The Red Room
Otherwise known as the most terrifying room of all time, a.k.a. proof that Mrs. Reed gets the gold medal for Worst Aunt Ever.Paging Dr. FreudThe red room, once the bedroom of Jane’s Uncle Reed, w...
Gross Porridge
Yup: the least appetizing meal in Jane Eyre is also one of its most potent symbols. We really wish we could be writing about a bacon cheeseburger.There are two important moments when (really nasty)...
Fire
No cozy, s'mores-toasting fires here. Nope. These fires are sexy and murderous.The most important fires in Jane Eyre are Bertha’s two acts of arson: the first at the end of Volume 1 (Chapter 15),...
Ice
If you’ve read Game of Thrones then you know that, where there’s fire, there’s also ice! (You could learn that from Frankenstein, too.) Anyway, not only does Jane take special interest in the...
The Splintered Chestnut Tree
Word to the wise: if the site of your engagement gets struck by lightning, it probably doesn't bode well for your marriage.The day after Rochester proposes to Jane under "the great horse-chestnut a...
Drawing Portraits
Here's where Jane Eyre (and Jane Eyre herself) gets a teensy bit meta. Jane draws four crucial portraits over the course of the novel: one of herself, one of what she imagines Blanche Ingram will l...