Jane and Pip’s Spatial Mobility that Traces Their Personal Growth in Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre and Charles Dickens’s Great Expectations, respectively
In both Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre and Charles Dickens’s Great Expectations, the fact that the protagonists, Jane and Pip, are orphans potentially restricts their self-improvement, financial independence, and social status. Interestingly, as Jane and Pip move away further from their homes, they come closer to realizing their desires of social ascent, though their morality is more severely tested. For instance, Jane’s each escape from her quarters augments her self-improvement and independence, though her morality is tested in each of the dwellings. Contrarily, albeit as Pip moves father away from his home, his social status seems to ascend, it is actually a delusional success of being a gentleman. Thusly, the “spatial mobility” of the both orphans, traces their different stages of social/moral ascent or descent.
Both Jane and Pip in their foster homes—Jane with the Reeds and Pip in his sister’s—feel that their self-improvement or social advancement is restricted. As orphans, both Jane and Pip are fortunate that their foster homes provide them the basic shelter, food, and protection from the harsh world. Both Pip and Jane, however, feel that they are emotionally, intellectually, and physically oppressed in their foster homes. In particular, for instance, Jane’s cousin, John Reed, is overtly oppressive to her. When Jane wants to be left alone with her reading, he emotionally and intellectually insults her by demanding her to not “take [his] books [since she is] a dependent” (8). He further orders that she “ought to beg, and not live [there] with gentlemen’s children like [him]” (8). This instance later develops into a physical trauma for Jane as well, as her Aunt locks her up in “the red-room” where her uncle died. (10). Jane in her Aunt’s home hence feels that she is being treated like a servant: Am I a servant?” (9). As long as Jane stays with the Reeds, therefore, she sees no brighter future for her, intellectually or socially. Likewise, Pip sees no extraordinary future for him in his sister’s house, other than an apprenticeship under his brother-in-law (Joe), who is a blacksmith. Joe narrates his conditions at home: “My sister, Mrs. Joe Gargery, . . . have a hard and heavy hand, and to be much in the habit of laying it upon her husband as well as upon me” (12). If Jane feels oppressed by her cousin, Pip feels oppressed by his own sister. Moreover, Joe (his brother-in-law) to Pip is someone of “dismal intelligence” (13). Like Jane, Pip therefore feels that his sister’s home is not conducive to his social and intellectual growth. If Jane’s cousin John Reed is the patriarchal authority who restricts Jane’s self-improvement and independence, Pip’s sister and her husband—in Pip’s mind—are people who hamper his social refinement.
The protagonists’ first spatial movement from their foster homes to another space directs them to more opportunities of self-improvements. For instance, as Jane moves away from the Reeds to Lowood Institution, her love for books and education materializes. Jane narrates that upon arriving at Lowood charity school, the first person that she finds interesting is “a girl sitting on a stone bench. . . [who] [i]s bent over a book, on the perusal of which she seem[s] intent” (41). Though Jane feels timid being in a new environment, she “from where [she] st[ands]. . . see[s] the title” of the book; “it [i]s ‘Rasselas;,’” she says in her mind, and the name “str[ikes] [her] as strange, and consequently attractive” (41). Lowood to Jane is, then, a place where she grows intellectually, which in her Aunt’s home, she could not have done so freely. Similarly, as a result of meeting Estella in Satis House, Pip yearns to have a higher social status. When he is taken to Satis House by his Uncle Pumblechook to play with the beautiful Estella, he immediately falls in love with her, and dreams of becoming a wealthy gentleman so that he might be worthy of her. He internalizes Estella’s disdainful treatment of him as “a common labouring-boy,” and feels more “ignorant than [he] had [ever] considered [him] self” to be (55). He even hopes that Miss Havisham will make him a gentleman and marry him to Estella. While Jane from Lowood Institution gains employable skills which enhance her self-sufficiency, Pip from Satis house soaks up vanity of wishing to be more than who he is—a gentleman. The first spatial movement on the part of the both protagonists—Jane and Pip—nonetheless becomes an impetus for their further self-improvements and social ascensions.
The protagonists’ second major change of dwellings marks a higher level of financial independence for Jane and dependence for Pip. For Jane, as she leaves Lowood to work as a governess at Thornfield, she feels she is alone in the world and must be self-supportive. Her aunt (Mrs. Reed) confirms Jane’s independence as an adult when she—in place of her deceased husband (Jane’s uncle)—permits “that ‘[Jane] might do as [she] pleased, [for] she had long relinquished all interference in [Jane’s] affairs’” (76). Likewise, as Pip moves from Kent to London, he feels that he is on his way of becoming a true gentleman of independence. Pip narrates his elated sensation as he leaves his hometown: “I ha[ve] been so innocent and little [here], and all beyond [i]s so unknown and great. . . it [is] now too late and too far to go back,. . . and the world lay spread before me” (124, 5). Although the fact that he is asked to come to London and begin his education as a gentleman is due to his secret benefactor, Pip is not ashamed of his financial dependence on him. Instead, he continues to fancy that as a refined gentleman, he will be worthy enough for Estella. Unlike Jane, who independently works for her own money and is more mature at this stage of her life, Pip, at this juncture of his life in London, is idle with financial dependence on a secret benefactor, and his maturity is yet to be called an independent adult, much less a gentleman.
