I had to write a scene from Jane Eyre from a different point of view for my English class, and I liked what I came up with enough to publish it.
DISCLAIMER: All dialogue belongs to Charlotte Brontë, not me.
It was snowing outside. I knelt by the fireplace, absorbed in finishing my book, Rasselas. I was just finishing the last page, when I heard light footsteps coming behind me. My suspicion as to the person's identity was confirmed when she asked, "Is it still Rasselas?"
It was the new girl, Jane Eyre. She had spoken to me once before, when I was reading in the garden, and I could see that she was curious about me. I admit, I was curious about her as well; although I rather wished that she would wait until I had finished reading. "Yes," I replied, "and I have just finished it." I then focused my attention back on my book, and did not look up until I was truly finished. I half expected that Jane would have wandered away, but as soon as I shut the book, she sat beside me on the floor. It seemed that she wanted to make conversation.
"What is your name besides Burns?"
"Helen."
"Do you come a long way from here?"
"I come from a place farther north; quite on the borders of Scotland."
"Will you ever go back?"
"I hope so; but nobody can be sure of the future."
"You must wish to leave Lowood?"
She is very bold, I thought, to ask questions like this. It's refreshing to me, but it'll get her into a lot of trouble. "No: why should I?" I answered automatically. "I was sent to Lowood to get an education; and it would be of no use going away until I have attained that object."
Jane seemed surprised. "But that teacher, Miss Scatcherd, is so cruel to you?"
"Cruel? Not at all! She is severe; she dislikes my faults." I wasn't sure that that was entirely true, but it was better for Jane to believe.
"And if I were in your place I should dislike her; I should resist her; if she struck me with that rod, I should get it from her hand; I should break it under her nose."
I was rather shocked by her words, although I didn't show it. This girl, I thought, is going to need to learn to keep her mouth shut for her own good. Out loud, I replied calmly, "Probably you would do nothing of the sort: but if you did, Mr. Brocklehurst would expel you from the school: that would be a great grief to your relations. It is far better to endure patiently a smart which nobody feels but yourself, that tend to all connected with you; and, besides, the Bible bids us return good for evil."
Having now seen what Jane was like, I was less surprised when she said, "But then it seems disgraceful to be flogged, and to be sent to stand in the middle of a room full of people; and you are such a great girl: I am far younger than you, and I could not bear it."
I empathised with her, but I could not tell her that. She had to learn.
"Yet it would be your duty to bear it, if you could not avoid it: it is weak and silly to say you cannot bear what it is your fate to be required to bear."
Jane looked confused, but she evidently decided to drop the subject, to my relief. Unfortunately, her next topic of choice was no better. It seemed to be her habit and purpose to make her questions into thorns that bit into my skin.
"You say you have faults, Helen: what are they? To me you seem very good." Internally, I grumbled at that question, but I really should have known that she would ask that. She's really far too curious for her own good.
"Then learn from me, not to judge by appearances. I am, as Miss Scatcherd said, slatternly; I seldom put, and never keep, things in order; I am careless; I forget rules; I read when I should learn my lessons; I have no method: and sometimes I say, like you, I cannot bear to be subjected to systematic arrangements. This is all very provoking to Miss Scatcherd, who is naturally neat, punctual, and particular."
"And cross and cruel," Jane added. I silently agreed, but refused to acknowledge it as Jane wanted me to.
"Is Miss Temple as severe to you as Miss Scatcherd?"
I smiled at the thought of Miss Temple. "Miss Temple is full of goodness: it pains her to be severe to any one, even the worst in the school: she sees my errors, and tells me of them gently; and, if I do anything worthy of praise, she gives me my mead liberally. One strong proof of my wretchedly defective nature is that even her expostulations, so mild, so rational, have not influence to cure me of my faults; and even her praise, though I value it most highly, cannot stimulate me to continued care and foresight." I knew I was rambling, but I thought Jane wouldn't care.
"That is curious," she said; "it is so easy to be careful."
Well, this is where we are different. "For you I have no doubt it is. I observed you in your class this morning, and saw you were closely attentive: your thoughts never seemed to wander while Miss Miller explained the lesson and questioned you. Now, mine continually rove away: when I should be listening to Miss Scatcherd, and collecting all she says with assiduity, often I lose the very sound of her voice; I fall into a sort of dream. Sometimes I think I am in Northumberland, and that the noises I hear round me are the bubbling of a little brook which runs through Deepden, near our house: -then, when it comes to my turn to reply, I have to be wakened; and, having heard nothing of what was read for listening to the visionary brook, I have no answer ready." I said.
To be honest, I wasn't sure why I was being so open with this little girl.
"Yet how well you replied this afternoon," she said, seemingly surprised.
