Class Blog

In The Moonstone, I was struck by comments made by Betteredge early on about education.  On page 28 (Chapter 3), Betteredge described Franklin Blake’s father and his struggle for the Dukedom.  He says, “Mr. Blake discovered that the only way of being even with his country for the manner in which it had treated him, was not to let his country have the honour of educating his son” (28).  Early on, this quotation introduces the idea that education and knowledge are forms of power.  Countries get to assert their dominance over the next generation through the school system; it ensures that the next generation will follow the same social, moral, and political views that currently govern the country.  Mr. Blake takes this power away from England by sending his son, Franklin, to school in “that superior country, Germany” (28).  Education also sets up a system of hierarchy, legitimizing countries whose education is ‘superior’ and condemning others.  The novel points out through the description of Franklin’s education, “he gave the French a turn next, and the Italians a turn after”, that Western countries are the only ones even allowed in this hierarchical system (29).  Indian education is not present here, even as the novel centers greatly on Indian origins.  As the novel takes place in England, I find it very interesting that immediately the common themes of English power and superiority are inverted through the educational system. Perhaps, this notion is meant to signify that character’s with English education will have a harder time understanding the events of this mystery, as their upbringing was not as well-rounded as Franklin Blake’s.

Betteredge inadvertently affirms the notion that there is power in knowledge frequently throughout the novel. He makes minor comments such as, “My lady, doing me the honour to consult me about most things, consulted me about Rosanna” (35).  As Betteredge is lower in society than his lady, he finds his power in the knowledge and gossip that he obtains about everyone around him.  He takes pleasure in being the inside man who knows everyone’s secrets.  He even knows more than he tells us; he often gives the readers a brief synopsis of the story or leaves out other details entirely, proving that he has more power than we do as readers.  I find it very interesting that Wilkie Collins introduces ideas about education, knowledge, and power early on in this mystery or detective fiction.  Perhaps, it is a tool to play up the common tension in a mystery: no one character knows the whole story.  Betteredge feels powerful knowing gossip, but does he have the full story?  Conflicting notions about education could further complicate this tension if we begin to doubt whose education and understanding is reliable as we move through different characters and perspectives later on.

In Reading for the Plot, Brooks asserts “in working out and working through plots, as writers and readers, they were engaged in a prime, irreducible act of understanding how human life acquires meaning.” How can this statement be applied as a lens in understanding The Moonstone and in particular Collins’s objective of tracing “the influence of character on circumstances”?  At first reading it would appear that the lens inverts Collins’s premise.  As P.D. James writes in her introduction to The Moonstone, “Character is to direct plot, not plot dominate character”.

Yet while character may be predominant and guides the reader through the plot, ultimately character is shaped as well by circumstances. In order to understand and reveal how human life acquires meaning, character can not only impose on plot but must be molded and formed and developed by situations and events.  Those influences on character then reveal how human life ultimately acquires meaning.

Taking just the Prologue in which to apply this lens, we would have the narrator repulsed by what he has witnessed: a theft and possible multiple murder. John Herncastle is the accused thief and murderer.  This plot reveals the absence of significance of human life for John (jewels are worth more than human life) while dictates the insurmountable importance of human life to the narrator who ultimately refuses a lifelong relationship with his cousin, John, after what he has witnessed.  The way it which the prologue has been structured would imply that plot is influencing character and not the reverse.

As the novel continues, we are lead through various stages of plot as narrated by different characters. Clearly this style of narratorship fulfills Collins’s objective in showing the imprint of character on plot.  The plot develops and is viewed and thus communicated to the reader through the eyes of each particular narrator.  To that extent, character does indeed direct plot.  However, ultimately if the prime and irreducible aim of plot is to understand the significance of human life, then the impact that plot has on character growth is preeminent.

