Journal Entry 7 - article

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/18/nyregion/five-new-york-city-school-principals-talk-budget-cuts.html?scp=16&sq=school%20and%20technology&st=cse

Living in New Canaan has opened up my eyes to the amounts of opportunity that are handed to us students on a silver platter. With having the number one public school system in Fairfield County and being in the top five high schools in the country, we still have our faults. Although we have smart boards and high standardized test scores, that doesn’t mean that the students themselves are truly and intelligently smart. Of course a great deal of the students in New Canaan Public Schools are bright kids, but there is another great deal of the students that are tutored for SAT, ACT, AP tests, SAT subject tests, and school in general. My favorite excuse is that the kids don’t have enough time to study because of their sport after school. When it comes down to the important things in a highschooler’s life, are sports one of them? If they can get a scholarship to college, then obviously it is on the top of the priority list, but if they are sitting on the bench for the entire game, then they need to rethink their priorities. If these kids aren’t grateful for the education that they are given or using the technologies in the school to their advantage, then they should provide for the kids that deserve the smart boards and iPads in the library, like the kids in New York City school system. 

Whenever I think of New York City, I see it as the land of opportunity and challenges. It’s where the Statue of Liberty was placed, Ellis Island and many other historic land spots where people had nothing and became the most successful people in America. Unfortunately, for the students in the NYC school system, they aren’t so lucky as we are. The school budget isn’t fit for every little thing that teachers need to give their students the best education that they deserve. As a teacher in the NYC school system, I imagine it to be one of the most difficult teaching jobs in America. Either the student is a neglected child living in an unstable home or the student doesn’t have a family. It takes determination and courage to try to educate these kids. In the last four years, teachers have been asked to cut 13.7% of their budget. This is a major problem because each year, the class sizes have been increasing, which means more money is needed to fund everything that the student needs to learn and grow in an educational environment. 88 schools in the NYC school system requested more money. How many do you think were approved? If you guessed none, then you hit the nail on the head. How many schools are in the New Canaan school system? Five. How many, if requested more money, would be approved? All of them. Is it necessary for any of the five? No. If more towns like New Canaan would not spend money on unnecessary items such as iPads in the library for students to rent out, then that money could be more useful at schools like NYC schools. “I thought about getting rid of the entire foreign-language department,” which is made up of two Spanish teachers, said Dr. Blake, principal of the Science, Technology and Research Early College in Brooklyn “but how can you expect to prepare your students for college if there’s no foreign language in your school?”. If more schools like this one has to completely demolish a department in the school, then New Canaan kids can live without some of the wasteful smart boards in every single classroom at the high school. 

All this talk about budget cuts connects to the book Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell.  What if the kids living in the city were the ones destined to find the cure to cancer or Alzheimer’s disease? What if one of the girls in the 7th grade were to become the first woman as President of the United States? Do you think they would have that opportunity without the appropriate technology in high school or college? How did Bill Gates do it? Well, he was born at the right time, went to the right schools, and became the richest man in the world. The students in New York City are the ones that care about their education and being someone better then who they are now or who their parents are. They want to make a difference in the world because of where and how they grew up. They don’t want to end up living in the projects like they do now. I don’t believe that they deserve three assistant principals, while at the same time are teaching four different classes a day. They deserve teachers that are dedicated 100% to the educational value of what they are teaching and who enjoy sharing their knowledge to the future of America.  Being raised in New Canaan has taught me to appreciate my education and my school, because their are kids, just an hour train ride away, that would die for the life that I have. 

Journal Entry 6 - Outliers

I think that both you and I are comfortable with the definition of an outlier. After the first couple of chapters, I believed that an outlier was a person that became successful through opportunity and connections, not just working hard and being smart and savvy. On the contrary, that is what being an outlier is. It’s as simple as being smart and working hard. Now, I’m not saying that if you are a lazy bum and not the sharpest crayon in the box that you won’t be successful, but you need to be intelligent and willing to work. That is what the Canadian hockey players, and one very important man, Bill Joy, had in common.

