"an Effective Evocation Of Childhood Presents A Writer With A Huge Challenge"-beginning With A Close

Childhood can shape beliefs, provoke behaviour for better or worse and alter a person's entire future. Throughout Jane Eyre Bronte uses self-conscious narration in past tense, gothic settings and thought provoking imagery in an attempt to evoke an effective childhood in which the reader can emphasise with Jane but also . Whereas Rhys contrasts this narration with a stream of consciousness with no clear structure or awareness of the reader. Although Rhys too uses past tense, a gothic and emotive setting and thought provoking imagery in order to evoke an effective childhood for Antoinette. Throughout the set passage Bronte uses differing sentence length in the dialogue between Jane and John to evoke an effective portrayal of being powerless as a child. John is given the only long and interrupted dialogue and is also given imperatives such as "go and stand by the door" and again Mrs Reed "take her away". This technique allows Bronte to make it clear that although Jane is biologically related to the Reed's, her social position is no more than a servant or maid who is not allowed to play with the same toys, read the same books, or have a freedom in a house that will always "belong" to someone else. The use imperatives and long sentence length combines with John's use of personal pronouns such as "my" and "I" to make Jane appear excluded and alienated as a child. This use of dialogue so early in the novel allows Bronte to make the reader emphasise with Jane and cast their mind back to a time where they were similarly spoken to as a child. This creates an effective childhood that draws the reader in but also contrasts Rhys use of dialogue, as Antoinette is not treated cruelly but still given little affection and often is told to "let me alone" by her own Mother. This suggests that throughout the set passage Bronte uses differing sentence length, imperatives and pronouns to evoke an effective childhood with little difficultly that demonstrates to a reader that Jane as a child will be powerless and isolated. Additionally, despite Bronte using past tense narration throughout Jane Eyre, in this passage she uses descri ptive narrative to give the reader an insight into the fear and intimidation Jane felt as child when faced with John Reed. In particular after the fight has been Jane's sentences reduce in length as the emotion heightens -" I really saw in him a tyrant: a murderer", later using the adjective "frantic" in relation to her physical response to the attack. Bronte's uses of this childlike narration allows a reader to understand how overwhelmed Jane felt as a child when faced with injustice, but also that Jane was strong willed and confident enough to fight back when faced with adversity. Similarly Bronte's use of adjectives further enables the reader to emphasise with the shame, embarrassment and frustration Jane feels in her childhood and also creates a strong image of John. John is described as "unwholesome", "bilious", "stout", "flabby" and "sallow" this almost venomous descri ption of John allows for the evocation of an effective childhood due to passionate and even unfair adjectives being common when children feel they have been unjustly treated. Rhys too uses imagery to evoke an effective childhood using adjective such as the descri ption of the fire being " a horrible noise.like animals howling but worse". However Rhys imagery tends to be written colloquially and much more simply than Jane Eyre making Antoinette's childhood seem very immediate as if a child is writing it, despite it being in past tense. Thus Bronte's use of a descri ptive narrative with expressive adjectives expresses the impulsive element of childhood and creates strong imagery in the readers mind about the intensity of the fight between John and Jane . Furthermore, throughout the entirety of Jane's childhood Bronte makes use of both self conscious narration and internal monologue to add an adult perspective and the thoughts of Jane at the time which contrast the physical actions presented. In particular during the intial meeting between Jane, Mrs Reed and Mr Brocklehurst Bronte has Jane express " Benefactress! Benefactress!-said I inwardly", this allows a reader to understand how alienated Jane is as her only known relatives view her as nothing more than charity case or a nuisance. It also allows for the reader to emphasise with Jane and the further use of retrospective narration such as "I felt though I could not have expressed that feeling" allows for a fairly objective presentation of childhood. Additionally Bronte makes Jane a self conscious narrator which makes it clear that she telling a story in the past tense and is organising the information Jane wants the reader to receive such as "I now pass the space of eight years almost in silence", this creates an effective childhood as the reader is aware that only the important parts of Jane's childhood that had a lasting effect on her have been mentioned and may therefore foreshadow some her adulthood. In contrast Rhys organisation and narration is much more a stream of conscious with no clear chapters and not intended exclusion or inclusion of different events in Antoinette's childhood, there is no awareness of a n audience throughout and it is clear that she is not intending for the story to be known by anybody but herself. The narration also changes from Antoinette to Rochester to Grace Poole and back to Antoinette throughout the novel which allows for a more objective insight into what is actually happening but confuses the reader in the same way Antoinette becomes slowly more and more disengaged. In summary, both Bronte and Rhys use of narration creates and effective childhood however Jane's perception of the world slowly matures as she starts to leave behind her childhood and gain freedom whilst Antoinette's perception spirals downwards throughout her childhood and into adulthood. Setting also plays a significant role in Bronte's attempt to create an effective childhood for Jane. Throughout