose to frame the encounter in this way? Think about the positioning of Rochester and how our attention is drawn to this…
Show them an edited version of the account cutting out Rochester’s preliminaries and subsequent commentary. Discuss the difference …
Here you’re trying to highlight the degree to which Bronte makes exhibiting, spectatorship aspects to be noted and implicitly judged…
How does the passage play with our understanding of who or what is being placed under the spotlight?
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