Throughout the whole book, I believe that the most important chapter, and the most interesting one, was chapter two “The 10,000-Hour Rule”. I could not believe what I was reading during those 33 pages. When I heard the word “success”, read about it in the paper, learned about it in school, I never really thought about how much practice these people put into what they were successful at. Think about it: 10,000 hours. How many days is that? Rounded, that’s 417 days (props to wiki.answers.com). Imagine sitting in your dinning room, playing piano for 417 days straight. No breaks, no water or food, no bathroom. That’s how the Beatles became famous, how Canadians born in January became professional hockey players, and how Bill Joy changed the way we use a computer. 

Think about the word “practice”. My parents always say “Practice makes perfect!”. I never truly believed that because every time I practiced the piano, I would just get sick of it and watch some silly cartoon on the television. Sometimes I think to myself, “If I only listened to my parents, I could be the next Mozart”. But I know that that isn’t true. To be successful you have to practice. To practice, you need to have the support of your parents who encourage you. Even with the support of my parents, I still never loved playing the piano. I found completely zero happiness when my fingers touched those porcelain white keys. This makes me think if those hockey players truly enjoyed waking up at five in the morning and practicing until they had to go to school or if they yearned to play on the chess team on a Thursday afternoon and spend the rest of the time being a kid. 

With the Canadian hockey players in the back of your mind, let me talk to you about the success story of Bill Joy. He first started out at the University of Michigan, a prestigious school with one of the best computer science programs in the country. Graduating from high school and entering college at the still young age of sixteen, he automatically fell in love with the Computer Center. After being introduced to the Computer Center, he was programming all day long. Went to Berkley in California, programmed all day long there. It was his lifestyle. Tradition. Almost as if there was no other way to live then to be programming. “At Michigan, I was probably programming eight to ten hours a day. By the time I was at Berkley, I was doing it day and night. I had a terminal at home. I’d stay up until two or three in the morning. Sometimes I’d fall asleep at the keyboard....thirty years later...so, so maybe ten thousand hours? That’s about right” (Gladwell 47). If you don’t think this is a dedicated man, then put me in a psychological home because I don’t think I have anything that I’m THAT dedicated to, and I’m the same age he was when he started programming. It’s amazing to read about someone like Bill Joy. You don’t read in the daily newspaper anyone like him. In our generation, I think the only thing that people my age are “dedicated” to is getting extremely wasted on a Saturday night and drunk text someone random on your contact list. People in the older generation say that it’s a shame that kids are the way they are, but to be brutally honest, it’s never going to change. As much as I wish that we could have a good time with playing a good ole’ game of Monopoly, that’s not the way that society is run these days. We were born during a time where technology was at it’s highest peak, and cell phones and computers were being purchased at the thousands every day. Now here comes the part of the book that I was most interested in. Remember how the most talented and successful hockey players were born in the beginning of the year? Well, the same goes for being a successful computer science genius. Let me name some of the most famous computer wizards that you probably have heard about: Bill Gates, Steve Ballmer, and Bill Joy (as of a few minutes ago, at least). When were they born, you say? Great question! Bill Gates: October 28, 1955, Steve Ballmer: March 24, 1956, Bill Joy: November 8, 1954. What do you notice? Nothing about the months or the days, but the years? Yes, you’re right! All three of these wildly successful men were born only one year of each other. Why were these men successful? Yes, they all were “out of the box” type of thinkers, worked their asses off programming day and night, and were simply bright men. However, they all went to college during the 1970s, the time when computer revolution had began and had access to computers whenever they felt the need to program, which happened to be all the time. 

With both hockey players and computer programmers, being born at the right place at the right time was vital in becoming successful. Canadian hockey players are professionals and are making millions of dollars every puck they swipe into the net, and people like Bill Joy and Bill Gates are the richest men in the world due to their computer programming skills from practicing 24/7. Even though the 10,000 Hour Rule plays a significant role in being a successful outlier, having the will power and brains to complete the practice, is a task even more cruel. “Practice isn’t the thing you do once you’re good. It’s the thing you do that makes you good” (Gladwell, 42). This quote is one that I will remember for the rest of my educational career. Men like Bill Joy, Bill Gates, even the Beatles, are the people that I will look to for inspiration and the desire to be dedicated, and to be successful. 