Jane's childhood she is frequently locked up away from the outside in isolated places away from other children, which creates a gothic feel to the settings Jane grows up in. A key example of Jane being detached and deliberately isolated from the rest of the world is her being locked away in the red room as a punishment. Bronte uses a lexical field of furniture being personified to create tension and a gothic atmosphere such as "a footstool before it, and looking, as I thought, like a pale throne". There is also a motif of the supernatural carried throughout the red room and into Jane's adulthood, during the red room punishment the room is described to have "tiny phantoms, half fairy, half imp" inhabiting it when Jane looks into the mirror perhaps foreshadowing her later encounter with Bertha in the bedroom at Thornfield. Furthermore, Bronte carries the idea of Jane being imprisoned without freedom throughout her stay in Lowood, where she lives a "uniform" life, in which she never leaves the surrounding area of Lowood, in fact it could be said that Jane gains more and more freedom throughout the book as she changes settings and encounters new things. These techniques used by Bronte not only evoke an strong imagery of the different settings in Jane Eyre but also ensure that Jane's childhood repeatedly has a lack of freedom and a sombre atmosphere that make her motives for leaving the security of a job at Lowood more understandable for a reader. On the other hand Rhys depicts Antoinette as slowing loosing more and more freedom, in the early parts of her childhood. While she is first at Coulibri she is surrounded by gardens that are "wild and beautiful" that have a "fresh living smell" which seems to suggest that she is given few boundaries whilst she is young. However after she moved to the Spanish Town and convent she is faced with social restrictions and boundaries that she has never dealt with before. Despite this difference Rhys too creates a fairly sombre and gothic atmosphere using imagery such as "the sky can have a very black look" to suggest the later darkness in Antoinette's life. Although Rhys too makes Antoinette isolated and alienated similar to Jane due to the family being Creole, they are frequently called "white niggers" and are kept apart from both the native people in the West Indies and the Europeans. Therefore both Antoinette and Jane are isolated children surrounded by gothic and sombre settings, however whilst Rhys depicts Antoinette as losing freedom, Bronte shows Jane as gaining more freedom and independence as she moves from different setting, evoking an effective childhood that shows the possibility of life getting better eventually. Bronte also uses interesting characterisation to create an effective childhood that makes the reader understand how Jane begins to change when she is exposed to more and more people. In particular Helen Burns is sued to somewhat contrast Jane who is shown as strong-willed, independent and even narcissistic towards authority and religion as child. Whilst Jane fights to get away from suffering and injustice she is enthralled by Helen who believes that "it is not violence that overcomes hate-nor vengeance that most certainly heals injury". This has a huge effect on Jane who has never been confronted with someone who leads such a puritan and holy life before, she has only before been confronted with the Reeds corruption and favouritism or hypocritical Christianity in Mr Brocklehurst. Although Jane know she cannot live like Helen Burns, Bronte perhaps uses this pure and wholly good character in Jane's childhood to not only suggest hope but also to stop the previous isolation of Jane and make her character more trusting. It could perhaps be suggested that without Jane's friendship with Helen Burns who believes you should "love your enemies" she would have been unlikely to trust Mr Rochester or return to Thornfield at the end of the novel as she would not have much belief in the good that humans can do as well as the bad. This creates an effective childhood as it makes Jane's childhood less one dimensional adds some hope into the mostly bleak childhood and even alters the way Jane thinks about life significantly. Whereas Rhys creates very few loving relationships in Antoinette's childhood, she admits she is "a little afraid" of her own Mother and is told she is "old enough" to look after herself, she is even told to "let me alone". Whilst Jane gains friendship from moving to Lowood and meeting Helen Burns, Antoinette is left without love or security in childhood and in her adulthood. Bronte creates an effective childhood through allowing Jane to interact with different characters and making her gain perspective and maturity as she interacts and matures. In conclusion both Jane Eyre and Wide Sargasso Sea evoke an effective childhood, whilst the challenges surround being too subjective, not creating believable and interesting emotional reactions for the children and failing to make a reader emphasise with the child due to the adult narrating in past tense, however both authors managed fairly well to overcome these problems. However Bronte uses a very structured and organised self conscious narration that creates an alienated and isolated childhood that slowly gains freedom, independence and hope. Whilst Rhys evokes a similar isolated childhood, in a gothic atmosphere, there is no knowledge of an audience and Antoinette's seems to loose freedom and also slowly loose sanity. Whilst Jane Eyre opens with an authoritative statement " there was no possibility of taking a walk", Wide Sargasso Sea sets a hesitant tone of "They say" which foreshadows in both cases and demonstrates that Jane is control and is aware of what she is writing and who she is telling it to, Antoinette is telling and important story without necessarily knowing she is telling it to anyone in the first place. Overall Bronte evokes an effective childhood that demonstrates the pain of growing up and facing difficulties but also the pleasure in being able to move on and leave behind controlling adults.