Essay on Social Conventions in Jane Eyre and Hedda Gabler

Social Conventions in Jane Eyre and Hedda Gabler Charlotte Brontes novel Jane Eyre and Henrik Ibsens play Hedda Gabler were written within fifty years of each other in the late 1800s. Both Jane and Hedda dwell within the same social contexts. They ar women of the middle class in European cultures. The fact Jane is penniless through much of the novel does not suspend her from the middle class. Jane and Heddas experiences, education and values all belong to the middle class. Therefore it should be no surprise their words echo. In detail and outcome their stories are different. However, it is the constraints of the same social forms which drive their different destinies. It is the same confusion of social convention with morality and spirituality that pains both their existences. Confusing social convention with legal, moral, and religious codes of conduct is a phenomena not confined to the 19th century. It is this same confusion that created Jim Crow Laws, anti-gay legislation and fuels the fire of the abortion rights debate. Social conventions of the 1800s did not award women of the middle class to live independently. With few exceptions women moved from fathers household to husbands household. It was the fathers prerogative to arrange a suitable marriage. In truth there might be a carefully selected few to choose from, but any unauthorized selection would hold severe consequences for both men and women. Jane Eyres mother was disowned because she chose to marry an unapproved man. Jane would rear because of this transgression, which occurred before she was even born. After being orphaned, Jane lives with her Aunt Reed. She is continually reminded she is a dependent and is unloved by her r... ...ton Prentice Hall, 1992. Ellis, Kate and Kaplan, Ann. Nineteenth Century Women at the Movies Adapting unspotted Womens Fiction to Film. Bowling Green, OH Popular, 1999 Jane Eyre. Dir. Christy Cabanne. Perf. Virginia Bruce, Colin Clive, and Beryl Mercer. 1934. Jane Eyre. Dir. Franco Zeffirelli. Perf. William Hurt, Charlotte Gainsborough, and Anna Paquin. 1996 Jane Eyre. Dir. Julian Aymes. Perf. Timothy Dalton, Zelah Clarke. 1983 Jane Eyre. Dir. Robert Stevenson. Perf. Joan Fontaine, Orson Welles, and Margaret OBrien. 1944 Peters, Joan D. Finding a Voice Towards a Womans Discourse in dialog in the Narration of Jane Eyre. Studies in the Novel. 23 no 2. (1991) 217-36. Zonana, Joyce. The Sultan and the Slave Feminist Orientalism and the Structure of Jane Eyre. Signs. 18 no 3. (1993) 592-617