Journal Entry 5 - Outliers

Everyday, people experience success and people experience failures. Which one is the most effective? Well, up until I read the book Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell, I had every reason to believe that learning from failure was more effective than learning from success. Throughout this book, Gladwell describes story after story about how men work their way from being poor, unemployed people to inheriting more money than God.     Gladwell puts simply that being an outlier is “something that is situated away from or classed differently from a main body or related body OR a statistical observation that is markedly different in value from the others of the sample” (Gladwell, 1). Now, when I read this, I had absolutely no idea what the definition meant. Despite lacking knowledge of what the title meant, I read for about an hour. After that hour, I completely understood what the definition stood for. Successful is not the word to describe an outlier. Ultra-successful hits the nail on the head.  Some outliers that are more famously known are Bill Gates, Bill Joy, Robert Oppenheimer, even the Beatles made the list. 

Out of all the books that I read this summer, I have to say that Outliers was the most informative and enjoyable book to read. Prior to reading this book, I 

One of the stories that I found most interesting was the story of Canadian hockey players. Now, living in New Canaan, Connecticut has made it perfectly clear how corrupt sports could be. But after reading about how the Canadian hockey system is run, I can cope with how the sports in New Canaan are operated. In the book, Gladwell posted a two page chart on Canadian hockey players, what position they play, how tall they are, and when they are born. What makes these hockey players special isn’t because they are from Canada, or that they are extremely tall or are right handed or left handed. What makes these players special is what month they are born in. “in any elite group of hockey players--the very best of the best--40% of players will have been born between January and March, 30% between April and June, 20% between July and September, and 10% between October and December” (Gladwell 23). Not one psychologist could come up with a prediction or hypothesis on why the most talented hockey players were born in the beginning of the year. Is it because they have more time to practice then those born in November? More months of maturity? Well, the logical reason happens to make perfect sense. The cut-off for age-class hockey is January 1. Therefore, someone who has a birthday, let’s say January 2, could play against someone who doesn’t turn the same age until November. One year makes an enormous difference in physical strength and emotional strength. Just think of it as when you can send your child to Kindergarden. For example, I was born on November 17, 1994. Everyone in my grade is born in 1994, I was just born months after them. Therefore, when my parents enrolled me in Kindergarden, I was only four years old when everyone else was five years old. For me, I didn’t have any disadvantages or advantages, speaking academically and physically. Actually, I’m happy that my parents put me in Kindergarden early because I have one extra year on everyone else (even though I still won’t be legal to drink until I graduate college...the irony!). 

Now, the underlying theme throughout this whole book is opportunity. Whether you are at the right place at the right time, or whether your uncle’s wife’s niece’s husband is the coach of an elite hockey team in Canada, opportunity is the number one pathway to success. Without opportunity, you have no practice or background in whatever you are working for. The phrase “rags to riches” is much too simplistic, which Americans have lived by for decades. Of course the hockey players that were described by Gladwell are much more talented then you or I will ever be, but they also had something that we don’t: opportunity. It doesn’t matter whether they deserved that opportunity or not, they still had it. That is why they are successful. 

Robert Merton, a sociologist, calls this the “Matthew Effect” after the New Testament. “It is those who are successful, in other words, who are most likely to be given the kinds of special opportunities that lead to further success. It’s the best students who get the best teaching and more attention. It’s the biggest nine and ten year olds who get the most coaching and practice” (Gladwell, 31). I agree with this statement one hundred percent. Yes, you are a successful hockey player, he’s better then all the other players on his team. Now that success opens up a door for more opportunity, which repeats itself a million times until that hockey player becomes an outlier. Just by being a little bit better then the other players, being born just a few months before the goalie, and he’s an outlier. Is this luck or fate? 

