Social class and Jane Eyre

I want to talk about class in this novel. Jane experiences the negative effects that class structure has throughout the novel. To begin with, John Reed gives her terrible treatment in Gateshead Hall. He keeps on reminding her how she is a penniless orphan and tries his best to make her feel worthless like when she is reading his book he snatches it away from her and says : "Now, I'll teach you to rummage my book-shelves: for they are mine; all the house belongs to me, or will do in a few years" 

Oppression is prevalent in the novel and is exercised by a class structure to which the Reeds belong to. All these characters are continuously trying to bring down Jane just because of the class she belongs to in order to demonstrate the power and superiority that they enjoy.

It is therefore understandable why Jane is seeking a sense to be valued when she says to her friend Helen: “to gain some real affection from you, or Miss Temple, or any other whom I truly love, I would willingly submit to have the bone of my arm broken, or to let a bull toss me, or to stand behind a kicking horse, and let it dash its hoof at my chest” (Chapter 8).

Jane’s character can be compared to that of Heathcliff from the novel Wuthering Heights. The social class that they belong to is ambiguous throughout, especially because the upper class at no point considers them to be at their equal footing.

Here the difference between the two, however, is that Heathcliff had to be taught proper manners whereas Jane’s manners possess the characteristics of aristocracy. The fact that she is ‘powerless’ an ‘orphan’ and ‘poor’ happens to be the main contention to her progress.  Jane is aware of her social position but considers herself to be a part of the same class as her cousins. The only thing that bothers Jane is the unfair treatment that she is subjected to compared to her cousin John for example who is never blames by his mother no matter what he does.