Queen Victoria

Queen Victoria came to the throne 1837, at just 18 years old. She ruled over the British empire for 64 years
and her name was given to an age of scientific and economic progress.
She had a very strong sense of duty infect she remained out of politics because she respected it and
provided stability. In 1840 she married Prince Albert and had 9 children with him. They were used as a
model of respectability. In 1857 Prince Albert received the Prince Consort in recognition of his importance
to the country and to her.
An age of reform
During the reign of Queen Victoria, there were several reforms:
The first reform act was about voting privileges : It transferred voting privileges from the
nobility and gentry to the large industrial towns like Birmingham
Factory Act: It imposes that the child from 9 to 13 could not be employed more
than forty-hours a week and child between 13 to 18 only seventy-hours
The Poor Law Amendment act: It’s about building workhouses, where the poor
people, the orphan, and the other disadvantaged people can stay.
Workhouses
These workhouses were considered terrifying because in that period they were considered
like prison. Inside these workhouses there were also a strict discipline: hard work, monotonous diet, forced
to wear a uniform, also they got separated from their family.
The idea behind this workhouse is to stay there the least time possible: the people were
aware of the awful life inside these places and would do anything to get out of these houses. The
workhouses were run by the Church.
Chartism
The Chartism were a movement created by a group of people that demanded some changes in the
parliament:
● a secret ballot ;
● universal male suffrage;
● equal electoral districts;
● a pay for the MP’s to prevent them from getting corrupted; ●
annual elections to prevent MP’s from getting corrupted.
This movement failed because the changes they asked got refused, but, however, thanks to the second
reform act, these ideas were approved except for the secret ballot.
The Irish potato famine
A combination between bad weather and an unknown plant disease from America caused the destruction
of potato crops. Ireland’s agriculture depended on potatoes and experienced a terrible famine that leaded
to a mass immigration to America and to a lot of people dying. The Prime Minister, Robert Peel, abolished
the Corn Laws that putted tariffs on imported corn, which kept the price of bread artificially low to protect
the interest of the farmers.
Technological progress
During the middle of the 19° century, England received a second wave of industrialisation
thanks to the economical, cultural and architectural changes.
The Great Exhibition was organized by Prince Albert that showed the world the economic and industrial
power of England. People became very fond of exhibitions, so money was invested in setting up several
museums. The London Underground and railways transported large quantities of raw materials and
products quickly. People were able to travel for work and leisure.
Foreign policy
During the 1850’s, England was involved in two opium wars against China. Those war were caused because
the China was trying to suppress opium’s trade. England won both war and had access to five Chinese ports
and to Hong Kong. The most lucrative colony for England was India. Englans also supported liberals
movements like the Italian. When Russia became too powerful against the Turkish Empire, the Crimean war
was fought. The Crimean War was the first conflict reported in newspapers by journalists. Florence
Nightingale leaded a team of nurses that give personal care to the wounded. When she back in England,
she formed an institution for the nursing profession.
A complex age
The Victorian Age was characterised by complexity infect it was a time of changes but also of great
contradictions. It was an age in which progress, reforms and political stability coexisted with poverty and
injustice. Modernity was praised but there was a revival of Gothic and Classicism in art. The Victorians
believed in God but also in progress and science. Freedom is freedom of conscience with optimism over
economic and political progress, and with national identity.
Respectability Education
and hygiene were encouraged. Society celebrated self-control, good manners, affirming social status,
maintaining appearances and caring for a family. Men had the duty to respect and protect women,
considered divine guides because they are morally superior. The women controlled the family budget and
raised the children. During this period the sexuality was repressed in public and private forms and the
ideals of moralism and prudery was exalted. Life
in Victorian Britain The
Victorian era was a period characterized by great dramatic changes in the life of the population. For some
it was a period of great wealth and privilege in fact there were the industrial revolution, advances in
medicine and TRANSPORT. But for the majority of the population, life had become hard. There were long
hours of work in factories or mines. Only a few could afford a wealthy life. There was an increase in
population particularly in the industrialized cities. But the housing was small and poorly hygienic. Child
labor was widespread. For example, author Charles Dickens started working at the age of 12 in a black
factory when his father was locked up in a debtor's prison. The cities were also the seat of the industrial
and commercial middle class. Their newfound wealth led to an increase in demand for goods and services,
and factories and workshops supplied clothes, toys, fine cutlery, silverware, pottery and glass. The
bourgeois were merchants and shopkeepers who lived in large houses, educated their children. The middle
class wanted respectability and the queen became their iconic symbol. She represented the ideal
femininity who looked after the family.
