Mr Rochester and Charlotte Bronte

Hello there- 1st post!

Has Charlotte Bronte reflected anything in her life in the character of Mr Rochester?

I've got how he reflects Msr Heger, and how the fuel of emotions for him and her stay at the school leads to the considered risque descriptions of him in Jane Eyre.
I've also got how Mr Rochester locking Bertha in the attic would be the best compassionate thing he could do, and that Jane Eyre could represent Charlotte Bronte in that she could love a man no matter what he did.

Many Thanks,
Ramico.

I know it's maybe a bit late...

But locking Bertha up in his own attick was not the best he coud do for her. Rochester is portayed in a very bad way. Charlotte used a technique called irony for this. She made him tell a few lies, especially, that everyone was able to identify at the time. Apparently now they seem to be rather subtle, as everyone seems to believe that Rochester is a positive figure.
We only need to do a little bit of serious critical reading and we can see that.
I put a thread on here that prooves that: Mr Rochester....
We in these modern days seem to have a stigma concerning madhouses and care for the mad in those days. It was not at all bad, certainly not for the rich. He could have sought good treatment but did not.

I hope for her that she didn't encounter that sort of person... Although ther is always hope for change as she demonstrates...

Indeed, Mr Héger (that's what I think you meant rather than his wife;) ), the Byron-cult, maybe? After all there were portaits of him, maybe he was in love with him?

Hi! First of all I totally disagree with kiki on Rochester maltreating Bertha. He is seriously doing his best and if you can not understand that fact, consider being ill and left in a general hospital (and not like the ones we have today) in hands of a stuff overworked, with a lot of patients instead of having an all day private nurse. In case it adds validity I am a psychologist and know for sure that without medication treatment of cases like Bertha's would be much the same: confining.
Secondly, Charlotte Bronte wasn't writing a manual of psychiatry. She needed Bertha in the house to create the Gothic element which brings those two together to face common danger and also to lead to dramatic discovery. She was the gravest impediment in their happiness, without wanting it of course, but they are all trapped because of a stupid law. He could divorce her for being an adulteress but since they found her mad it was supposed that she had no responsibility for her conduct. I am so annoyed that people consider Bertha a saint only for being mad and treated (I repeat) with the usual and even better way and Rochester is considered for that her torturer. Their marriage is a mistake and would be dissolved even if he had found Jane or no one at all.

About the original question apart from Rochester's similarity with Heger in terms of abrupt and despotic conduct and his cigar smoking, I really feel that in someways he expresses feelings that were in reality Charlotte's. In his line "it can not be wrong to love me" I can feel the writer's belief that in spite of morality and laws and religion, love herself is not a crime. Charlotte loved a married man, but she never did anything inappropriate. And no matter how she struggled to drawn that love she never came to see it as bad. She even thought she was punished for a crime she never committed. What she felt it was her own business, they could not judge her conduct. It was what was "natural and inevitably (for her to) love". When St John says to Jane that her love is unlawful and sinful she doesn't answer back but neither is molested. She has her own opinion about it.

I don't feel like Charlotte would love a man no matter what he did. She could love him with his faults but was not blind to his conduct. Even through her novels she criticizes him in showing him how much better men her heroes were and how capable they could be of returning and accepting love. Paul Emanuel loves Lucy and writes to her often because he loves her and likes to do so. Something Heger was not up to. Smith was also rejected because of his inability to defy conventions and take a serious line of conduct towards her.

It seems to be a fact so much fixed in people's brains that it is hard to eradicate. Confining and confining is two: there is good confinement, as Mary Lamb was subected to and there was bad confinement out of ease for the care-takers. Would you, still, as a psychologist lock up your patient in the semi-dark for 24 hours a day, 15 years in the same room? The lamp that was on the ceiling was not the light of a 40Watt lamp like we know it now. It gives permanent dusk. The confinement is not an issue (because, as you say, Bertha's condition can only be treated with medication, although that of course preconcludes the idea of delusion and hallucination, which is not definite but likely (I can understand that that could be right), it is the conditions of that confinement. There were much better places for cheaper.

