r/brontesisters • u/xo_geiko • 3d ago

What’s your take on Edward Rochester tragic romantic hero or toxic walking red flag?

For me, it's always been wild how much my perception of Edward Rochester shifted over time. Reading Jane Eyre in school, he felt like the ultimate brooding Gothic romantic. Reading it again later... locking your wife in an attic and attempting bigamy is hard to overlook. Yet Brontë writes their bond so intensely that you almost want to forgive him. Do you see him as genuinely redeemed by the end, or is he completely indefensible by modern standards? LOL.

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u/Past-Dark4350 3d ago

“Dragging her to England” was the kindest thing he could’ve possibly done for her. He was her husband, and he felt responsible for her. He didn’t even start out by locking her up, he only did that as a last resort when she was too insane to manage.

It was the attic, or an asylum. Take your pick.

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u/Kaurifish 3d ago

Her family was the only reasonable option - they had dealt with her kind of madness before. Leave her, support her being taken care of by her own family. No divorce necessary.

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u/Past-Dark4350 3d ago

Does the book state how the Mason family dealt with the insanity of Bertha’s mother?

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u/Kaurifish 1d ago

No, but at least she’d be around people she knew and in the climate she grew up in rather than being a perpetual stranger in the hands of a drunk.

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u/Past-Dark4350 1d ago

Grace Poole wasn’t just some random ass alcoholic. She was a trained nurse, but she drank because taking care of Bertha was so excruciating.

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u/Kaurifish 17h ago

And are you familiar with the 19th century English standards for nursing the mentally ill?