The Victorian novel
Readers and writers
During the Victorian age there was a communion of interest and opinion between writers and their
readers. One reason for this relationship was the growth of the middle class. Although literacy spread
heterogeneously among its members, they loved literature. The middle class took the books from the
periodicals. Also, writers themselves came from the middleclass.
The publishing world
A great part of Victorian literature was published in a serial form: all kind of
literature made their debuts as instalments in the periodical’s pages. The writers did this because the
story could be altered if the people didn’t liked it.
The Victorians’ interest in prose
The Victorians showed also a lot of interest in prose, and the greatest literary achievement of
the age was the novel: the spread of scientific knowledge made the novel realistic and
analytical, the spread of democracy made the novel social and humanitarian, the spirit of moral
made the novel inquisitive and critical.
The novelist’s aim
The Victorians felt that they had a moral and social responsibility: they wanted to reflect
the social changes such as the industrial revolution, the struggle for democracy and the
growth of towns and cities, so they described as they saw it, but they were
still aware of the problems of the society like the terrible condition of the manual workers and
the exploitation of children. Except for the sentiments that broke the current morals, in particularly sex.
An important feature of this age was the Didacticism (it is writing a story that teaches you something),
because
The narrative technique
The most used technique was the omniscient narrator, this gave the opportunity to the
writer to comment the plot and to divide good and bad behaviours.
Setting and characters
The common setting was the city because it was the symbol of the industrialisation, the
anonymous lives and the lost identities.
The character were usually normal people because they wanted people to recognize
themselves inside the characters. In this period, the writers focus also on describing the inner side of the
characters.
Type of novels
● The novel of manners
it dealt with economic and social problems and described a particular class or situation. Jane Austen
invented this, one of the master of this genre was sir Thackeray.
● The humanitarian novel (or novel of purpose) it
combined humour with a sentimental request for reform for the less fortunate. The most important writer
was Charles Dickens
● The novel of formation
These novels dealt with the development of characters from the youth to the
maturity. The most important novels were “Jane Eyre”(Charlotte Bronte) and “David
Copperfield”.
● Literary nonsense
This literature based on the nonsense, presented a world where he
social rules and conventions were disintegrated, like Alice’s adventure in Wonderland.
Women writers
A great number of novels published from the middle to the late Victorian period, were written by women
like Charlotte and Emily Bronte and Mary Ann Evans. This should be surprising considering the women’s
condition in this period infect they were submissive to their husbands. But the women were
the majority of the readers: this because women had more time to spend at
home rather than men that had to work. However, it was hard to get published as
women so they usually used a pen name.
The New England Renaissance
The cultural centre of American in the 19th century was New England, where the influence of Puritanism
was strong. This period from is known as the ' New England Renaissance, also called ' American
Renaissance. The term indicate the beginning of a truly American literature, with themes and a style of its
own.
The Puritan heritage
The literary production of this period is a reaction to the Puritan doctrine. However, the poets take from
the Puritan heritage symbols and emblems, such as allegory
Transcendentalism
The most influential figure of the American Renaissance was Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-82), who
expressed his philosophy, called "Transcendentalism". His ideas later developed into different cultural
movements: English Romanticism, German Idealism, Political Liberalism and Eastern Mysticism. The key
ideas of transcendentalism were: reality is seen as a single unit; nature is the means to attain truth and
awareness. the ' over - soul ' was the spiritual principle linking everything; man was the reflection of the
over - soul.
The power of human consciousness
This philosophy has an optimistic and self-sufficient point of view, which we find in the poems of Walt
Whitman. Transcendentalism praises humanity that transcends the mortal world through reflection and
intuition. The power of human consciousness allows man to find eternal truths in the natural world. This
idea is expressed in Civil Disobedience and Life in the Woods by Henry Thoreau, the most faithful followers
of Emerson's theories.
● Realistic novel
It took place in the late Victorian period: it mirrored a society with a growing moral and religious crisis
fields. The realistic novel began an evolutionary model inspired by Darwin's theory of evolution. The best
representatives of the realistic novel were Thomas Hardy and George Eliot. While Eliot focused on the
psychological and moral complexity of human beings, Hardy presented the clash between the forces of
nature and the social forces of human history and civilization.
