A Law Review Article about Jane Eyre; Some excerpts

30 Rutgers L.J. 597 Rutgers Law Journal Spring, 1999 Symposium: Fourth Annual Mid-Atlantic People of Color Legal Scholarship Conference Law and Literature: Examining the Limited Legal Imagination in the Traditional Legal Canon *597 THE BLACK WOMAN IN THE ATTIC: LAW, METAPHOR AND MADNESS IN JANE EYRE Michele Cammers Goodwin [FNa1] Copyright © 1999 by the Rutgers University School of Law, Camden; Michele Cammers Goodwin I. INTRODUCTION ........................................................ 598 II. RECLAIMING VOICE & CHALLENGING THE DISCOURSE: THE VALUE OF LAW & LITERATURE ........................................................ 610 A. Return to Law & Literature ....................................... 612 B. Law in Literature ................................................ 617 C. Judicial and Legislative Activism: A Novel Approach and Case Study on Anne Brontë ............................................. 619 1. Literature as Life ............................................ 620 2. Literature Prompts Reform ..................................... 622 D. Race, Feminism, and The Novel Approach ........................... 623 1. Gender Essentialism ........................................... 623 2. Race Essentialism ............................................. 625 3. Race & Gender Essentialism: The Dynamic Duo ................... 627 4. The Emergence of Silence ...................................... 628 III. CONTEXTUALIZING BRONTE'S WORLD: WOMEN IN THE VICTORIAN ERA .......... 629 A. Property, Women, and the Law ..................................... 629 1. Black Women as Property: An "Other" Story ..................... 629 2. Coverture: An Iniquitous Tale ................................. 633 B. Women and Education .............................................. 635 C. Sex, Passion, & Madness .......................................... 638 IV. POVERTY, LAW AND MADNESS, A STRANGE SYMBIOSIS: OR A BRIEF HISTORY ... 642 A. Due Process ...................................................... 642 B. Misdiagnosis ..................................................... 649 C. Labeling ......................................................... 651 D. Confinement ...................................................... 656 V. JANE EYRE: WHOSE STORY IS IT ANYWAY ................................. 658 A. A Critique of Feminist Interpretation ............................ 658 B. Two Women, One House, One Man: Jane & Bertha ..................... 662 C. No Recourse, No Due Process ... No Justice ....................... 667 1. Jane Eyre ..................................................... 667 2. Bertha ........................................................ 671 D. Homelessness and Poverty: The Helpless Jane ...................... 673 E. Stolen Wealth from Bertha ........................................ 675 F. Confinement ...................................................... 676 1. Domestic Confinement: Is There No Place Like Home? ............ 676 2. Institutional Confinement: Is It Really Better than Being on the Street? ....................................................... 678 VI. CONCLUSION .......................................................... 680 *598 I. INTRODUCTION While some of the history of the domain "law and literature" has been told, relatively little attention has been paid to the question of the canon-- of who is given voice, who cited, quoted and marginalized, ignored, submerged. Judith Resnik [FN1] I hardly expect that the reader will credit me, when I affirm that I lived in that little dismal hole, almost deprived of light and air, and with no space to move my limbs for nearly seven years. But it is a fact; and ... a sad one; for my body still suffers from the effects of that long imprisonment. Harriet Jacobs [FN2] *599 After attacking the sacred majesty of Kings, I shall not excite surprise by adding my firm persuasion that every profession, in which great subordination of rank constitutes its power, is highly injurious to morality. Mary Wollstonecraft [FN3] We let them in chains rot in their own excrement. Their fetters have eaten off the flesh of their bones, and their emaciated pale faces look expectantly toward their shallow graves which will end their misery and cover up our shamefulness. Reil (1803) [FN4] [T]he book is interesting--only I wish the characters would talk a little less like the heroes and heroines of police reports. George Eliot on Jane Eyre (1848) [FN5] Real-life drama found in news reports, legal cases, and police reports are potential sources for "gripping fiction." [FN6] The salacious details of public and private scandals can satisfy even the most insatiable gossip's appetite. It is thus understandable why most literary fiction (novels, short stories, novellas) reflect the social, psychological, and legal conundrums of a particular time. [FN7] Communities often indulge in its members publicized misery. This indulgence, albeit voyeuristic, can