Bedlam was not the standard! Take a look on here. It will help to put Bedlam in the right place and the improvements in psychiatric care in its place as well.
http://www.mdx.ac.uk/WWW/STUDY/MHHTim.htm

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Originally Posted by ramico

I've also got how Mr Rochester locking Bertha in the attic would be the best compassionate thing he could do, and that Jane Eyre could represent Charlotte Bronte in that she could love a man no matter what he did.

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I'm with Kiki here: Rochester is not in the least portrayed as a compassionate man - he even links the belief in "sympathy", something Jane goes by, to some sort of superstition. Hiding Bertha in an attic and pretending she does not exist is not compassionate whatever way you choose to look at it. It reminds me of the way madmen and freaks were often dissimulated in good families - their existence represented a stain on their good name, and if they were not acknowledged, it was not out of compassion but out of shame. Of course she's also a Gothic motif, but we musn't forget she's also a human being - Jane even takes pity on her and identifies with her at one moment.

I don't think, either, that Jane could love a man whatever he does. After all, she abandons Rochester, doesn't she? And she chooses not to accept St John. She has principles, and acts rather faithfully to them.

Τι κάνεις,

“She needed Bertha in the house to create the Gothic element which brings those two together to face common danger and also to lead to dramatic discovery.” is an acute observation as to Charlotte's intent of Jane Eyre the novel. It is within the bounds of the novel as an artistic expression. “Secondly, Charlotte Bronte wasn't writing a manual of psychiatry.”, ditto.
In the case of kiki's argument of Bertha's treatment, one has to distinguish intent from rhetoric. Hers is not the proof that Rochester was cruel in Bertha's confinement, it is because Rochester is Satanic that he confines Bertha. Hers is an ideological argument, not a discussion of relative merits of treatment of mentally ill patients in the Victorian era.
A documentation of this is in the note by Smq123 (a medical student doing my psychiatry rotation), thread :Mad Woman in the Attic. post#92

“Bertha Rochester is (based on the description in the book) certainly very, very psychotic. She may have something like severe schizophrenia or a psychotic manic disorder. Putting her in the attic didn't make the mental illness worse. You could have given Bertha all the love in the world, and it wouldn't help her. She's psychotic and the only thing that might have helped her is medication, which they didn't have back then.
I find it interesting that some people feel that Rochester treated Bertha poorly. The treatment that Bertha gets is pretty good, even by today's standards. She was kept in a locked room, but most psychiatric units nowadays are locked units - the chances that someone will run away and hurt themselves/other people is very high. Bertha had one-on-one "nursing care" (which is rare even in the best nursing/assisted living homes), and she was only restrained when she was clearly violent and "combative." No, we don't use physical restraints as much nowadays, but that's because we have access to Haldol and Ativan (i.e. "chemical restraints").”.This discussion predates kiki's essay Mr. Rochester and seems that not even a medical opinion had any sway on kiki's predisposition to view Rochester as demonic. She begins her essay: “As we had this discussion before and as I was forced to surrender to people who deliberately wanted to believe that 19th century asylums in Great-Britain were horrible places like Bedlam Hospital, and wanted to see Rochester in a positive light,”

What is unsaid is that kiki had a predisposition to see Rochester as Satanic.

I have read enough scholarship on the death of Bertha being an example of, to use Frye's term, Tyrannical Teleology, killing off the ex-centrics (to use Linda Hutcheon's term) so that the white, English, hero and heroine can get married in proper fashion. It is no mistake that she happens to be of West Indian, Creole origins, and happens to have a stream of insanity running through her. This is the 1840s mind you.

So yeah, locking her in the attic is a way for forgetting her, and concealing the fact that he married an ex-centric from the "proper society" within the novel. Rochester may be romantic in the 1840s sense, but today he is nothing more than an encapsulation of the racism of his time.

