Jane Eyre: A Halfway Fighter

Due to the obvious connections between Jane Eyre and Wide Sargasso Sea,many scholars and critics began to combine these two novels into their studies.However,most of these studies are respecting Wide Sargasso Sea’s inheritance and subversion of Jane Eyre,while few are able to discuss systematically their intertextuality in symbolism at the theoretical level.And studies on the resistant spirits of the two heroines from the perspective of symbolism are still fewer.Based on the theory of intertextuality and symbolism,this thesis will be focused on symbolic images used in these two novels,such as looking glasses,dreams,shifting spaces and fires.Through close reading and comparative analysis,the psychological states of these two heroines could be explored by the author much more thoroughly.In this way,this thesis is aimed not only to explain the intertextuality in symbolic techniques between Jane Eyre and Wide Sargasso Sea,but also to highlight those long neglected facts such as Jane Eyre’s fear of patriarchal society as well as the limitations of her rebellion.The whole thesis is divided into 5 chapters.Chapter One will provide the readers with necessary literary backgrounds and theoretical foundation.The main body will be from chapter two to chapter five,following the psychological growth of both heroines.Specifically speaking,Chapter Two will be devoted to proving their lack of positive identity,deducted from reflections they received from all of those mirror images.Chapter Three will focus on the frequently appeared dream images in both novels,which indicate the two heroines’ fear of establishing a fresh but subordinate identity in a patriarchal family.In Chapter Four,the image of Thornfield will be fully discussed so as to prove its similar confining influences on both heroines,which will be followed by the comparison of the divergent meanings of the fire images in them.In this way,limitations of Jane Eyre’s rebellion would be distinguished through comparison,which will be summarized in Chapter Five.Through comparative analysis of the two heroines based on the intertextuality in symbolism,this thesis may contribute to supplementing relative studies in this field and completing people’s understandings of Jane Eyre’s character.