The Moonstone opens with a short prologue describing an account of how a gem known as the Moonstone was stolen. The narrator of the prologue contemplates the ideas of morality in relation to stealing as well as the difference between evidence and moral evidence. The narrator witnesses his cousin take part in the murder and the stealing of the precious jewel. While he tries to process this information, he gives his cousin multiple chances to explain to himself what happened. However, his cousin chooses not to come clean and the narrator doesn’t press the issue. They just decide to “turn my back on him; and we have not spoken since”(15). While the narrator confesses that he has only moral evidence, throughout the entire prologue he seems to be unsure of himself and the consequences that his recollection of the events could lead to. They also choose not to be proactive in trying to find justice for the killings or the stolen stone. Instead, they are content with letting the curse of the Moonstone do its own form of justice. 

The speaker heavily focuses on the morals of stealing the Moonstone but doesn’t appear to question the morals of colonization in the subsequent death of the native people protecting the stone. This is an interesting concept because the stolen stone seems to be the drive of this whole novel and no characters consider that to break the curse the stone should be placed where it once was as the myth stated. Instead, the characters choose to try to break the Moonstone to stop the curse. Within the novel, there is an odd juxtaposition between colonization and destroying the native’s culture, while at the same time believing in the religion enough that they believe in the powers of the Moonstones curse.

As we (y’all) discussed in class, Betteredge has very surface level opinions on most things and I think that applies to his and other characters’ knowledge on the moonstone as well. They are concerned only about the appearance and the worth of this stone, but are completely ignorant of, even have no care for its religious and cultural value or the consequences of displacing it.

This is the passage where we get the grand reveal of the moonstone:
“Lord bless us! it was a Diamond! As large, or nearly, as a plover’s egg! The light that streamed from it was like the light of the harvest moon. When you looked down into the stone, you looked into a yellow deep that drew your eyes into it so that they saw nothing else. It seemed unfathomable; this jewel, that you could hold between your finger and thumb seemed unfathomable as the heavens themselves. We set it in the sun, and then shut the light out of the room, and it shone awfully out of the depths of its own brightness, with a moony gleam, in the dark.” (Collins 74)
In Betteredge’s narrative, he focuses mainly on the its size, glow and how much it resembles the moon, but he seems to be unaware of (or choose to turn away from) the the origin of the moonstone: it was set in the forehead of the Indian God of moon and was “supposed to be affected by the lunar influences” (12). Betteredge does address how the moonstone “seemed unfathomable as the heavens themselves” (74) but fails to see that it might possess some sort of divine agency. If it can be taken literally that the stone is “affected by lunar influences”, I found a website (reliable or not I don’t know) that tells me the moon phase on Rachel’s birthday, 06/21/1848, and that is a 74% full moon, which to me sounds strong enough to induce an unpleasant dinner party through the moonstone. Maybe this idea will recur in the rest of the novel, but if not, the link is attached just for fun.

Based on Franklin’s observation on the moonstone, there is “a defect, in the shape of a flaw, in the very heart of the stone” (50). Apart from the physical defect, the stone is said to be cursed as well; it is said to punish and avenge those who lay their hands on it. If the stone is affected by the moon, and punishment is even predicted by a deity (Vishnu the Preserver), it seems to imply that divine power punishes the immoral in this case.

Betteredge and the other characters are depicted as ignorant intruders who take what’s sacred in another culture without knowing its true value and power. They are trying to take possession of something that is beyond their knowledge and control. I’m curious to read on and see if there will be any more obvious supernatural interference in the story.

 

https://www.moonpage.com/index.html?go=T&auto_dst=T&totphase=WANING+GIBBOUS+%2863.64%25+full%29&m=6&d=21&y=1848&hour=21&min=0&sec=0

“If he was right, here was our quiet English house suddenly invaded by a devilish India Diamond—bringing after it a conspiracy of living rogues, set loose on us by the vengeance of a dead man. There was our situation, as revealed to me in Mr. Franklin’s last words! Who ever heard the like of it—in the nineteenth century, mind; in an age of progress, and in a country which rejoices in the blessings of the British constitution? Nobody ever heard the like of it, and, consequently, nobody can be expected to believe it. I shall go on with my story, however, in spite of that” (Collins 46).  