best be perceived as a search for truth and justice. Very often, understanding may be a by-product of that search. Indeed, the successful novel provides more than narratives; it challenges its audience to think and explore its subtle truths. Specifically, literature provides a forum for observing the human condition; it "trains *600 people in the reflection, consciousness, choice, and responsibility that make up the ability to engage in moral decisionmaking." [FN8] The purpose of this Article is to use literature to explore the intersection of madness, law, gender, and race during the Victorian era. This study uses Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre [FN9] to gain a greater understanding or appreciation for the social, legal, and political climates of the era and to place the treatment of women, people of color, and the mentally ill in the proper context. Although other novels written during the Victorian Era explore madness and its relative legal implications, Jane Eyre is particularly intriguing given its metaphors of slavery, poverty, racism, gender subordination, and even religious bigotry. The novel's relevance to the Victorian plight of women, from the female gaze, makes it a classic deserving our attention. Brontë, like a nineteenth-century Barbara Walters, develops an expose on adultery, false imprisonment, racial intolerance, and domestic violence. [FN10] Anita Allen, one of Jane's staunchest critics, nevertheless describes the novel as remarkable for its "psychological interiority," [FN11] commenting that legal scholars who recognize the complexity of this novel realize its historical value. Clouded racial issues, gender subordination, and madness loom throughout the novel, but achieve their climax and intersection during Jane's tenure as a governess under the watchful eye of her adulterous employer, Edward Rochester. *601 Ironically, these issues, arguably the most controversial aspects of her work, have eluded the novel's critics and proponents for more than a century. More than 150 years have passed since Charlotte Brontë pseudonymously published Jane Eyre in 1847 under the androgynous guise of Currer Bell. Acutely aware of gender subordination and unscrupulous reviews of women's literature, she consciously assumed a male identity. [FN12] Brontë acknowledged that she and her sisters challenged the roles and voices of women. While reflecting on the literary lives of her deceased siblings, she observed "our mode of writing and thinking was not what is called 'feminine."' [FN13] Indeed, honesty, passion, and defiance from women writers generated boundless criticism from both men and women. [FN14] Women during that era, explains Joan Perkin, were defined as intellectually inferior to men and presumed unsophisticated to the ways of the world. [FN15] It was unfitting and unbecoming for a woman to express ideas that, at the time, were considered vulgar, brutal, and evil. [FN16] Brontë once lamented, "I wish all *602 reviewers believed 'Currer Bell' to be a man; they would be more just to him. You will, I know, keep measuring me by some standard of what you deem becoming to my sex; where I am not what you consider graceful you will condemn me." [FN17] Through Jane Eyre, Bertha Mason Rochester, and other women who weave in and out of the novel, Brontë captured the intersection of law, literature, and life for women and girls in mid-nineteenth-century England. [FN18] Critics have long explored the similarities between the fictitious Jane and Charlotte. As Joan Perkin explains, Brontë's life mirrored that of her protagonist; both were educated at deplorable institutions, witnessed the psychological collapse of loved ones, and fell in love with married men. [FN19] "The [unsanitary] conditions at Lowood Asylum were based on a school for the daughters of the clergy at Cowan Bridge in Lancashire, [where] two of [her] sisters died after contracting tuberculosis." [FN20] The frightening howls of Bertha Mason Rochester are reminiscent of Charlotte's younger brother's fits of delirium tremens. [FN21] Under Charlotte's gaze, Branwell Brontë succumbed to debauchery, alcohol, and drug addiction, and eventually, insanity. [FN22] Charlotte's confused emotions and embarrassment surrounding her brother's demise may have influenced Jane's less than sensitive reaction to Bertha. Readers--jurors of the text--bear witness to law's engagement with complex social issues in the novel. Brontë provided her readers with an open window to the social, economic, and political landscape of the Victorian era, unveiling the psychological misogyny curtained behind liberal positivism, insensitive traditions, and iniquitous laws. [FN23] Here, Brontë's passionate plea for justice highlights the plight of Victorian women: *603 Women are supposed to be very calm generally; but women feel just as men feel; they need to exercise for their faculties, and a field for their efforts as much as their brothers do; they suffer from too