Journal Entry 4 - One Summer

The next book that I chose to read was One Summer by David Baldacci. And you are wrong if you think that I read this book because the title so happens to be connected to the summer. Actually, I chose to read this book because it was on the New York Times best seller list, and I intend to read at least the top 10 books on that list. 

When you see the cover of the book, you automatically get the sense that the story line is going to be similar to that of Nicholas Sparks novels such as The Last Song or Dear John. I would say that Baldacci’s story correlates more towards The Last Song because the story’s focus is mainly about the father-daughter relationship that they never had, which is similar in One Summer. 

Let me give you my abridged version of this book: terminally ill Jack is preparing to say his last goodbyes to his wife Lizzie and kids Mikki, the rebellious teenager, Cory, the background kid, and Jackie, the youngest. With a miraculous turn of events, Lizzie is killed in a car accident, while Jack’s illness suddenly disappears. To get back his family, he and his children move back to the place where their mother grew up. There, they replace one of the worst years of their lives with one of the best summers they ever had by rebuilding their family again. 

From the page 1 to page 320, Baldacci pulls at the heartstrings of anyone who reads this book. It’s almost like watching a soap opera, dealing with reuniting families, budding romantic relationships, second chances. Going even more specific, this novel deals with child custody battles, near death drowning experiences, police arrests, accidental deaths, and the overwhelming power of love. 

Mikki was Jack’s only child that was most affected by his illness. During the hardest time, the time when Jack was holding on by a bare thread, Mikki was pulling away. It got worse when her mother died. Was she resentful of her dad? If Jack didn’t need his medications the next morning, Lizzie would have been alive. So now that their mother died, and Jack was still ill, the children were forced to live with Lizzie’s parents out in Arizona. It’s hard enough that they just lost their mother, but to be uprooted from everything they know, is just wrong. This is where Jack’s nickname, “miracle man” comes into play. Because of his miraculous recovery, he got his kids back. 

Now one thing that I think sets this book apart from Dear John and The Last Song is that Jack always thanks Lizzie when something out of the blue happens to their family. He knows that Lizzie is still there, helping them move on every step of the way.  When Jack made his quick recovery, he knew Lizzie made that happen. When Jack got the kids back, he could feel Lizzie’s presence around them.  One reason why Jack took the kids to Lizzie’s beach house was to rekindle what the family could have been if Lizzie was alive. Before she died, Lizzie was going to take the kids there anyways, so this is just a way for Jack to finish what Lizzie started. This is one way to have their family feel whole again, even without Lizzie. The smells, sounds, and atmosphere in the beach house restore what their family used to be like. “In his mind’s eye, there was Lizzie seated next to him on the bed, on what would turn out to be her last day of life. You never know Jack, you might enjoy it too. You could really fix the place up. Even make the lighthouse work again” (Baldacci 93). Here, Baldacci brings in Lizzie’s voice. She motivates Jack to move into the Palace (Lizzie’s old beach house), she encourages him to spend more time with the kids since he is the only parent they have left. 

Now that Jack is a single man/dad, he is dealing with so many different emotions that cause him to isolate the people around him. For example, Jack’s new neighbors, Jenna and Liam, play a significant role in their family during the second half of the book. Like Jack, Jenna is a struggling single mom, working as hard as she can to make her son’s life and hers survivable.  Through the comfort of each other, Jack and Jenna make their lives somewhat easier. While reading the parts that describe Jack and Jenna’s relationship, it seems that Jenna is making it okay for Jack to build a relationship with another woman. I thought that Jack would push every woman in his life away because he was attached to Lizzie in every way humanly possible. Maybe Jenna was a gift sent from Lizzie. Lizzie never wanted Jack to be as miserable and lonely as he was, so in a way, Jenna is Lizzie’s approval for Jack to move on. That’s all Lizzie ever wanted for Jack, was to be happy, and the same goes for Jack to Lizzie. Fate had a different path for Jack which led him to Jenna. We can choose the people that we want in our lives, but we never can choose the people that we fall in love with. Unfortunately, Lizzie wasn’t the only woman that Jack would fall in love with.  We can never choose the people that make us happy.  It’s a miracle that Jack was able to open his heart to new people and new opportunities. If only the rest of us could have that power... to cope with death and open our hearts to love. 

