Teaching Jane Eyre: approaches to Bertha Mason (lesson plan iii)

Go to the passage in which Jane describes being singled out at Lowood and branded ‘a liar’

• how does Mr Brocklehurst treat Jane?

• how is the language of race and empire used and to what effect?

• in what ways is Mr Brocklehurst’s treatment of Jane similar to Rochester’s introduction of Bertha later in the novel?

By this stage, hopefully your students should have a good grasp of the way in which spectatorship and the politics of the gaze are brought to our attention in the novel; this has implications for the novel’s treatment of Bertha of course as it asks that we view othering as more politically aware and subversive than has been hitherto credited.