Rochester is not a "good person" by todays standards. Locking a woman up in your attic is hardly a kind thing to do. I would think burning down the house should be seen as a heroic act more so than an insane act. I'm sure Helene Cixous would agree :p.

The judgement of smq123 was based on psychosis/schizophrenia.
Wikipedia provides the prime symptoms of it (referenced!):
hallucinations, delusions, thought disorder, or lack of insight (each described below). The symptoms are similar in nature to mental confusion and delirium.

Lack of insight for Bertha is clear, thought disorder as well. Although we never hear her speak, we can assume that she is so far gone that that is not possible anymore.

But I have an issue with hallucinations and delusions.

Hallucination is defined (referenced!) as ‘sensory perception in the absence of external stimuli. They are different from illusions, or perceptual distortions, which are the misperception of external stimuli.’

Delusion is defined (referenced!) as ‘A false belief based on incorrect inference about external reality that is firmly sustained despite what almost everybody else believes and despite what constitutes incontrovertible and obvious proof or evidence to the contrary. The belief is not one ordinarily accepted by other members of the person's culture or subculture.

Primary delusions and Secondary delusions: ‘Primary delusions are defined as arising suddenly and not being comprehensible in terms of normal mental processes, whereas secondary delusions may be understood as being influenced by the person's background or current situation (e.g., ethnic or sexual orientation, religious beliefs, superstitious belief).’ So in essence, primary delusions are for outsiders totally incomprehensible, where secondary delusions are in the sense that the base of it can be found.

There is no proof that Bertha did have hallucinations. There was nowhere a scene where she saw something Rochester, or Jane could not see.
The fact that Bertha can have had delusions is possible, but that implies that there was a reality that was judged badly by her, yet that is not sure. The most obvious is that she attacks Rochester. Is it only in her mind that he was cruel to her or is it not only in her mind? (the reaction from the critics that attacked Brontë for not pitying Bertha says a lot in that respect) What did she want to do when she set Jane’s room on fire? Did she just want to have a fire or did she want to take revenge? Did she want to commit suicide or did she jump from the roof to escape Rochester? It is hard to judge Bertha, because she has not a lot of pages dedicated to her.

The only thing there is is the laugh, but that does not denote hallucination nor delusion definitely. We do not know what she was laughing at because we are not allowed to peep into the room where she is hidden.

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Originally Posted by kiki1982

Would you, still, as a psychologist lock up your patient in the semi-dark for 24 hours a day, 15 years in the same room?

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No. Why should I? The word "still" says it all. Nowadays things are different. There are medications. Doesn't it occur to you that Bertha is in a room with no windows in order to avoid her jumping out and to allow Grace Pool to monitor her better? When was Rochester an expert on the subject of psychiatry that would allow him to dictate how she should be treated? Probably he took Carter's advise to confine her at home. About her dark room: I was participating in the effort of de-institutionalize people from Greek mental clinics to come back to the community. We were told and we saw too that the important factor was not to move a patient from a cell to a nicely decorated room. That helps our guilty conscience but not the patient. So it is not the decor that was wrong there but Bertha's inability to understand that. She was years and years sick and without medication and psychotherapy and help from experts. She would really be reduced to that animal state. You say we don't know if she was hallucinating. Who cares? We are not to diagnose her. But even so. She tries to burn him in his bed, she attacks her brother, Jane later, she has lost the ability to speak, she is scratching the walls, she laughs without reason, she is suicidal and there is no way that all this was created to her by Rochester. I know I can't drive a person crazy, if he is not predisposed, and I don't think that Rochester really wanted her to get crazy anyway. It is not to his interest. She is clearly sick.
She is presented as an animal, but not because Charlotte was an insensitive woman, but because the more of a shadow Bertha is and the less of a personality, identity, consciousness she has, the more Rochester is justified in his claim that he is not married to a real person (in her senses) and Jane doesn't get to be criticized for longing for a married man. It is the economy of the plot. She is a fictional character. Charlotte didn't do her any harm. And also everybody tend to forget that Bertha was no angel that was maltreated. She was a sinner, an alcoholic and a nymphomaniac and her marriage to him would end in no time, if she wasn't diagnosed as crazy and irresponsible for her actions. And you can't say that we learn all this by Rochester only, because the whole town knew his wife's adventures and her brother would act differently towards Rochester if he thought he was maltreating her.

