Female Subjugation over Female: A study of Interpersonal Relationship among the key female figure in Jane Eyre

Abstract

The present thesis analyses Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre from feminist perspective. It studies the protagonist’s dauntless effort to find her individuality as being herself a female. The major character Jane faces many tortures and problems in her life. It is not only the male members who dominate and exploit her; rather it is also the females who dominate and exploit. During her encounter with her aunt Mrs. Reed her different identities are manifested. Sometimes she is called 'good girl', sometimes 'bad girl' or sometimes the 'Female gothic'. She is always in search of a stable identity in the nineteenth century Victorian society. The thesis essentially analyzes how the interpersonal relationships among females rather than male, have affected the females' lives. In the novel, the relationship between Jane and her aunt is not harmonious. This disharmony is the result of Mrs. Reed's discriminatory behavior upon her. It argues that the emancipation of female not only depends on male being liberal to female but more significantly female being liberal to female themselves.