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Independence. Sounds great, huh? That’s what Jane Eyre thinks. In Charlotte Brontë’s story, independence is pretty much all Jane wants. Well, independence and love. But in the 19th-Century world of Jane Eyre—a world in which men and women were anything but equals—could love and independence ever go hand-in-hand? Check out this Recap to learn Brontë’s opinion on that one.

Video Transcription:

If you watched Recap 2, you know that Jane Eyre is built on conflict. And there’s one other conflict worth looking at—it’s Bronte’s second theme.

Love versus independence. At the beginning of Jane Eyre you’d have to wonder if a girl can have both.

As an orphan, Jane yearns to belong and to be loved. But she’s also fiercely protective of her independence and her identity.

And we see this conflict through Jane’s journey in Jane Eyre. Her quest over the course of the story is to discover how to be loved without sacrificing any part of herself in the process.

Both of Jane’s romantic relationships test her ability to fulfill this quest.

Remember that Rochester offers Jane a marriage that will be emotionally fulfilling, but that would require her to sacrifice her integrity. (Since he’s already married to Bertha, Jane would essentially be his mistress.)

By contrast, St. John offers Jane a marriage proposal that’s based in a common purpose—in a business endeavor that would have Jane acting as his equal. The problem, of course, is that he doesn’t love her.

It’s only when Jane returns to her relationship with Rochester as an equal that the conflict between love and independence is fully resolved. And that’s when Jane can finally say, “I am my husband’s life as fully as he is mine.”