EN12: INTRODUCTION TO LITERATURE

Fall Semester 2005

Third Essay Assignment

The third essay is due at the beginning of class on Monday, November 28. (Note that this is one week later than orignially indicated on the syllabus.) The paper should be about 5 pages long.

In this essay, you should carefully compare and contrast Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre to any one of the fairy tales that we have studied. Brontë is rather explicit about the fact that her novel incorporates themes and motifs from classic fairy tales, and she refers to several of them by name. I am particularly interested, therefore, not just in how the novel's plot parallels those of certain fairy tales, but how Brontë responds to or revises the tales-- how the echoes of the tales give her novel greater meaning, or how the changes she makes in the classic plots changes their meanings. Feel free to explore the areas of your greatest interest, but consider some of these options:

• Jane Eyre and "Cinderella": Brontë's novel is a story of a girl who goes from rags to riches, from outcast to marriage to the rich and eligible nobleman. How do the themes of the Cinderella story-- including the issues of activeness and passiveness, and the permeability of class boundaries-- resonate in Jane's story?
• Jane Eyre and "Beauty and the Beast": De Beaumont's Beauty is an especially comples version of the fairy tale heroine, and merits comparison to Jane Eyre. Is one more free to make her own choices than the other? Is marriage ultimately a trap for Beauty, and if so, is it a trap that also ensnares Jane? Is Rochester more sympathetic than the Beast? Is either of them a symbol of male authority and domination tamed and reformed? Or do they both, in a kind of wish fulfillment, get everything that they want in the end-- whether they deserve it or not?
• Jane Eyre and "Bluebeard": "I lingered in the long passage to which this led... like a corridor in some Bluebeard's castle" (114). Behind a locked door in the lord's mansion is a dark secret from his first marriage. Is Rochester a redeemed Bluebeard, or does the comparison reveal ways in which he is not as innocent or as unthreatening as Jane may want him to be? And how does Jane compare to the heroines of the Bluebeard stories?
• Jane Eyre and "Snow White": This is not the most immediately apparent comparison; Jane's story does not very directly parallel that of Snow White. But Sandra Gilbert finds themes central to issues of the representation of women and their choices in both tales. Is she justified in doing so? Is the evil queen an inverted image of Snow White, and Bertha Mason a haunting version of Jane Eyre?

For class on Thursday, November 17, bring a thesis for your essay.