This is the reaction of Mr. Betteredge, after hearing the tale of the Moonstone from Mr. Franklin upon his arrival. The two men sit along the coast, separated by a rough walking path from the comforts of the English home and garden, watching the waters create a deadly pit in the form of the Shivering Sand. The instability of their environmental situation extends to their narrative ones: Mr. Franklin’s story of the “devilish Indian Diamond” is impossible to believe, and despite this Betteredge must continue it against the assumed incredulity of the reasonable reader (46).  

Franklin and Betteredge are seated at the edge of nation, reason, and the simultaneous pride and confinement of their time. This passage is full of binaries: the English versus the Indian, the living against the dead, the 19th century self-sense of “progress” versus the unbelievable, and reader versus narrator. These overlap, of course, as the sea overlaps the shore, making lethal quicksand of solid ground. The “devilish India Diamond” has “invaded” the “quiet English house,” blessed in the nineteenth century with “the British constitution” which must push back against such gothic nonsense as curses and religions-that-aren’t-Christianity (46). The Moonstone is, effectively, a stand-in for all kinds of English anxieties, ranging from the potential for rebellion by colonized nations to sexual and capitalistic competition. The “devilish India Diamond” could be—and is—immediately followed by “living rogues, set loose on us” to wreak havoc in the psychological as well as the physical world of secure English countryside life.  

The anxiety of foreign influence, interference, and invasion are not the only ones present in the passage—there is also the skepticism of the English reader. Betteredge assumes the likeness of his reader with himself: “Who ever heard the like of it?” he asks, only to answer his own question: “Nobody ever head the like of it…” (46). Who ever heard of England fearing the influence of India? he seems to ask. Nobody. It was supposed to be the other way around, and now everything has been turned upside down and the “blessings of the British constitution,” the very “age of progress” cannot coincide with such reversal (46). Betteredge sees the gothic element, the collision of the present (“the nineteenth century” “the age of progress) and the nation (“our quiet English house” “a country which rejoices in the blessings of the British constitution”) with the Other—in this case the Indian, the past, and the dead. It is this separation of the living and the dead which makes possible the entire “situation”— “the vengeance of a dead man” is wreaking havoc on the life of living people, and that the dead man spent significant time in India and only existed before the span of the novel connects him also with the foreign and the past.  

By establishing, on the shores of England, that the threat is not only the diamond but the “living rogues” who have enabled its influence and intensified its dangers, Betteredge and Franklin raise the stakes of the Moonstone question: it is not simply a battle over money, of religion, or of property, though it is also all of these things—it is (at the risk of being cheeky) a battle for the soul of England itself. 

 

Franklin and Betteredge discussing the story at the Shivering Sands

http://www.victorianweb.org/art/illustration/jewett/8.html

 

“A wind fresh from Europe blew over the ocean and rushed through the open casement: the storm broke, streamed, thundered, blazed, and the air grew pure.  I then framed and fixed a resolution.  While I walked under the dripping orange-trees of my wet garden, and amongst its drenched pomegranates and pine-apples, and while the refulgent dawn of the tropics kindled round me—I reasoned thus, Jane—and now listen; for it was true Wisdom that consoled me in that hour, and showed me the right path to follow. 

“The sweet wind from Europe was still whispering in the refreshed leaves, and the Atlantic was thundering in glorious liberty; my heart, dried up and scorched for a long time, swelled to the tone, and filled with living blood—my being longed for renewal—my soul thirsted for a pure draught.  I saw hope revive—and felt regeneration possible.  From a flowery arch at the bottom of my garden I gazed over the sea—bluer than the sky: the old world was beyond; clear prospects opened thus:— 

“‘Go,’ said Hope, ‘and live again in Europe: there it is not known what a sullied name you bear, nor what a filthy burden is bound to you.  You may take the maniac with you to England; confine her with due attendance and precautions at Thornfield: then travel yourself to what clime you will, and form what new tie you like.  That woman, who has so abused your long-suffering, so sullied your name, so outraged your honour, so blighted your youth, is not your wife, nor are you her husband.  See that she is cared for as her condition demands, and you have done all that God and humanity require of you.  Let her identity, her connection with yourself, be buried in oblivion: you are bound to impart them to no living being.  Place her in safety and comfort: shelter her degradation with secrecy, and leave her’” (Brontë 304-05).  