"It was mere chance: the subject on which we had been reading had interested me." I probably should have left it at that, but my mouth kept moving on its own accord. "This afternoon, instead of dreaming of Deepden, I was wondering how a man who wished to do right could act so unjustly and unwisely as Charles the First sometimes did; and I thought what a pity it was that, with his integrity and conscientiousness, he could see not farther than the prerogatives of the Crown. If he had but been able to look to a distance, and see how what they call the spirit of the age was tending! Still, I like Charles- I respect him- I pity him, poor murdered king! Yes, his enemies were the worst: they shed blood they had no right to shed. How dared they kill him!"
"And when Miss Temple teaches you, do your thoughts wander then?" I had almost forgotten about Jane during my little rant. Suddenly, I remembered how young and ignorant she was; she likely hadn't understood a word of my speech. I had gotten lost in my own little world again. Feeling sheepish, I pulled myself back to the present.
"No, certainly, not often; because Miss Temple has generally something to say which is newer than my own reflections; her language is singularly agreeable to me, and the information she communicates is often just what I wished to gain."
"Well, then, with Miss Temple you are good?" Something in Jane's tone told me that that was a loaded question. I decided to answer honestly.
"Yes, in a passive way; I make no effort; I follow as inclination guides me. There is no merit in such goodness."
"A great deal; you are good to those who are good to you. It is all I ever desire to be. If people were always kind and obedient to those who are cruel and unjust, the wicked people would have it all their own way; they would never feel afraid, and so they would never alter, but would grow worse and strike back again very hard; I am sure we should- so hard as to teach the person who struck us never to do it again." It had been a loaded question after all.
She means well, I thought, but she is too young. She has no idea what she's talking about, and if she doesn't either change her mind about that or learn to keep her opinions to herself, she'll get in a lot of trouble. "You will change your mind, I hope, when you grow older; as yet you are a little untaught girl."
"But I feel this, Helen: I must dislike those who, whatever I do to please them, persist in disliking me; I must resist those who punish me unjustly. It is as natural as that I should love those who show me affection, or submit to punishment when I feel it is deserved."
Your age is showing, Jane. "Heathens and savage tribes hold that doctrine; but Christians and civilized nations disown it."
"How? I don't understand."
That is because you are young, and naive. "It is not violence that best overcomes hate- nor vengeance that most certainly heals injury."
"What, then?" She seemed almost agitated.
"Read the New Testament, and observe what Christ says, and how He acts; make His word your rule, and His conduct your example."
"What does he say?"
"Love your enemies; bless them that curse you; do good to them that hate you and despitefully use you." I didn't really expect her to understand, but I also didn't expect her to argue; however, argue she did.
"Then I should love Mrs. Reed, which I cannot do: I should bless her son John, which is impossible." I asked her to explain, and several minutes later I knew Jane Eyre's story. I felt bad for her, having grown up in a home like that, but the way she spoke of her relatives, oh my. It was clear that she said exactly what she wanted to, and did not hold back.
She asked me if I thought Mrs. Reed was "a hard-hearted woman."
The trouble is, I realized, she hasn't learned to see the world from any perspective other than her own. And why should she have? She's very young.
"She has been unkind to you, no doubt, because, you see, she dislikes your cast of character, as Miss Scatcherd does mine; but how minutely you remember all she has done and said to you! What a singularly deep impression her injustice seems to have made on your heart! No ill-usage brands so brands its record on my feelings. Would you not be happier if you tried to forget her severity, together with the passionate emotions it excited? Life appears to me too short to be spent in nursing animosity, or registering wrongs. We are, and must be, one and all, burdened with faults in this world: but the time will soon come when, I trust, we shall put them off in putting off out corruptible bodies; when debasement and sin will fall from us with this cumbrous frame of flesh, and only the spark of the spirit will remain- the impalpable principle of life and thought, pure as when it left the Creator to inspire the creature; whence it came it will return, perhaps again to be communicated to some being higher than man- perhaps to pass through gradations of glory, from the pale human soul to brighten to the seraph! Surely it will never, on the contrary, be suffered to degenerate from men to fiend? No, I cannot believe that: I hold another creed, which no one ever taught me, and which I seldom mention, but in which I delight, and to which I cling, for it extends hope to all; it makes eternity a rest- a mighty home- not a terror and an abyss. Besides, with this creed, I can so clearly distinguish between the criminal and his crime, I can so sincerely forgive the first while I abhor the last; with this creed, revenge never worries my heart, degradation never too deeply disgusts me, injustice never crushes me too low; I live in calm, looking to the end."
Whether I died tomorrow, this winter, or in fifty years' time, I had resolved to stay true to myself until the very end. I had gotten lost in my own thoughts again, and this time I didn't bother to drag myself back. I was done talking, and Jane seemed to sense that.
"Helen Burns, if you don't go and put your drawer in order, and fold up your work this minute, I'll tell Miss Scatcherd to come and look at it!" It was a monitor. I heaved a deep sigh at being forced to leave my little world, but I stood and went to tidy up.
She is strange, I thought later, and yet at the same time not strange at all. She sees past the shadows on the cave wall, and she will be ridiculed for it; yet she is right. Perhaps not in everything, but at least her heart is where it should be.
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