● Psychological novel
This kind of novel tried to capture the monstrous and illogical aspects of life in this period and described
the double nature of the Victorian society: he wanted to represent not only the duality of the common
individual but the society as a whole, in particularly, the aristocracy that looked kind and refined but hid
horrible secrets in their houses. The perfect example of this is “Dr Jekill and Mr Hide”, wrote by Stevenson
● Colonial literature (or exotic literature)
An example of this kind of novel can be found in Kipling: he exalted the brits imperial power as a sacred
duty in the poem “The White’s Man Burden”. Here he talked about his belief that the task of the
British man, was to carry civilization and progress to the savages.
The birth of the Aesthetic Movement
This movement developed in universities and intellectual circles in the last decades of the 19th century. It
began in France thanks to Ethnophile Gautier and reflected the sense of uncertainty and frustration of the
artist, and his need to redefine the role of art. French artists refused to participate in political and social
issues and “escaped” into aesthetic isolation. The bohemian embodied a way of living against the
monotony and vulgarity of bourgeois life, pursuing sensation and excess and cultivating art and beauty.
The English Aesthetic Movement
The American painter James McNeill Whistler imported the doctrine in England. However, the origins of the
English Aesthetic Movement can be traced back to the Romantic poet John Keats, Dante, Gabriel Rossetti
and John Ruskin who paved the way for Walter Pater’s works, who is considered the main theorist of the
English Aesthetic Movement.
The theorist of English Aestheticism
Walter Pater’s Studies in the History of the Renaissance and Marius the Epicurean were immediately
successful, especially between the young people because of their subversive message. He rejected religious
fate and said that art was the only means to halt the passage of time. He also thought life should be lived as
a work of art. The task of the artist was to feel sensations and describe to the rest of the world these
sensations (also by using drugs), not the facts.
Walter Pater’s influence
Pater’s work had a great influence on the 1890s poets and writers: one of those is Wilde
and a group of artist called Rhymers club.
The Features of Aesthetic works
Adhering to Aestheticism means being selfish and indifferent. Some common features have
been identified in the works of Aesthetic artists:
➔ a hedonistic and sensuous attitude
➔ excessive attention to the self
➔ perversity in subject matter
➔ disenchantment with contemporary society
➔ evocative use of language
The European Decadent Movement
Decadence is a European movement, created by a group of French writers from the magazine Le Decadent.
The main representatives of the decline in Italy were Gabriele D'Annunzio (1863-1938), with the novel The
pleasure (1889), and the poets Giovanni Pascoli (1855-1912) and Guido Gozzano (1883-1916).
The dandy The
term 'dandy was first used in the song of the British troops during the American Revolution. The lyrics of
the song mocked the Americans presented riding a pony, with a feather on their hat. Hence the term
'dandy' referred to a man who prided himself on his appearance to him even though he wore strange and
ordinary clothes. Brummell created dandyism as a way of life. the figure of Oscar Wilde is associated with
that of the dandy.
Charles Dickens
Life and Works
Charles Dickens was born in Portsmouth in 1812. He had an unhappy childhood infect his father was
imprisoned for debt when he was 12 and he went inside a workhouse and then he went to work inside a
factory. When his finances improved and his father was released, he went to school in London. At 15 years
old he found a job inside a lawyer’s office and studied shorthand at night. At age 20, he became a very
successful reporter of parliamentary debates. He started publishing using a pen name: “Boz” and he wrote
tales describing London’s people and scenes for a periodical called “monthly magazine”. Then he also wrote
“The Pickwick Papers”, that revealed his humoristic and satirical qualities.
Dickens married Catherine Hogarth in April and became editor in the same year. After the success of the
Pickwick papers, Dickens started a full time career as a novelist. He begun to write “Oliver Twist”.
He was a republican, Dickens stood up against the US when he visited the country he talked about the
abolition of slavery. The first successful Christmas book will be “A Christmas Carol”.
Then he wrote Oliver Twist and David Copperfield, this will be considered his autobiography because he has
a lot in common with the character. His last 3 great works will be Bleak House, Hard Times, Great
Expectation that dealed with the conditions of the poor, the working class and the Utilitarianism. He will
died, he buried in Westminster Abbey.