rigid a restraint ... precisely as men would suffer; and it is narrow-minded ... to say that they ought to confine themselves to making puddings and knitting stockings, to playing on the piano and embroidering bags. It is thoughtless to condemn them, or laugh at them, if they seek to do more or learn more than custom has pronounced necessary for their sex. [FN24] Brontë stimulated contemporary discourse on gender subordination, homelessness, racism, confinement, the wanton treatment of wards in institutions, adultery, and mental illness. [FN25] Social reality drives the text, situating women, wards, and the mad in context with Victorian attitudes and beliefs. Darkness pervades the novel, making the prose, for the attentive reader, more than a simple romantic journey. [FN26] Those who see the novel as only romantic fiction overlook the psychological enigmas and struggles between Divine and positivist law erupting throughout the book. [FN27] Legal, social, political, and cultural issues resonate throughout the narrative, attracting the attention of psychiatrists, sociologists, and legal practitioners. [FN28] *604 The novel's universal appeal derives from its ability to transcend cultural boundaries. [FN29] For its women readers, the novel holds special appeal. The plight of the sagacious young orphan evokes sympathy among many; her loneliness, disconnection from family, feelings of abandonment, and fight against male dominance touch a cord with female readers. Unlike the submissive, wealthy, and beautiful Victorian heroine, Jane described herself as plain, friendless, outspoken, and poor. [FN30] She could be anyone's daughter, sister, cousin, or friend. Perhaps, for this reason the novel is frequently revisited. On Angela Carter's rereading of Jane Eyre as an adult, she remarked, "[O]ne wants the world to be kind, not to Jane, but to the girl who invented Jane, and, in doing so, set out so vividly her hopes and fears and longings on the page." [FN31] Jane's hopes and fears are universally applicable to the contemporary female condition. Desiring an education, respect, equitable compensation, and love-- without compromising one's values [FN32]--is an aspiration for all *605 women. Readers admire Jane's tenacity and courage. [FN33] She "was strong enough to search-inquire-to grope an outlet," [FN34] and triumph over nineteenth-century essentialism. For Linda Hirshman, Jane's refusal to internalize abuse and subordination renders her an ever-powerful symbol of strength for all women. However, feminist critics of the novel deconstruct the classical Jane Eyre: The Cinderella motif. They challenge the Victorian discourse where liberal positivism reminds us that good conquers evil, hard work overcomes poverty, and obedience to God and State secures heaven and earth-bound peace. [FN35] In essence, they question Jane's strict adherence to normative values--or male authority--which allows her to transcend poverty and attain financial and emotional gratification before death. They direct our attention to the fact that Jane's "true success"--marriage, family, and established wealth--occurs only after compliance or submission to natural and positive law. [FN36] In their view, Jane relinquishes autonomy and self-*606 respect, and concedes to male authority. Thus, when Jane sacrifices her independence for the ghostly calls of her adulterous ex-lover, she has given up the fight: [FN37] "I saw nothing: but I heard a voice somewhere cry--'Jane! Jane! Jane!' nothing more .... And it was the voice of a human being--a known, loved, well-remembered voice--that of Edward Fairfax Rochester; and it spoke in pain and woe wildly, eerily, urgently." [FN38] Without knowledge to the contrary, Jane flees home, friends, and gainful employment for the mendacious married man that she left the year before. [FN39] Critics conclude that the novel holds little value for contemporary feminist critique: "[A] consoling novel is not necessarily an effective antidote to liberal patriarchy." [FN40] Undeniably, Jane's contradictory behavior stirs confusion amongst the novel's critics and supporters. Vehement arguments wage amongst feminists torn between interpreting Jane as being part of the gender subordination problem or part of the liberation solution. Accordingly, Linda Hirshman [FN41] emphatically rejects Anita Allen's interpretation of Jane as an Austenian, "habitually obedient to the tyranny," "privileged," and "bourgeois." [FN42] In a commentary on Allen's article, Hirshman passionately asserts that Jane rejects the moral unity of English positivism. According to Hirshman, Jane "is a persistent rebel." [FN43] However, Allen's observation that "Jane seemed to be a privileged, bourgeois, white Englishwoman with an admittedly miserable childhood who complains about women's inequality and poverty but does nothing about either," [FN44] strikes a stinging blow to many feminist Jane Eyre admirers. Surely, both scholars, each self-described feminists, interpret