"I am not deceiful"

A brief discussion and yesterday's post on Bronteana about Rochester's appearance and our subsequent reaction toward him, made me wonder about Jane's credibility as a narrator.

The novel, as we know it, is called an Autobiography, and it is written by Jane herself, many years after the events in the novel have taken place. Jane's first impression of Rochester is as follows:

"I traced the general points of middle height and considerable breadth of chest. He had a dark face, with stern features and a heavy brow; his eyes and gathered eyebrows looked ireful and thwarted just now; he was past youth, but had not reached middle-age; perhaps he might be thirty-five. I felt no fear of him, and but little shyness. Had he been a handsome, heroic-looking young gentleman, I should not have dared to stand thus questioning him against his will.."

At the same time, she contradicts herself by saying, "I had hardly ever seen a handsome youth; never in my life spoken to one."

How can she know what an "ugly" man on earth is really is like if she had not met a handsome one?

Moreover, she goes on to claim that, "I had a theoretical reverence and homage for beauty, elegance, gallantry, fascination;"

So she says that her opinion on Beauty is based on theory. Her use of the word "theoretical" suggests that theory can differ from reality, although she might expect everything in reality to follow from theory. If Jane had not met with a handsome man, then chances are she had not met with an ugly one either because her views on Beauty (and its counterpart, Ugliness), are both based on theory--not reality. If Jane had not met many men, then how can she fairly comment on Rochester's looks without comparing him to many other men?

My other concern about Jane is that, as idealistic as she might be, she is not free of human cares, such as jealousy and obsession. Jane does feel immensely jealous towards Blanche and exaggerates the discrepancy in appearances by executing portraits of both Blanche and herself. In fact, she does demean Blanche in the novel instead of exempting from describing her. Even though Jane has a right to be angry at Blanche's superficiality and greed, this same jealousy could propel her to misrepresent Rochester as well. For example, it is possible for her to want to protect him from the discerning minds of the readers, as well as their imaginations, by calling him "ugly". This could keep readers who might be attracted to his physical beauty away from him.

Another matter of note is that Jane's writing about her first impression of Rochester several years after she met him. In this sense, I wonder how accurate her memory is. Because Memory tends to get distorted over time, and Jane is, after all, producing a work of creative non-fiction, I wonder how far she is playing the role of an artist manipulating the information around her for the purpose of her craft. In that case, perhaps Rochester is as much an object in the hand of the artist, as much as the fantastical paintings she creates at Lowood.

Despite the incongruities in Jane's narration, I maintain that the novel remians a powerful work of fiction precisely because it invites these kinds of questions. Thanks to this kind of inquiry, we, the readers, are at liberty to imagine a Rochester, including his appearance, to suit our desires.