Characters
Dickens shifted the social frontiers of the novel: he replaced the characters of the uuper-middle classes
with the ones from the lower classes. His aim was to gain the reader’s interest by exaggerating his
characters’ habits like social peculiarities like vanity and ambition. He was always by the side of the poor
and the working class. Children were often the most important characters in Dickens novels: usually good
and wise children were opposed with worthless parents and grown-up people. His ability was to make
people love this children who are model of behaviour.
A Didactic Aim
The didactic aspect was a great success because the wealthier people recognized the
conditions of the poorer classes. Dickens objective was was to make the ruling class aware on the poor
people without offending his middle classes readers.
Style and reputation
Dickens used the most effective language possible and used very powerful descriptions of
the life and of the characters. He used a lot of adjectives, repetitions and so on.
He is considered the greatest novelist in the English language.
Dickens’s narrative
Dickens’s novel were influenced by Bible and fairy tales. His plots are well-planned even they appeared
artificial, sentimental and episodic. London was the setting to most of his novels but it looked like he always
added something new and showed an intimate knowledge of it. In his mature works he condemns public
abuses, evil and wrongs.
Oliver Twist
Oliver Twist is the second novel by writer Charles Dickens, published in the first half of the nineteenth
century and is a social novel dealing with poverty, child labor and urban crime. It is published within the
monthly installments where the author signs under the name of "Boz". The novel is about an Oliver Twist
born in a workhouse, who is raised in an orphanage because his mother dies shortly after his birth. Oliver is
raised in very bad conditions, only to be sold to an undertaker. Later Oliver suffers various mistreatments
until he reacts, as the memory of his mother is insulted. Oliver escapes from this family to go to London,
here he meets a boy his age and starts working as a pickpocket. The first victim of Oliver and his friend
Dodger is Mr. Brownlow but to take the blame is Oliver who is tried, but luckily the bookseller who
witnessed the theft defends Oliver and so Mr. Brownlow decides to take the child into custody. One day
while Oliver is away from home to run an errand for Mr. Brownlow, he is kidnapped by another man
Monks, who lives with a woman named Nancy. Oliver's half-brother, Fagin who also works for Monks He
plans to kill him to get his inheritance but Nancy helps Oliver and saves him. Eventually Nancy informs
Brownlow of Monks' plans and has him arrested.
Oscar Wilde
Life and works Oscar
Wilde was born in Dublin in 1854. His father was a surgeon while his mother was a literary woman.
After graduating in classical studies at Trinity College, he went to Oxford. Here he also met
John Ruskin and Walter Pater, that introduced him to their Art for Art’s sake theory
(Aestheticism theories).
He settled in London in 1878 after he graduated, where he became a celebrity for his
extraordinary wit and his style: here he was defined as a dandy. In 1881 he published his first volume of
poems. He then went to the US when he visited New York, he told at the reporters that Aestheticism was a
search for the beautiful, a science through which men looked for the relationship between painting,
sculpture and poetry. When he returned in Europe, he married Costance Llyod and had two children with
her. At this time, He was considered a great speaker: his presence became a social event and
his remarks appeared in the most fashionable London magazines. He wrote a series of short stories and in
this period he also wrote “The Picture of Dorian Gray” and “The Importance of Being Earnest”. In 1891,
Oscar will be charged with the accuse of homosexuality with lord Alfred Douglas.
The court will sentence him 2 years of forced hard labour. While he was in prison he wrote, a long letter to
his lover Lord Douglas. After his wife refused to see him and he went to exile in France, where he lived his
in poverty. He died of meningitis in 1900 in Paris.
The rebel and the dandy
Wilde adopted the ‘aesthetic ideal’ infect he affirmed that his life is like a work of Art because he lived as a
rebel and dandy. Wilde’s dandy is an aristocrat whose elegance is a symbol of the superiority of his spirit.
And pleasure must not be hindered by morality.While the rebel side of Wilde was his dark side, that was
similar to French bohemian.
His aestheticism-Art for Art’s sake Wilde
believed that only art understood as beauty prevents the murder of the soul. For Wilde the artist is an alien
in a materialistic world and he wrote for himself. Whit his pursuit of beauty and fulfilment he became artist
an outcast.
