Remembering the Future: The Temporal Relationship between Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre and Jean Rhys’s Wide Sargasso Sea

Abstract

If you can remember your future, can you change it? In this article, I examine this question with reference to the intertextual and temporal relationship between Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre (1847) and Jean Rhys's Wide Sargasso Sea (1966). In Jane Eyre, Bertha Mason burns down the house of her husband, Rochester. In Wide Sargasso Sea, Bertha, who has been renamed Antoinette, is locked in the attic and remembers her past in Jane Eyre which, in Wide Sargasso Sea, is located in her future. She remembers that she must set the house on fire in order to fulfil the role she plays in Jane Eyre, where she is an obstacle that must be overcome before Jane and Rochester can end up together. In Wide Sargasso Sea, Rhys critiques this role of the madwoman by providing Antoinette with a history and an explanation for her madness. This article explores the relationship between the two novels, arguing that, through the intertextual relationship, Rhys subverts conventional notions of time as linear and chronological in order to reject Brontë's depiction of female madness, and to transform the interpretation of the madwoman. Opsomming:As jy jou toekoms kan onthou, kan jy dit verander? In hierdie artikel ondersoek ek hierdie vraag met verwysing na die intertekstuele en tydsverwantskap tussen Charlotte Brontë se Jane Eyre (1847) en Jean Rhys se Wide Sargasso Sea (1966). In Jane Eyre brand Bertha Mason haar man, Rochester, se huis af. In Wide Sargasso Sea word Bertha, wat herdoop is tot Antoinette, in die solder toegesluit en sy onthou haar verlede in Jane Eyre, wat in haar toekoms geleë is in Wide Sargasso Sea. Sy onthou dat sy die huis aan die brand moet steek om die rol wat sy in Jane Eyre speel te vervul -waar sy ʼn struikelblok is wat oorkom moet word voordat Jane en Rochester by mekaar kan uitkom. In Wide Sargasso Sea kritiseer Rhys hierdie rol van die waansinnige vrou deur Antoinette se geskiedenis en ʼn verklaring vir haar waansin te gee. Hierdie artikel ondersoek die verwantskap tussen die twee romans, met die argument dat Rhys, by wyse van die intertekstuele verwantskap, konvensionele idees van tyd as lineêr en chronologies, omverwerp om Brontë se uitbeelding van vroulike waansin te verwerp, en om die interpretasie van die waansinnige vrou te verander."I looked at the dress on the floor and it was as if the fire had spread across the room. It was beautiful and it reminded me of something I must do. I will remember I thought. I will remember quite soon now" (Rhys 1966:121). Towards the end of Jean Rhys's Wide Sargasso Sea (1966), the protagonist, Antoinette, utters this statement. Descended into madness and locked up in an attic, she begins to remember a future set out for her by the madwoman, Bertha, in Charlotte Brontë's canonical Jane Eyre (1847). Jane Eyre is a Bildungsroman about the eponymous Jane, who falls in love with her employer, Rochester. He, however, has a mad wife, Bertha, who stands in the way of their happiness. Towards the end of the novel, Bertha burns down Rochester's house and commits suicide in the process,...