Yes Rochester (God knows only how much) he tries to forget her and doesn't sympathize with her much because in the first place their personalities were different. It is difficult enough to be near and care and provide for people that belong in your family and you really love (Thackeray as you said close his wife in an asylum as it would be very difficult for him and his daughters). Imagine doing that for a person you have never felt love for. And yet Rochester acted like a husband to Bertha. Even Mason had confidence on him and refrained from taking his share of responsibility as a brother and a person who knew all along. So I find it pretty hard to criticize on situations like this and I wish no one would ever come to face that, plus the stigma or the judgment of the world (like in our case).

I don't find Rochester satanic. He is no Heathcliff. He would never end up with Jane if he was. Charlotte really liked him. And being his creator she knew better what he was:
"Mr. Rochester has a thoughtful nature and a very feeling heart; he is neither selfish nor self-indulgent; he is ill-educated, misguided; errs, when he does err, through rashness and inexperience: he lives for a time as too many other men live, but being radically better than most men, he does not like that degraded life, and is never happy in it. He is taught the severe lessons of experience and has sense to learn wisdom from them. Years improve him; the effervescence of youth foamed away, what is really good in him still remains. His nature is like wine of a good vintage, time cannot sour, but only mellows him." from a letter to Mr Williams.

To peripathetic: Μιλάς ελληνικά; I am impressed!

About the Creole thing: In my opinion Charlotte didn't had anything against Creoles, she didn't even met one. She just needed a story to happen in a far away country so as to be credibly hidden in England. She lived in an imperialistic country that had colonies in both West Indias and India and she used that in a novel. In that sense all her nation was racist. Who said that Phys wasn't also. For me she was really prejudiced in her read of Jane Eyre because of her nationality and some reviewers have said she was as unfair to black women, as Charlotte was to Creoles. So Charlotte and her heroes are not to be judged as racists for echoing the general attitude of their era.

Hmm, if you read the novel carefully, though, you do come to realize that there is something about foreign women that Jane (and probably Bronte) didn't like much. Consider also the fact that all the disparaged women have dark skins (from Mrs Reed to Blanche), whereas Jane is as pale as the proverbial lily! Have you noticed the way "frenchness" is treated, too? Not awfully broadmindedly! :p Rochester also comes very close to vindicating the aristotelian justification of slavery (inferior in nature), so I suppose this bothers some people...

I didn't much like the criticism that was based on Bertha's vicimisation as woman and foreigner before either, but the more I study the book, the more I can only acknowledge its validity. And the argument that Bronte only reproduced the prejudice of her period, whilst being quite valid, is a little disappointing: others didn't. And as her views were rather "modern" in certain aspects, I think lots of people feel let down that it's not the case in all.

About Creoles, I wonder whether the most important isn't the uncertainty underlying that word... Even in the 19th century, it wasn't clear, when you spoke of a Creole, if the person was white or black, and that could only be bothersome for a society which rested on a rather clearcut system of differences between races/classes/genders etc. The figure of the governess is actually problematic for much the same reason: not part of the underclass because of her culture, and slightly higher earnings than other servants, but not part a bourgeois and even less a noblewoman - an in-between creature, like the Creole.

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Originally Posted by Bitterfly

Hmm, if you read the novel carefully, though, you do come to realize that there is something about foreign women that Jane (and probably Bronte) didn't like much. Consider also the fact that all the disparaged women have dark skins (from Mrs Reed to Blanche), whereas Jane is as pale as the proverbial lily! Have you noticed the way "frenchness" is treated, too? Not awfully broadmindedly!