 

This story, told with heavy bias from Mr. Rochester as he attempts to convince Jane of the rightness, and even morality, of his imprisonment, abuse, and torture of his wife Bertha Mason is saturated with language of contrast and hierarchy. How Bertha has “so abused your [Rochester’s] long-suffering, so sullied your name, so outraged your honour, so blighted your youth” is unclear (Brontë 304-305). She seems guilty of marrying him, and of inheriting a temperament and (perhaps) a disease that runs in her family. He is equally guilty of one of these offenses, and the only others clearly committed at the time he describes are saying mean things about him. Strange crimes, if indeed they can be called crimes. Still, as in much of the novel, Bertha herself is almost entirely absent—she is “that woman” “her” or “not your wife,” but she is never referred to as either Bertha Mason or Mrs. Rochester throughout this passage. Instead, Rochester focuses on the weather, plants, and climate around him—they seems equally as guilty as Bertha, in his mind, for his suffering (and, like Bertha, they represent his willing entry into an environment he did not understand). “The storm,” he recalls, “broke, streamed, thundered, blazed” in a furious display of heavenly (or, by his token, hellish) ire. Much like the chestnut tree, Rochester risks being torn asunder as he stands facing the storm. Still, it is passing, as is his time in the Caribbean (Brontë 304). The “refulgent dawn” (Brontë 304) is softened by “a wind fresh from Europe…and the air grew pure” (Brontë 304); this “sweet wind” “whispers” to him the necessity of his escape back to Europe, across the (wide) Sargasso Sea into the waiting arms of his homeland (Brontë 304). The “thundering in glorious liberty” of the Atlantic contrasts with the storm that “thundered” only moments before (Brontë 304) and his heart “swelled…and was filled with living blood” as he finds hope for the first time since his marriage to Bertha began to degenerate (and, perhaps, long before that). It is in escaping, in a sense, the fiery moods, painful passions and heats of the Caribbean that Rochester sees a chance for a new beginning in an old world. The “orange-trees…pomegranates and pineapples” emphasize the exoticism of this fiery Hades, and he knows better than to taste the seven seeds—he wanders past them to the “flowery arch” which frames his view of the sea he longs to cross, “bluer than the sky” (Brontë 304).  

The question of what to do with Bertha lingers. He can run away from everything that he associates with her, all that she knows or loves. He can draw them both into the cold, rainy climes of Europe instead of lingering in the sunlight of the Caribbean—like Adèle, he can find security in an English garden. But he cannot in good conscience leave his wife behind. Hope, with startlingly coarse language for such an embodiment, tells Rochester that the “filthy burden,” “the maniac” can be “confine[d]” while he “travels to what clime [he] will,” ever to be punished for her marriage with the loss of freedom, friends, family and country. To stow her, as any other unfavorable possession, in an unused chamber of his attic will be “all that God and Humanity require of him” (Brontë 304). To let her rot in a cell of his own division is only fair compensation for her giving contradictory orders, and for having a mentally ill mother. Rochester finds outlet for his own anger at all that he has found in this part of the world, wife and weather, and nature reflects his rage and hope back to him.  

What Brontë suggests is a hierarchy of worlds, one in which the “new” world is actually a raging, dangerous beast kept in close contact with the supernatural and the mad, holding only suffering for Europeans who venture there unprepared—yes, a fortune could be secured, a wife found, but at no cost a reasonable man would ever pay. The “old” world is where Hope and Wisdom lie (Brontë 304-05), and it is where the hearts of sinners may be repaired. However, she makes clear, the only way to bring back anything from the far West is to bring back the devil with you, to infiltrate England with animalistic rage and terror, and any such thing must be kept under lock and key for fear of burns, blood, or the detection of bigamy. To allow the influence of the Caribbean and the New World to come to Europe is, in short, to embrace the destruction of the European stronghold, to draw a path to England for storms and lightning bolts to follow, and to purchase the death of not only the foreigner but the maiming and disruption of Europe besides: though Old England can, of course, master it and struggle on, it will be a painful and close fight, one nearly pyrrhic in its resolution. Far better, of course, never to leave at all.  