Journal Entry 3 - Jane Eyre

When love comes knocking at your door, you invite it in with open arms and open heart. What you make of that love is the only thing that matters. Unfortunately, Jane could not accept Mr. Rochester’s love due to the circumstances of his life. The problem was not loving him, the problem was trusting him and feeling safe around him. The only answer to their situation was to keep distance from Mr. Rochester while trying to figure out what their love means.

1. Life Without Thornfield

Jane’s decision to leave Thornfield was a mutual decision: between what she hopes for and what is reality. Her only dream in life is to marry Mr. Rochester, but the reality of the situation shows that her love for her was not completely true because he didn’t tell her about Bertha. If he was truthful about Bertha, then Jane would have appreciated his honesty and stayed at Thornfield. At this point of her life, leaving love behind was the hardest decision of her life. She knows that she can’t compromise her feelings for Mr. Rochester by staying at Thornfield. She could never and should never live with the fact that as long as Bertha is alive, she would only be a mistress, the second woman in his life rather than the only woman in his life. 

After sleeping outside with no food or shelter, Jane is welcomed into a home in a nearby town. St. John brings her into his home with his sisters Diana and Mary. Here, we see a hope lingering in the story. She now knows that Thornfield isn’t the only place where she can find work or a home. What I found interesting is when Jane introduced herself, she introduced herself as Jane Elliot rather than her real name, Jane Eyre. Why would she give a false identification of herself? Did she want to start over, begin a new chapter of her life without being tied to a name that has only forsaken her? Think about it: with her last name, she has only been with a family that ignored and resented her and fell in love with a man that was untruthful about his present relationships. Giving herself a new last name gives herself new opportunities and new chances to really start her life the way it was supposed to be started. 

Now that Jane has spent a period of time with the Rivers family, it is time to begin her new career. St. John gave her the chance to run a charity school for girls, like the school she attended when she was a little girl. At that same time, St. John is informed that their wealthy Uncle John has died and left them with nothing, which happens to be Jane’s Uncle John that wanted to adopt her years ago. Here, we see how Bronte has used the tool of foreshadowing in the book. When Jane’s Aunt Reed told her that her Uncle John wanted to adopt her, it gave Jane a sense of hope that she still had family in the world and that there was a chance that they could be together. Unfortunately, that chance is taken away when her Uncle dies. Is it a coincidence that Jane is living with the people that are related to her Uncle, or is it fate that has lead her in that direction? But when Jane finds out that St. John and herself share the same Uncle that died, she is overjoyed to have finally found her family at last. As the weeks go by, Jane spends more time with her newfound family. All this time spent together, St. John believes that he is in love with Jane. This sparks a fire within herself. She hasn’t experience the vast power of love since Mr. Rochester.  I believe this to be a good thing for Jane. For she is a much different person than she was when she was living at Thornfield. Here, she has a family, she is independent, she has money to fall back on and she has the strength to go back to Mr. Rochester. 

Remember how I said leaving Mr. Rochester was the hardest decision Jane had to make in her life? Well going back to Mr. Rochester was the easiest decision of her life. Being prompted to marry another man, she realizes that she gave her heart away a long time ago, and never got it back.  Taking a carriage back to Thornfield, she has come to a place that she did not recognize. She learns that Bertha set the manor on fire, which causes Mr. Rochester to go blind. This does not stop Jane from finding her one true love. Here, we know that her love is eternally connected to him. Once she finds him, they marry at once. Jane is assured that Mr. Rochester was truly in love with Jane from the beginning, having never married anyone else. “No woman was ever nearer to her mate than I am: ever more absolutely bone of his bone, and flesh of his flesh. I know no weariness of my Edward’s society: he knows none of mine, any more than we each do of the pulsation of the heart that beats in our separate bosoms; consequently, we are ever together” (Bronte, 281). At this stage of her life, Jane finally sees herself as an equal with Mr. Rochester; not because of marriage, but because she knows herself. In the beginning of the book, Jane did not identify herself with anyone or anything. Being with Mr. Rochester, Jane knows who she is. Ever since they met, she has been irrevocably tied to him and every way possible. When she left him, she lost herself. Being together has given Jane the reassurance that with him, she is the best that she can ever be. 