the novel from their own socio-economic, cultural, racial and political points of view. [FN45] This is not illogical. However, if it is the case that *607 scholars will cling to images familiar to them, who then, will claim Bertha Mason, the rejected, perhaps insane, black woman in the attic? [FN46] Sadly, madness has the effect of leaving one friendless and without allies in spite of gender and racial ties. Most Jane Eyre scholars overlook the intersection of race, gender, and mental illness in the novel. Their oversight is particularly surprising with regard to the black woman in the attic. The implications of this intersection have contemporary as well as historic import; [FN47] scholarly neglect reflects a larger social disengagement with issues affecting women labeled mentally ill [FN48]--particularly those of color. [FN49] A diagnosis of "culturally unfit" or *608 "socially inadequate" in qualities and character often justified psychiatric and legal intervention in the lives of sane women. [FN50] At the turn of the century, in an era presumed to be more equitable than the previous, women of color were targets of eugenic experimentation, involuntary and court-sanctioned sterilization, and psychiatric misdiagnosis. [FN51] An unresolved silence encapsulates this largely untold and unacknowledged tragic history. While perhaps a point of shame and embarrassment for both the legal and medical communities, these stories merit acknowledgment and discussion. This "dark age" in our history warrants investigation. Jane Ussher, on deconstructing madness and sexual identity, attributes racism and xenophobia as the cause of over-identifying and labeling women of color as "mad." [FN52] She notes that "diagnosis of madness acts as a means of dismissing behavior," and "controlling" what is right or normal in a society. [FN53] Consequently, women can be labeled and treated as "mad" for failure to observe and conform to the myth of femininity. Further, women of color or immigrants can be labeled "mad" for failure to assimilate or become "a part of their host culture." [FN54] Brontë, intentionally or not, reveals the combined complexity of race, gender, and madness. A cruel, self-centered husband such as Edward Rochester might have caged a white wife in the attic [FN55] although he assures *609 Jane of the contrary. [FN56] His malevolence, vile descriptions of his wife, and constant references to Bertha Mason Rochester's color, size, hair texture, intellect and his vain desire for "antipodes of the Creole" continually remind us that race is an issue for him. [FN57] In fact, he passionately confides to Jane "it is not because she is mad I hate her. If you were mad, do you think I should hate you?" [FN58] Arguably, Rochester would not lock Jane in the foreboding attic with an alcoholic servant as companion, guard, and nurse as he did with his black wife. [FN59] I should not shrink from you with disgust as I did from her: in your quiet moments you should have no watcher and no nurse but me; and I could hang over you with untiring tenderness, though you gave me no smile in return; and never weary of gazing into your eyes, though they had no longer a ray of recognition for me. [FN60] Here, Rochester discloses views not inconsistent with popular culture. This passage reflects Victorian attitudes on race, gender, and mental illness. As for the victims of this dark age, their muted voices, having long been overlooked and disregarded, may be audible in literature--if we choose to listen. This Article uses law and literature as a convenient tool to investigate and explicate the intersection of madness, law, gender and race during the Victorian era. Madness, a multifarious theme in the novel, reveals itself as motive, metaphor, and motif. This study of the novel is concerned with three aspects of madness and the law treated in Jane Eyre: the legal rights of mad women; diagnosis and treatment; and poverty and homelessness. It also challenges feminist interpretations of the novel, interrogating the over-identification with Jane as victim while overlooking the black woman in the attic. *610 Part II of this Article defends the value of using literature to gain a greater insight to legal and social issues. Part III places the novel in context with the Victorian era by examining prevailing laws, principles, and attitudes on race, gender, sexuality, and madness. Part IV analyzes the historical symbiosis between law, poverty, and madness, which backdrops the novel; it also briefly examines the ramifications of a traditionally misogynistic psychiatric process. Its four primary foci are due process, diagnosis, labeling, and confinement. Part V deconstructs the novel in context with that psychological process, critiquing feminist interpretation of the novel and analyzing the implications of legal and psychiatric misogyny in the lives of Jane Eyre and Bertha Mason Rochester. It explicates the complex symbiosis between poverty and madness in the novel.