 

Jamaica:

England:

Fairy language is constantly used throughout the novel Jane Eyre. Many of this language comes from the character of Rochester, that constantly compares and calls Jane magical creatures like witch, elf, sprite, fairy, and more. Jane is generally characterized with fairy-like characteristics as well, including being small statured and often compared to a bird. Besides Jane, the character of Bertha in the story is also characterized as a mythical creature, but she is instead mainly called a vampire and has a habit of being people and sucking their blood. Most of the characterization of humans as mythical creatures comes in the description of these two women. Besides this, Jane herself often focuses on, hears, and mentions mystical creatures. One of the instances that Jane brings up the subject is when she first sees Rochester arriving, and is frightened when remembering a tale Bessie had previously told her.

“….all sorts of fancies bright and dark filled my mind: the memories of nurses stores were there amongst other rubbish; and when they recurred, maturing youth added to them a vigor and vividness beyond what childhood could give. As this horse approached, I remembered certain of Bessie’s tales wherein figured a North-of-England spirit, called a “Gytrash”; which in the from of horse, mule, or large dog, haunted solitary ways, and sometimes came upon belated travelers, as this horse was now coming upon me. “

Ironically, Rochester is the traveler in this situation and he is the one who has becomes “ambushed” by an unexpected creature on the road, his horse slipping on the ice and injuring his leg. This curious reversal of the roles in the situation puts Jane once again into the role of the fairy tale creature. This furthers the point that much of the representation of mythical creatures in the novel comes from women alone, despite Jane seeming unaware of her own “mystical” roles.

Notably, even the story that Jane recalls has been taught to her by the servant Bessie. While Bessie is not characterized in a mystical manner, she represents how women can wield a certain authority in the household through these “rubbish” old wives tale stories that Jane is recounting. Despite the fact that Jane puts down this tale as childish, it undoubtably left a mark on her well past childhood. The power of women’s oral tales went so far as to cause fear in the English politician and theorist John Locke, who claimed that children may be mislead by these tales and their imaginations could get out of control. In “Some Thoughts Concerning Education,” he comments “Always whilst he is Young, be sure to preserve his tender Mind from all Impressions and Notions of Spirits and Goblings, or any fearful Apprehensions in the dark. This he will be in danger of from the indiscretion of Servants, whose usual Method is to awe Children, and keep them in subjection…” Specifically, he is relating these stories to the lower class and therefore their values, and encouraging those of higher class to separate from these fairy tales. The connotation between lower class and fairy tales is also interesting in looking at the character of Jane, who is of course infatuated with them herself despite often putting them down as unreal and childish.

In Jane Eyre, Bertha Mason serves as an unintentional antagonist since she is the major hindrance to Jane and Rochester’s marriage. Bertha’s mental illness and power are implied to be a result of her upbringing in the West Indies, reflected in the colonialist descriptions of this landscape.

In chapter 24, Rochester’s description of his marriage to Bertha demonstrates how the text characterizes Bertha and the West Indies as a source of moral corruption and entrapment. Rochester states, “it was a fiery West Indian night; one of the description that frequently precede the hurricanes of those climates…the air was like sulfur streams— I could find no refreshment anywhere” (Bronte 433). This description of a “fiery,” sulfuric environment convey images of a toxic, overpowering atmosphere. The eminent hurricane expresses the ‘instability’ of the West Indies. Rochester cannot find “refreshment,” and therefore escape from this uncomfortable, foreign setting. The environment of the West Indies is comparable to a hellish landscape, reflected in Bertha’s moral and mental degradation.