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I am surprised that when “ you read the novel carefully” we come to such different impressions. I think that you misread the comment about 'frenchness'.
The English historically have had an inferiority complex about the French. From Henry the Eight to Churchill and even some Americans reflect it. How else do you explain that girls were thought French as a sign of accomplishment, that the aristocrats drank and valued Bordeaux and Burgoyne above all other wines, that French literature was held at the apex of culture and at the same time sneered at as depravity? That Rochester proposed to take Jane on her honeymoon to France?
Yes, Charlotte reveled in her Englishness but at the same time her cultural horizon was French.
I think that you misread. Our understanding is often influenced more by emotions than by reason.

Let us deviate for a moment from the clouds of psychiatry, fear not I'll return in a moment, and descent to linguistics. When kiki says Rochester is demonic or Rochester is Satanic, she implies the present tense by 'is' as opposed to the historic 'was'. Had she used the word 'was', the problem would be searching the text for such usage and the problem would be solved, in that Rochester's characteristics would have been described by Charlotte; artistic license.
“is” is a problem in that it denotes the present, ie implies that the reader should make the judgment of Rochester's character, here and now, as if Rochester was your neighbor, on the evidence presented by kiki in Mr Rochester. And the evidence is not there. Charlotte' statement should suffice for reasonable minds.
What she does is use allusions from Byron, Milton, intermixing with Biblical passages, to substantiate a connection to Rochester that is subjective in extreme. Are her interpretation of allusions delusional?

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Originally Posted by kiki1982

Delusion is defined (referenced!) as ‘A false belief based on incorrect inference about external reality that is firmly sustained despite what almost everybody else believes and despite what constitutes incontrovertible and obvious proof or evidence to the contrary. The belief is not one ordinarily accepted by other members of the person's culture or subculture.

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Has kiki met Satan? Does she know of anybody who has? Has she proof of 'external reality' of Satan's characteristics that she could compare them to Rochester's? Religious belief does not constitute external proof. Therefore the question is not of Bertha's delusions, whether primary or secondary but whether the supposition of Rochester being demonic or Satanic is delusional.

I was only talking about the mere 'locking up in semi-dark' circumstances 24 hours a day. Whether there is medication nowadays or not, it is not relevant to the absolute darkness, always.

It is well possible that she could not be helped, but it is a fact, that there is an increase in winter in scandinavia of suicides that has been put down to the lack of daylight. And that is only a few months of lack of daylight, in some cases, not 15 years...

'no window to jump from'. Ever thought about bars?

There was a general optimism in the 1830-1850s that every lunatic could be cured. We all know this is not true, but Bertha needs to be seen in that context. If not the pity Charlotte found in order, and for the lack of which she was criticised, cannot be found.

Hallucinations, we don't care. If we do not care, what are then the grounds for making Rochester the victim in all this?
Has it ever occured to anyone that it might be different? (that Bertha was a little potty, maybe got worse, and that he locked her up out of shame and that she wants to kill him out of revenge?). All perfectly possible, without diagnosis on Bertha's part, as we do not care and are not able to do that, so the focus is not on her yet her moment is important.

About the 'frenchness':
Charlotte also had a problem with the Belgians apparently. Or maybe rather with their 'superficial' Catholic morals, fed to her by the discussion on it in England (emancipation of the Catholics outside the Church of England). In The Professor I have heard, she is not at all positive about them. Apart from one, of course :D.
It is interesting what you say about the dark women, Bitterfly. There could be some truth in there (Platonic :p). Maybe it is interesting to look at what connotations the words French/France had in the 19th century, like Rome had 'inevitable downfall' attached to it.

Peripatetics:

MAY ASK YOU ONCE MORE to stop ridiculing yourself by making such ignorant remarks as that. I do not see in this case where delusion is involved. I think it might find itself hidden on the other side of the ocean. Indeed, 'lack of insight' is an inherent problem to those people.
If you cannot put forward a better argument than that, you spoil the discussion to everyone.

