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Characters in the Minority

In: Novels

Submitted By icex
Words 387
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Characters in the Minority Georgiana and Eliza Reed are described as "feeling without judgement"(Georgiana) and "Judgement without feeling" (Eliza) - both are used to differentiate what happens when one takes one side to the extreme of both types of behaviours. In effect, Jane finds she has to fight to preserve the balance in her character between judgement and feeling - the Reed sisters therefore provide a strong example as to what happens if the balance between the two is upset. Blanche Ingram is a woman without scruples or morality, she is haughty and proud, very beautiful and priveleged too, but is nevertheless shallow and intellectually inferior. She is a warning Jane, who is soon to be faced with the temptation to give in to her passions and embrace the shallow life of a courtesan, when Rochester pleads with her to go to the continent with him after the "wedding". The more virtuous minor characters serve the same function, standing as moral or spiritual beacons to which Jane may aspire, but may not ever reach. Maria Temple - the charitable schoolteacher is both an example and a warning. She can and does serve as a role-model for Jane but is also powerless, having to answer for her independence to a wrathful Mr Brocklehurst, and having no real authority when he is on the premises. Her position is inferior and she submits too. Jane later will break this pattern at Thornfield, in her dealings with her employer, but ironically her habit of submissiveness is gained as a direct result of her interaction with Maria Temple. Helen Burns is the saint-like Christian child who teaches Jane the philosophy of submission and endurance. Her religious conviction of Christ as a father and a loving friend is an important facet of the novel. This, together with Helen's insistence that trials and sufferings are to be endured and their perpetrators forgiven, is the essence

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