Journal Entry 2 - Jane Eyre

In the next two stages of Jane’s life, she experiences events that unfortunately do alter her true fate. For the first time in her existence, she feels the overwhelming exhilaration of being in love. To say “I love you” is the easy part for her...what to make of that love is the struggle that Jane endures.

1. Life at Thornfield

When Jane first arrives at Thornfield, she does not meet the man that she will be working for, Mr. Rochester, but Ms. Fairfax, who is the housekeeper of Thornfield. She informs Jane that Mr. Rochester frequently goes on trips and does not return for days on end, which make it seem as if he is hiding or running away from his problems at home.  Ms. Fairfax introduces Jane to Adele, of whom she will tutor. Adele is an 8 year old French girl, who also lost her parents. Here, Bronte gives Jane the first opportunity to identify with someone who shares the same life experiences as herself. With both girls losing their parents and not having any family stability, they can try to cope through their hardships and struggles together, when at the same time getting comfortable around new people (both Jane and Adele). 

Jane’s first night at Thornfield is one night that she should never forget. When I was reading this Chapter 11, I felt a sense of mystery and strangeness that I felt while reading the beginning chapters. Jane hears an ungodly voice coming from somewhere in the manor. Ms. Fairfax informs the manor’s seamstress, Grace Poole, to “follow directions”. What is that supposed to mean? Trying to give a positive impression on the first day, Jane does not interfere. For all she knows, there could be a monster or something deadly in the manor that she does not know about. I chose to keep this scene at the back of my mind while reading this book, because I knew that the mystery is coming to haunt Jane in the end.

Because of my previous knowledge of old-English books like Jane Eyre, I knew to keep an eye on the relationship soon to brew between Jane and Mr. Rochester. This man happens to be the only real man in Jane’s life that owns a home and is somewhat in his middle ages.  Also, Mr. Rochester is the only man that Jane finds physically attractive. Because she has never dealt with male-female tension, she does not know what to do with her feelings but keep them hidden from the man that she loves. When Mr. Rochester leaves for his occasional outings, Jane feels a pain in her chest and wonders when he will return. This tension also brings up another theme throughout the book: equality. In the manor, Jane is a paid employee while Mr. Rochester is the employer. Quite simply, she is poor and he is rich. Will he be able to fall in love with someone of her social status? When Mr. Rochester does return, he returns with many wealthy elites in his social group, one of which Jane believes is more beautiful then herself. Now, Jane’s feelings are put to the test. Is Mr. Rochester bringing these wealthy, beautiful people here to see how Jane reacts? 

When Jane hears the news that Mr. Rochester is to marry Blanche Ingram, she is still able to move on and cope with the circumstances that she is living in. I believe that this state of coping connects with what her late friend Helen Burns believed in, accepting your fate. Jane needs to accept the fact that Mr. Rochester is going to marry another woman. At this point of the book, I came to believe that Mr. Rochester was using up this time to tell Jane how he feels the same way she feels for him. When he disguised himself as the gypsy and was telling Jane her fortune, I knew that he was trying to make her confess her love for him. Also, this scene portrayed the magical power that men have over women. Throughout their whole relationship, Mr. Rochester has taken the reigns and controlled their paths. 

Unexpectedly, Jane hears news of her Aunt Reed being ill, and travels back to Gateshead. Here, Jane tries to redeem her Aunt’s and hers relationship before it is too late. I thought of this scene as trying to move on from the past and try to live in the present. Maybe Jane thought that if all the past grievances with her Aunt Reed would be solved, then her life with Mr. Rochester could be achieved. To her dismay, her Aunt gives her a letter that is three years old from her Uncle, informing Jane that he wants to adopt her and live together as a family. Therefore, we have learned that her Aunt has not changed one bit since Jane left years ago. She is still the same bitter, old woman that can’t live with the fact that her late husband loved Jane. She dies, with no forgiveness to Jane. Does this mean that her relationship is forever doomed with Mr. Rochester?

