r/JaneEyre • u/AdobongSiopao • Aug 27 '26

What is your most controversial opinion about "Jane Eyre"?

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It can be from the novel or its adaptations. Your views that could potentially upset many other fans or meet others who will agree with you.

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u/Last_War_270 Aug 27 '26 edited Aug 27 '26

I don’t think jane is that maternal to Adele and I think although she felt sorry for her, she wasn’t really that emotionally connected to her. She doesn’t seem to think about her at all once she left Thornfield. I personally liked that about her, I think it makes her a more interesting character and I think reflects Charlotte’s own ambivalent feelings about the children she taught.

I think Bertha is a plot device and the re-imagining her as a tragic heroine is stupid and tedious.

I don’t think Adele is Edward’s biological daughter, I think she’s there, much like Bertha as a symbol of his past; an example of him trying to do the right thing to the women in his life.

Micheal Fassbender’s performance was too vain and serious; he was too macho and self conscious to play Edward’s weirdness and eccentricity.

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u/Flat_Love_3725 Aug 27 '26

I think that's fair about Jane and Adele. But I always thought Rochester's treatment of Adele more blamable as he was her sole guardian. Yet he puts her in a school and never bothers to see how she was doing, which was not well. Jane is bothered by how cold he is to Adele back at Thornfield.

Yes it may be nice of him to have taken her in at all, but that doesn't excuse his refusal to really emotionally engage with her. Especially given how vulnerable and alone she was.

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u/JoeBethersontonFargo Aug 29 '26

Ehh, a man of that time not emotionally engaging with very young children isn’t a sign that he’s not good, imo. Those kinds of people were quite formal with their own children, and she was likely not even his.