The Picture of Dorian Gray
The novel is set in the 19th century in London. The protagonist of this novel is Dorian Gray, a charming
young man. The painter Basil Hallward decides to make a portrait of him. Dorian influenced by Lord Henry
Wotton throws himself into one life of pleasure. and even his desire for eternal youth has been realized in
fact the signs of aging do not appear on the young man's face but on his portrait. Then Dorian hides the
portrait. After many years, the painter will ask Dorian to see the portrait, but Dorian killed him when the
painter saw the corrupted image in the portrait. At some point in his life Dorian decided to stab the portrait
but in doing so he killed himself. After Dorian's death, the painting returns to its original purity and Dorian's
face becomes wrinkled and repulsive.
Characters
Dorian Gray represents the ideal of youth, beauty. The description by the young man made by the painter
creates great expectations in the reader. But it actually looks immature. In the end, his vanity and
selfishness ruined him, and the portrait is a visual representation of the degradation of his soul. Other
characters in the novel are: Lord Henry is an intellectual, a brilliant orator, Basil Hallward (the painter) is an
intellectual who falls in love with Dorian's beauty and innocence.
Narrative technique
The narrator is a third person and the narration is internal in fact there is a process of identification
between the reader and the character. The settings are described in words that appeal to the senses.
The allegorical meaning
This story is allegorical: it is considered a new version of the legend Faust (Shakespearean character, who
made a pact with the devil: in exchange for the services of the devil. In the novel, the portrait represents
the dark side of Dorian's personality, his double. The novel teaches us that any excess must be punished.
The portrait is considered a symbol of the bad conscience of the Victorian middle class, while the pure
appearance of the young man is the symbols of the bourgeois hypocrisy.
The Importance of Being Earnest
The Importance of Being Earnest is Wilde's theatrical masterpiece. The first act takes place in Mayfair
where aristocrat Algernon Moncrieff awaits his aunt, Lady Bracknell, for tea. Ernest also arrives, a friend of
his who wants to make the proposal to Lady Bracknell's daughter, Gwendolen. Algernon discovers that the
man Ernest is actually Jack Worthing, who lives in the countryside. Jack explains that he has invented an
alter ego, an evil younger brother named Ernest who lives in the city, as a pretext to avoid his
responsibilities. Algernon also confesses that he made up a friend, named Bunbury, to escape his London
social obligations. Jack must overcome the obstacle of Gwendolen's mother, Lady Bracknell, who interviews
him but discovers he was a foundling. Algernon pretends to be Ernest, and starts flirting with Cecily and
shortly afterwards Jack appears announcing the death of his brother. A comical situation is created.
Gwendolen goes to the countryside to learn more about Jack, whom she only knows as Ernest. The two
young women discover that they both were engaged to an Ernest Worthing. At the end the puzzle about
Jack's birth is solved: he is Algernon's brother and both men manage to marry the women they want.
Characters
Wilde's work is a comedy of the customs of the Restoration where the author emphasizes the problems of
his time with witty jokes. In The Importance of Being Earnest the members of the aristocratic society are
arrogant, formal and concerned about money, attending dinners and parties in luxurious homes.
Theme
The main theme of the play is marriage. Some examples come from the works of Jane Austen. Wilde jokes
about marriage that leads to hypocrisy and absurdity, in fact Victorian society does not believe in marriage
for love but as a means to obtain social status. Irony
and appearance
In the work there are witty dialogues, funny puns, misunderstandings and paradoxes. The title is a play on
words: the name 'Earnest' (a misspelling of 'Ernest') means true but none of the characters are true. The
characters are used by the author to criticize the exaggerated Victorian seriousness. irony is a dominant
feature of the work.
Edwardian England
When Queen Victoria, her son Edward became king. At that time the British Empire was very large and
British cities were the richest in Europe. However, power was challenged by the technological innovation of
France, Germany, and America. In this context, King Edward signed an agreement with France called the
Cordial Entente, which stipulated that Britain could maintain its interests in Egypt, and France in Morocco.
The king's diplomacy led to the birth of a coach between Great Britain, France and Russia who opposed
Germany, Austria or Italy. In Edwardian society there was a strong division into social classes and poverty
was widespread
The seeds of the Welfare State A
new Labor Representative Committee was born in the Labor Party. In 1906 the general elections were won
by the liberals, who split into two groups: those who supported traditional liberal values, and those who
supported New Liberalism, which was in favor of some interventions of the state in social life. The welfare
state included the introduction of a pension, free meals and regular medical inspections in schools. Three
years later, minimum wages were set and workers were granted free medical care and sick pay. In 1910
the House of Lords did not approve the People's Budget, because its members would have had to pay
higher taxes. Then the Liberals decided that the House of Lords needed to be reformed. The Parliament
Act was passed which deprived the Lords of the right of veto over the decisions of the House of Commons:
they could delay them by only two years. He also said that general elections would take place at least every
five years. This system still works.
