7/31/2019 Jane Eyre Reading Log #1

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Eamon Barkhordarian

Period E

English Honors

Blackburn

Jane Eyre Reading Log #1

“Mr. Brocklehurst buys all our food and all our clothes.” 

 Does he live here?” 

“No—two miles off, at a large hall” (49). 

“Semi-starvation and neglected colds had predisposed most of the pupils to receive infection:

 forty five out of the eighty girls lay ill at one time” (78).  

Initially, the reader has no idea about what kind of person Mr. Brocklehurst is aside from

the few facts squeezed in (like the one above). But as the reader is finally introduced to this

character, they begin to realize his mean nature. Not only does he go out of his way to humiliate

Jane in front of the school, he cannot properly run the school for these orphans. The author

Charlotte Bronte repeats the idea of religion and clashes it with Mr. Brocklehurst to give the

reader the impression of contradiction and inconsistency. While he advocates for one thing, he

practices something completely different.

When Mr. Brocklehurst was informed that Jane does not pay particular attention to

sermons, he was furious and began advocating religious practice. In psalms, there are lovely

poems about forgiveness and love, yet there is no sign of that with Mr. Brocklehurst. The same

religion he supports would encourage the caring and love for others. Yet, he is running a facility

in which the children are becoming sick and dying due to unjust living conditions.

Understanding this, he decides to avoid the problem by living two miles away in a huge mansion

while the kids at his schools become sick. Mr. Brocklehurst is supporting his own successfully

family at the expense of the Lowood students.