Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre is a novel about a young girl who is orphaned and sent to live with her uncle. When her uncle dies, she is sent to live at Lowood School. Eventually, she becomes a governess at Thornfield Hall. It is while working at Thornfield that Jane meets Mr. Rochester, the owner of the estate.
The two eventually fall in love and become engaged. However, their happiness is short-lived when it is revealed that Mr. Rochester is already married to a woman named Bertha Mason. Bertha is locked away in the attic of Thornfield and Jane leaves, heartbroken.
Charlotte Bronte’s novel Jane Eyre includes several Gothic elements, one of which is the red room. The red room is a symbol of Jane’s repressed feelings and emotions. When she first arrives at Thornfield, Jane is told by Mrs. Fairfax, the housekeeper, that she should not go into the red room because it is where Mr. Rochester’s wife died. Despite being warned, Jane goes into the room and has a vision of a bloody figure coming towards her.
This vision represents Jane’s fears and anxieties about marriage and relationships. Her experience in the red room also foreshadows the events that will unfold later in the novel when Mr. Rochester’s wife is revealed to be alive and locked away in the attic. Charlotte Bronte uses the red room to explore the theme of repression and to create a sense of suspense and foreboding in her novel.
What makes a house frightening? Is it the enigma, the sense of impending danger, or people’s apprehensions when they enter? Is it the sensation that others have when they are inside this area? The gothic elements are the characteristics that produce scary ambience and add to the horrific mise-en-scène. The red chamber from chapter two of Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte is regarded as a frightening location, causing individuals to feel anxiety and dread while inside.
Charlotte Bronte uses the gothic elements of suspense, fear, and the supernatural to make the red room an unsettling place. The first factor Charlotte Bronte uses to make the red room an eerie setting is suspense. When Jane is exploring around Thornfield, she comes across a locked door which happens to lead into the red room.
Jane is naturally curious, so she asks Rochester about the room. He tells her “it was my aunt’s bedroom; and that it always makes him feel strange to enter it” (Bronte 34). The fact that Rochester himself feels weird going into adds to the suspense because now readers are wondering what could be so bad about this room that even the owner feels uneasy.
This also builds up suspense because readers are anxious to know what is inside the room. Charlotte Bronte also uses descriptive language to add onto the suspense of the red room. When Jane is finally allowed into the room, she describes it as “the most stirring adventure of my life so far” (Bronte 36).
The fact that Jane says this shows how different and strange the red room is in comparison to everything else she has experienced. This sets up a sense of uneasiness for readers, who are now even more curious about why this room would be so different. By adding these elements of suspense, Charlotte Bronte makes the red room a more unsettling place.
The red chamber’s features and mysteries, as well as Jane’s terrible anguish throughout the frame, contribute to the setting’s gothic atmosphere. The presence of a mysterious, suspenseful ambience is increased by the excessive use of color in the red room, which also serves as Mr. Reed’s murderer.
Charlotte Bronte’s purpose for having Jane experience such fear and terror in the red room was to emphasize both the physical and mental power that men held over women during the Victorian Era. Furthermore, Charlotte Bronte was successful in illustrating the gothic elements of a suspenseful atmosphere and Charlotte’s purpose for having Jane experience such fear through her use of descriptive language, symbols, and motifs.
The color red is repeated multiple times throughout Charlotte Bronte’s description of the red room. For example, Charlotte Bronte writes, “There was no light save what came in through the opening door…a crimson cloth hung before it; a chair stood before it…and on the chair a great black cat sat smugly curled” (Bronte 24).
The color red is not only seen in Charlotte Bronte’s description of the objects within the room, but also in the way light enters the room. The use of red creates a feeling of suspense and fear because it is associated with danger and blood. Charlotte Bronte’s purpose for using the color red was to create a gothic atmosphere that was both suspenseful and scary.
In addition to Charlotte Bronte’s use of the color red, she also uses symbols to create a gothic atmosphere. For example, Charlotte Bronte writes, “There were three windows in the room…at each window stood a heavy black curtain that reached from ceiling to floor” (Bronte 24).
The windows are symbolic of Jane’s lack of freedom. The heavy black curtains represent the barriers that keep Jane from escaping the red room. Charlotte Bronte’s use of symbols creates a gothic atmosphere because it makes the reader feel as if Jane is trapped in the red room and is unable to escape.
Charlotte Bronte also uses motifs to create a gothic atmosphere. For example, Charlotte Bronte writes, “The carpet was red…the walls were hung with red” (Bronte 24). The repeated use of the color red creates a feeling of suspense and fear. Charlotte Bronte’s use of motifs makes the reader feel as if they are in a constant state of suspense.
Another frightening element of the red room is Mr. Reed’s impending death, since it adds to the uncertainty around Dempsey 2′ physical characteristics. While Jane explains Mr. Reed’s role in the red room, she says, “… her deceased husband; and those last words are the key to the red-room’s secret, which kept it so lonely despite its magnificence.”
Charlotte Bronte uses gothic diction to further enhance the terror within the red room. The words “deceased,” “coffin,” and “under-taker” all connote death and dying, which only adds to the eeriness of the space. Furthermore, Mr. Reed’s death is described as being sudden and without warning, leaving those close to him with many unanswered questions. The mysterious circumstances surrounding Mr. Reed’s passing only serve to make the red room an even more foreboding place.
In Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre, the red room is used as a symbol of fear and isolation. The physical characteristics of the red room, combined with the mystery surrounding Mr. Reed’s death, work together to create a space that is both frightening and unwelcoming. Charlotte Bronte expertly uses gothic elements to further heighten the sense of dread associated with the red room, making it a truly memorable location within the novel.