As Jane and Mr. Rochester are united back at Thornfield, Jane realizes that life is fragile and you should seize every opportunity that you get, after seeing death thrust upon her Aunt Reed. Both Jane and Mr. Rochester declare their love for one another and are soon to be wed. However, a series of twists and turns make this event unobtainable. The manor is filled with interior tension between Jane and Ms. Fairfax, who witnessed the kiss between Jane and Mr. Rochester when he was still engaged to Blanche. This makes the preparation for the wedding start off on a rocky beginning. On the day of the wedding, Jane’s dreams come to an end. An unknown man stops the wedding because Mr. Rochester is already married. The noise coming from somewhere in the manor is his wife, Bertha, who he believes is terminally insane/mad. No one knows about his wife because of that reason. After being in the same room as Bertha, Jane locks herself in her room and grieves over the loss of Mr. Rochester. When Bertha ripped Jane’s veil, I believe that it was a symbol against the idea of marriage. Look what marriage did to Bertha: imprisonment. Looking back on her experiences at Gateshead, does Jane really want to end up lie Bertha? After finally having stability in her life, after finding a man that loves her the way no one ever has, she loses him. Is this her fate? 

Journal Entry 1 - Jane Eyre

Rather than go into a spiel detailing each chapter of Jane Eyre and critiquing Charlotte Bronte’s way of illustrating something as so specific as why Helen Burns was a red-head instead of a brunette, I am going to divide the book into four distinct chapters of Jane Eyre’s life: 

1. Life at Gateshead
2. Life at Lowood
3. Life at Thornfield
4. Life Without Thornfield 

As I take a step back and look at Jane Eyre’s life, I realize that her life isn’t just her childhood and her adulthood. Although she didn’t have much of a life that a typical girl her age would have, her life was much more complex then being an orphan. 

In this post, I choose to discuss the first and second stages of Jane Eyre’s life. 

1. Life at Gateshead

Our first contact with Jane Eyre when she is living with her Aunt Reed and her cousins, Georgiana, Eliza and John. Her relationship with all four of her family members reflects her personality. Living with her cold hearted and rotten Aunt Reed has influenced the way Jane is portrayed throughout the rest of the book: closed and harsh.  For example, when Jane is condemned to the red room, where her Uncle Reed died years prior, she blows into an extreme temper tantrum, feeling a sense of loss, abandonment, and cruel punishment. All of those emotions in one little girl is too much for even an adult to handle. The outrage that Jane Eyre exemplified in the red room is one of the repercussions of being raised by the wealthy elite of the Victorian age when you yourself are poor with money and love. “What a consternation of soul was mine that dreary afternoon! How all my brain was in tumult, and all my heart in insurrection! Yet in what darkness, what dense ignorance, was the mental battle fought! I could not answer the ceaseless inward question--why I thus suffered; now, at the distance of---I will not say how many years, I see it clearly” (Bronte, 13). Sitting in the deadly red room, Jane realizes that when the lights go out, it’s all the same darkness. Either in the red room or in the nursery, the battle between Jane and Aunt Reed will be never-ending. She knows that throughout her life at Gateshead, she has and will always be treated as nothing to them. Jane can’t stand the thought of being secluded to the “red room”, where her only way to having a happy family died. Her Uncle Reed could have been someone who cared for her, but was unluckily taken away. When reading about the “red room”, its interesting to note the color choice that Bronte used. Red is known to be a symbol of passion and aggression. As I visualize the “red room”, I see all four walls painted with a deep, fiery red, with dark furniture and decor placed all around, but keeping the room open, for Jane’s thoughts to roam around. It’s a back and forth game for Jane, because in a sense of being “locked in” the red room, she is also “locked out”, as in isolated from the pain and cruelty that her Aunt forces towards Jane. Although Bessie and Abbot could be Jane’s one saving grace, they are blinded by Aunt Reed’s torturous actions. 