I say it once more (If you had read my text properly I didn't have to do so): Rochester is only demonic in the sense that he is narcissistic, which is carefully deducted from allusions as Manfred whose narcissism Freud already acknowledged, although he was puzzled by the extent of it. If Charlotte had wanted to portray Rochester in a favourable way, why then did she link him with King Lear? With Manfred? Why did she make him a Byronic Hero, which is a self-destructive character in its core? Why did she give him qualities in a dangerous combination: conscientiousness, firmness, acquisitiveness, hope (seeing the positive in everything, liable to live in another reality) and that in combination with a lack of empathy?

Dear kiki,
I think you are determined to dislike Mr Rochester and that would be fine by me, as everyone is entitled to his/her opinion. I wouldn't mind at all, if you said you found him too despotic or blabbering or boring or anything else. But his presentation as a man who maltreated his wife is a serious one and has an bad effect on a book I truly love. Because, if he is what you take him to be, no healthy woman would like, approve or even forgive him (something that is quite the opposite), not to mention that both Charlotte and Jane would appear blind, stupid and masochistic (because Charlotte explicitly says he is good). Do you think that this is the message of the book (that women like scoundrels) or do you believe that Rochester was so much redeemed in the end that he left his tendency to abuse women behind?
That is the real question and not if Bertha was sane or not. In another novel she could be an annoying woman locked up by a domineering, lying husband, but not in this one, according to it's writer, who is for me the highest authority in this.
I grant you that if I met a man like Rochester I would consider him very dangerous indeed and I don't know if I would trust him, because I wouldn't know the extend of his character, as I know it from the book and because there would be no Charlotte Bronte behind my back to guide him with her pen and save me in the right moment. In true life these are risks you have to take when you love someone and you must show some confidence in order to be in a relationship. You then see how the other person uses that confidence and so on. What I mean to say is that there are really scoundrels out there but this is no reason for any of us to project to Rochester whatever bitter experiences we may have. In the end he is a marvelous, exciting but true and good kind of man in this novel, capable of loving and esteeming a woman for what she is and we can thankfully enjoy him the way Charlotte meant him to be. And I don't see the reason why not accepting him the way the writer portrayed him.

As for Bertha, I have stated before that her character is there for the gothic element and the economy of the plot. Charlotte was not indifferent to madness. Her friend's Ellen Nussey's brother had mental problems and Charlotte was very supporting to the family, more perhaps than she was to Branwell, probably because she thought drinking is something that you may indulge in, while you can not help being mad. She said about Bertha that her condition is pitiful and that she herself (Charlotte) perhaps made a mistake in letting the horror prevail in the novel. What more did you wish her to say? It was a social problem, but not a theme of her book to handle. Charlotte had warned her publishers that she would not write a book about its morals. An artist can not apologize for everything. There will be in his/her work characters that he/she may not approve but are there for aesthetic reasons or to help the plot.

To bitterfly: I have read something similar about dark colored characters but then again Mrs Reed's hair are flaxen (blond), Ginevra Fanshaw (an irritating person from Villette) is blond and blue eyed, Madame Beck (brown hair blue eyes) is a nasty character, while Rochester (a good character) is dark skinned and dark haired and so is Paul Emanuel and Mrs Bretton (Villette) and Robert and Luis Moore (Shirley). So go figure... I, on the contrary, believe that Charlotte Bronte was attracted to dark colored heroes and heroines exactly because she was of the opposite colors (in my country, where dark colors prevail, blond is considered more attractive and rare).