The hellish description of the West Indies is mirrored in Bertha’s actions. Rochester recalls that Bertha “threw her last bloody glance over a world quivering with the ferment of tempest… my ears were filled with the curses the maniac still shrieked out; wherein she momentarily mingled my name with such a tone of demon-hate…no professed harlot ever had a fouler vocabulary than she” (Bronte 434). The violent landscape described as a “ferment of tempest” is reflected in Bertha’s loss of mental control, leading to disturbed behavior. She is dehumanized as a “maniac” and “demon” with “bloody eyes,” creating an image of a monster rather than a woman. Bertha is also compared to a “harlot,” or prostitute, which reinforces her sinful nature connected to her sexuality. Therefore, Bertha is both mentally ill and uncontrollably immoral, which is implied to be a product of her surroundings.

These images of an unmanageable, hellish landscape combined with Bertha’s ‘insanity’ portray the West Indies as a site of  moral degradation. Rochester, since he is a foreigner, is able to ‘escape,’ yet is still tempted to succumb to sin through suicide. However, he is also permanently trapped by his experiences there through his marriage to Bertha. The portrayal of the West Indies as an overpowering force simultaneously removes Rochester’s blame for his situation and reinforces colonialist attitudes of  “civilizing” other cultures.

Prejudices, it is well known, are most difficult to eradicate from the heart whose soil has never been loosened or fertilised by education: they grow there, firm as weeds among stones (Brontë XXIX.395.15).

Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre (1847) is narrated by the titular character, whose upbringing and education afford her a place in the middle-class as a governess that would otherwise be out of her reach had she been left to the squalor of orphan life. Jane’s personality and being are defined by her education. Her experience at the Reeds’ and at Lowood Institution fortified her sense of individuality, and granted her patience and compassion for others. Even in her private thoughts, an adult Jane is slow to criticize or judge the characters she encounters.

Brontë, being an educated woman who enjoyed a special place in 19th-century London’s literary circles, is using her platform to advocate for education: if prejudices are weeds, they pervade the garden that is society and disrupt the harmony between its wildlife.

In this passage, Jane the character asserts that prejudice is borne of ignorance, and must be combated with education to achieve some kind of enlightenment. Hannah, the Rivers family’s servant, refuses to provide Jane with shelter and food when the latter arrives on their doorstep one night, hungry and unkempt and soaked from the rain. Although Jane has the manners and accent of an educated lady, Hannah distrusts her and casts her away. Jane argues that Hannah’s prejudices prevent her from helping out a stranger in need. The “weeds” harden her heart into “stone” and render her indifferent to a fellow human who is in a dire situation. While Jane makes an astute point that Hannah’s prejudices limit her ability to show compassion and mercy, she misses the point by insinuating that Hannah’s lack of education rendered her prone to bias.

The characters quickest to judge and disregard Jane throughout the novel often belong to the educated elite class. The Reed family treats her like an garbage, even though she is related to them, because she’s an orphan and the product of a unprofitable marriage; Mr. Brocklehurst is a religious hypocrite who siphons money from Lowood to support his luxurious lifestyle while making the girls live in squalor; and Rochester’s inner-circle of “friends” spend their time gossiping and insulting their social inferiors. So, contrary to Jane’s assertion, education does not enlighten the beholder with a predisposition towards charity and acceptance. If anything, the elite use their education as another quality that elevate them above the working class and the poor. Let’s not forget how Rochester, upon meeting Jane, claims or believes that his privilege—an upper-class education and the means to travel and enter different social circles—make him better than the young, humble Jane. While Rochester has these experiences under his belt, he is still an asshole.

There are plenty of educated literary characters in 19th-century novels that are quick to judge and hold immense biases. One notable example is Mr. Darcy from Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice (1813), whose opening lines present a “universal truth” that sounds a lot like the passage from Brontë’s novel. Under this analysis, Brontë’s line in her seminal work becomes a diss, a calling-out: she is suggesting that the elite are as prone to prejudice—the supposed product of ignorance— as the uneducated working class; and their more fortuitous stations in life do not necessarily make them better people.

Brontë, Charlotte. Jane Eyre. Barnes & Nobles Classic, New York, 2015.