Albeit moving from one home to another causes tremendous amount of anxiety and insecurity, Jane nevertheless removes herself from Thornfield to St. John’s to resist temptations of immorality—the temptation of living in Thornfield as a mistress to Rochester. Upon the shocking revelation that Rochester—the man she is about to marry—has a living wife in the attic, Jane goes through a powerful moment of confusion. Though she loves Rochester dearly, she cannot debase herself to be his mistress, who in her mind is just as bad as a financially and morally parasitic prostitute. In agony, she consults her heart: “’What am I to do?’ But the answer [her] mind g[ives]—‘Leave Thornfield at once’—[is] so prompt” (253). Her third geographical movement is thus a flight from Thornfield to St. John’s abode. This move proves to be the quintessential period in her life, because during her stay there, she is linked to a loving and admirable extended family (St. John and his sisters). It is also during this period—with the help of her cousin, St. John—she discovers that her uncle of long distance has made her a wealthy woman through inheritance. Yet, she is again morally challenged by St. John’s loveless marriage proposal. Jane’s strong sense of morality, however, does not allow her to marry someone without true affections, so she refuses his offer by telling him that it is “because [he] d[oes] not love [her]” (351). Irrespective of her morality being challenged in both places—Thornfield and St. John’s—she is able to withstand temptations of illegitimate or loveless romances. From both places, she thus walks out with her finance and morality augmented.
Unlike Jane, who removes herself from the romantic temptations and restrictions on her independence that Thornfield and St. John’s represent, Pip further indulges himself in London, financially and sentimentally. In London, Pip befriends a gentleman named Herbert, who helps Pip learn how to act like a gentleman. Pip however lacks the maturity and morality that Jane possesses. With the regular income from his fortune, he and Herbert lead an undisciplined life, enjoying themselves and running up debts. Pip admits to his lavish life style: “As I ha[ve] grown accustomed to my expectations, I ha[ve] insensibly begun to notice their effect upon myself and those around me. . . My lavish habits led. . . into expenses that [Herbert] c[an] not afford, corrupt[s] the simplicity of his life, and disturb[s] his peace with anxieties and regrets” (208). His financially dependent, affluent lifestyle in London thus morally degenerates him as well as others around him. He also becomes increasingly arrogant. He expresses disdain for his former friends and loved ones, especially Joe, but he vainly continues to pine after Estella, wishing to match his social status to that of hers. While the fact that Jane is all alone as a governess makes her more morally alert and shuns away from sexual temptations, Pip’s financial dependence on an unknown benefactor and his amorous desire to marry Estella corrupts his morality. Thus, while Jane’s mature self-control over sentimentalism makes her move away from material affluence (i.e., Thornfield), Pip’s immaturity and romantic idealism over Estella overshadows his basic goodness and demoralizes him.
Jane’s final movement back to Rochester in Ferdean is, in effect, a cardinal moment in her life where she makes an important pronouncement of her independence. This final movement is profound, not only because it frees her from St. John—a restrictive patriarch—but because it is a choice that she deliberately makes, as Jane informs Rochester, as “an independent woman” (370). Bewildered by her new aura and claims to independence, Rochester asks for explanation: “‘Independent! What do you mean, Jane?’” (370) Jane gives him a stunning answer that not only informs him that she now has money of her own, but her subtle word play also implicates that she intends to keep and manage her own money: “‘Quite rich, sir…If you won’t let me live with you, I can build a house of my own close up to your door, and you may come and sit in my parlour when you want company of an evening’” (370, emphasis added). Indeed, for Jane, each “spatial movement” dramatically challenges her morality. She however does not succumb to irresponsible romanticism, thereby enhancing and fortifying her self-improvement and independence.
Unlike Jane, Pip’s final movement back to his home town does not accompany financial growth or increased dignity, except remorse. He realizes that his great expectations of becoming a gentleman and marrying Estella have been an illusion, as he finds out that Estella is a daughter of a criminal, Magwitch, who is also his secret benefactor of big fortune. Unlike Jane, Pip’s dizzying rise in social status at the end is thus accompanied by a sharp decline in his confidence and happiness. Pip, however, learns from his mistakes, and shows improved morality: “I live. . . frugally, and pa[y] my debts. . . I work pretty hard for a. . . living, and therefore—Yes, I do well” (355-7). Pip finally learns that social and educational improvements are irrelevant to one’s real worth, and that conscience and affection are to be valued above erudition and social standing. Thusly, Jane and Pip—the two orphans in Bronte’s Jane Eyre and Dickens’s Great Expectations—increase or decrease their social status, independence, and morality, in relation to how they succumb to or overcome temptations and restrictions in each of their abodes.
Works Cited
Bronte, Charlotte. Jane Eyre. Norton & Company, Inc: New York, 2001.
Dickens, Charles. Great Expectations. Norton & Company, Inc: New York, 1999.
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