When Jane is finally given an ultimatum, to enter this school for girls called Lowood, she wonders if her Uncle Reed is sending her an angel, that maybe he is watching over her as she has spent days in the “red room”. Little does she know, that maybe the things that are handed to us on a silver platter are not always the best things for us, or are they?

1. Life at Lowood

After Jane was saved from the “gates of hell”, she was taken to her second dosage of hell, at Lowood. At least that is how Bronte describes Jane’s beginning experiences at Lowood. Even though she spent 9 years of her life there, in the beginning, I felt she hadn’t even left her Aunt Reed. Mr. Brocklehurst, the man that liberated Jane from Gateshead, resembles a chicken pot pie. On the outside, the potatoes and gravy are just delicious, but when you cut your fork down the middle, you have the green peas and all these vegetables that do not seem appetizing. Now that Jane is in a new environment, she needs time to adapt to the different surroundings. Think about it: she has never been around girls her age, let alone, children other than Georgiana, Eliza, and John. How hard do you think it was for Jane to get up the nerve to speak to another girl?  Miraculously, Helen Burns arrives in her life, the one person that Jane was comfortable around and able to open up and find herself with. At this point of the story, Bronte illustrated the irony there is between Gateshead and Lowood. Jane leaves the only place that she ever known in life to start a new chapter in her depressing life. Once she gets to Lowood, it does not take long for her to realize that Lowood is the same as Gateshead, just more children, and her Aunt Reed is an older man with a beard named Mr. Brocklehurst. However, at both Gateshead and Lowood, Jane is viewed and feels like an outcast, not being able to blend with the rest of society because of the circumstances that embody her life. As her life at Lowood proceeds, she gets to know Helen Burns a little better than the others. The saying “opposites attract” fits nicely with the relationship between Helen and Jane. Helen is faithful to the Bible and everything written in it, she does not like to bend the rules because they are there to teach her what she needs to be taught. I see Helen Burns as very black and white, while I see Jane as seeing the gray areas. Also, Jane believes that you should stick up for what you believe in, and strongly disagrees with the idea of injustice. “Yet it would be your duty to bear it, if you could not avoid it: it is weak and silly to say you cannot bear what it is your fate to be required to bear” (Bronte, 67). Here, Bronte is showing the distinct difference between Jane and Helen. Helen believes in fate and the power of love, and how it is impossible to change your fate because that makes you weak and powerless. Jane could not believe this because what Helen has seen in her life is entirely different from what Jane has endured in her lifetime. Jane remembers the events that happened at Gateshead so vividly that she can not put aside what she felt then, even though it is different from what she feels now. When Helen’s life moves on, Jane does not have a hard time dealing with the death. She now understands where Helen was coming from when she said all those things about accepting your fate. 

One character that I have not mentioned yet is Miss Temple, who was one of the teachers at Lowood school. Although she did not play a big role, she was still an important person in Jane’s life. Ever since the beginning, Miss Temple has been there for Jane like Bessie and Abbot was there for her at Gateshead. While reading, I found this symbolic of someone always watching over Jane, somewhat as a motherly figure in her life. “...with her gone every settled feeling, every association that had made Lowood in some degree a home to me” (Bronte, 106). When her time at Lowood came to an end, so did her time with Miss Temple. This seems like a theme throughout the whole story. Once Jane finds some stability in her life, it is soon taken away from her like Helen was taken away from her years past. However, she does not weep for the ones that she lost, she accepts her fate and moves on to a new chapter of her life.

After the death of her dear friend, Lowood began changing for the good. It was almost like Helen sending a message down to Earth, insisting that Lowood change for her good friend, Jane. Mr. Brocklehurst was has no more ties to the school and is now run by a new organization that influences Jane to stay for another 6 years and teach for 2 years. That experience led her to her new job as a governess at Thornfield manor.