About Charlotte's racism: I understand your argument that if she were a woman so far beyond her era, she should be also beyond racism itself. But I believe that most people tend to reflect mainly on issues that concern them and they know inside-out. Charlotte was sensitive to sex issues because as a woman she could not fulfill her dreams and ambitions and fought to find her way out. She believed in her talent and struggled to assert the right to express it. She was sensitive partly to cross-cultural differences too, especially when she went to Brussels with Emily and they were singled out as too weird and old and Protestants. And so she retaliated in a hostile environment by reinforcing what was "good" in her culture and emphasizing what was "bad' in the other (although you must admit that she did credit to the educational system of Brussels). We must not also forget that her experience in that strange country was not a pleasant one and that she was for this prejudiced. Charlotte also was concerned about themes like slavery (which she often connected with the position of the woman) and told her publishers she really admired Harriet Beecher Stowe (author of Uncle Tom's cabin) for her great handling of a such sensitive matter as this, but she could never do something like that, because she doesn't know the situation well enough and living isolated in Haworth she did not have the luxury of research like Thackeray or Dickens had when writing about social problems in industrial cities. She also reminded them that she tried once to handle a matter thus and it was a failure (she meant Shirley). So, she knew that personal experience was were she was realy strong at. She may not be always right or even prejudiced, but she was great in expressing the deeper parts of a woman's soul and her use of psychology is faultless. Everyone has his/her era of expertise after all. :)

I agree with your third paragraph, and think it's true that it is easier for a woman in the 19th century to defend the cause of women than the cause of blacks. On that subject, by the way, while i do not refute your examples from Bronte's other novels, I would quibble on Mrs Reed's darkness: John Reed is said to have "reviled her for her dark skin, similar to his own" (ch. 2). Blanche has the complexion of an "Israelite princess". If Rochester too is said to be dark, I think it is because he is not a pure character either - or at least, the part he plays at the beginning of the novel is that of a dark character (he even dresses up to be darker than he is in the charade scene).

And that is where we disagree, once again. I am of the opinion that Rochester is first a cruel character, in whom is lacking compassion (Jane remarks on this). He stages a real mascarade for Jane's benefit (see all the references to Shakespeare and the idea of the theatrum mundi, in particular), he is a liar, and a would-be bigamist. He is also a hubristic character, in that he thinks that he can disrespect laws (which he knows he is breaking, since when jane says yes, he asks for God's pardon). But the end of the novel brings about his redemption, and he says this himself: "I would have sullied my innocent flower - breathed guilt on its purity: the Omnipotent snatched it from me. I, in my stiff-necked rebellion, almost cursed the dispensation: instead of bending to the decree, I defied it. Divine justice pursued its course [...] I was forced to pass through the valley of the shadow of death [...] I began to experience remorse, repentance; the wish for reconcilement with my Maker". Here you have an experience of conversion, which also resembles a pilgrim's progress (the reference to the valley of the shadow of death): Jane's spiritual progress is not the only one in the novel, it is parallelled by Rochester's. References to Revelation, on the next page, show that his eyes have been opened, paradoxically at the same time that he has been blinded (but the blind seer is a common place in myth).

You say that Charlotte and Jane would be fools for accepting such a man, but that is just the point: Jane does NOT accept the first version of Rochester. She takes him on when it is clear that he accepts human laws, and God's laws, and he has to be mortified in the flesh to do so (casting away the sinful eye and hand, by the way).

What is interesting is that I still wonder, thanks to your questions, whether he is more condemned more for his ill-treatment of Bertha or for his attempt at bigamy... The latter identifies him with the Oriental harem-masters Jane so rejects, and therefore with a form of arbitrary masculine domination. For the first, you can argue that he makes Bertha into a monster, and that Jane participates, subconsciously, in this endeavour. There's also the fact that his very marriage with Bertha seems to constitute a sin, because he married her for the wrong reasons: lust and money.

I've been long enough, so will stop here, but please, please, Rochester is not monodimensional - he's an evolutive character, and that is what makes him interesting. If he's marvellous and exciting, and there I concur with you again, it's because, also, he's a type of the Byronic hero - mysterious, romantic, but also dangerous, and closer to a satanic figure than to an angelic one (and there I'm with kiki again). What's funny in the novel is that the satanic character is finally domesticated - but that's also what happens to the Gothic elements of the novel.