The suffragettes
Emmeline Pankhurst founded the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU). These women called the
"Suffragettes" wanted the vote. They protested in London and Women over 21 got the vote in 1928.
The outbreak of the war In
1914 a Serbian nationalist killed Archduke Francesco Ferdinando, heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, and
his wife Sophie in Sarajevo. This event led to a series of events: Austria started bombing Belgrade, the
capital of Serbia; the German Kaiser Wilhelm II declared war on Russia and then on France; Germany
invaded Belgium. When Germany violated Belgian neutrality, Britain declared war.
Britain at war
In September 1914 the German army had reached the Marne River, where a great battle stopped the
Germans. the Secretary of State for War, Lord Kitchener, understanding that the war would last a long
time, relied on volunteers who came from Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Then women replaced men
in their civil jobs.
The Easter Rising in Ireland
The term "Irish question" refers to the tragic events surrounding the struggle for Irish independence. In
1916 there was a rebellion in Dublin which was supported by Germany. During the rebellion the general
post office was seized. The rebellion was suppressed.
A war of attrition
In May 1915 a German submarine sank the British passenger ship and more than a thousand people died,
including 128 Americans. The president of the United States sent diplomatic protests to Germany. In the
same month Italy joined France and Great Britain, and there was the first aerial bombardment of London.
The bloodiest battle took place on the Somme. Huge battles were fought here to kill soldiers. The Germans
also relied on submarines, called U-boats, to fight the war at sea. Life in the trenches was very stressful due
to the mud, lack of hygiene, boredom and fear of gas. By the term 'Shell shock' doctors referred to the
psychological effect of bullet explosions. the Bolsheviks seized power in Russia and the Italian army
collapsed in the battle of Caporetto in October 1917. The Austrians had mass desertions, Germany was
starving. The United States joined the war in April 1917 alongside Great Britain. Bronte sister
Charlotte, Emily and Anne were the Brontë sisters who had an important influence on the Victorian age.
Their life was uneventful because they spent most of the time living in isolation. They were self-educated
by reading their father's library. They began to express their emotions since ever, but with the publication
of Poems by Currer they started to be famous. As the most part of female writers, they used pseudonyms
for their works. The most important masterpiece is Jane Eyre.
JANE EYRE
Jane is an orphan who was brought by her cold aunt to a very strict school, that was like a prison. When
she grows up she becomes a teacher there, but she decides after to accept the job as governess at
Thonfield Hall, where she will fall in love with Mr Rochester, the owner. The life at all was characterized by
the strangest events. After some long-time distance, she returns to Mr Rochester Place, where he will
propose to her. While they were on the altar, A woman, which was Rochester wife, Bertha mason,
interrupted the ceremony. Rochester prays Jane to stay with him, but she will leave The hall to go to live
with her cousins at Moor House. Here She will met St. John rivers, which he will propose to her. Jane
refuses because she was still thinking about Rochester. One night she hears Rochester voice, so she
decided to go back to the hall place! But she will find only the remains of a fired house, Rochester in this
accident lost her sight of him. He now lives in Ferdean, with Jane. The two are married and they also have
a child.
SETTINGS
The novels are structured on a separate location, and they all represent something because they have a
significant name. CHARACTERS
Each section of the novels represent a new phase of Jane's development. She undergoes many struggles.
especially bea use she is an outsider, we can recognize the free spirit fightning for the self respect. In
Rochester we can see the quality of the Byronic hero, the stereotyped seducer that becomes an nobleman
and that is in love with the woman not only for her physical appearance but for her personality.
THEMES
Jane Eyre is a BILDUNGRS ROMAN, a novel of growing up woman who had a tortuous past who fought for
her independence from her. The most important theme is the analysis of the woman in the Victorian
society, because she is treated like a servant here. If Jane was a man, she might improved her position than
her. The traditional gothic use of symbols demands a more complicated response and reflection on the
situation rather be the single part