Jane - Chapters 20-22:
Chapter 20: Now, we have finally reached their wedding day! A small, informal wedding it is to be, planned to occur in a small chapel. Mr. Rathburn is rather unceremonious, cavalier and hurried. His lack of attention or affection towards Jane and Madeline causes Jane to begin to tear up at their private wedding, and he apologizes to her. Suddenly, just like in Jane Eyre, Mason rushes in with a marriage license and protests the marriage on the grounds that Mr. Rathburn is already married to Mason's sister, Bibi Oliviera. Then, just as in Charlotte Bronte's novel, they all return to the house and see Nico Rathburn's wife, Bib. The difference in this story is there seems to be much more love still in existence between Mr. Rathburn and Bibi, when they are seen together. He states she has schizophrenia, which may have been what Rochester's wife had, but in those times they may not have known what it was or how to treat such a condition. Just as I had mentioned several blog entries back, Mr. Rathburn believes he was the cause of her onset of schizophrenia, due to their rather prolific drug use, while he was in his younger days with Bibi, both living the rather reckless life of a rock star. Due to this exposure of Rathburn's current marriage to Bibi, Jane's wedding to Nico is abruptly canceled, and she is, as one might expct, devastated.
After all is said and done, and the wedding protestors have left, Jane locks herself in her room for hours, waiting for Mr. Rathburn to come seek her out. Nico, simultaneously, is waiting for Jane to emerge from her room and come to him. They eventually have the same basic discussion as Jane Eyre did with Edward Rochester; yet, it is nowhere near as beautiful and eloquent as what occurred in the classic novel. In this story, I did not feel the same intense love and passion between Jane Moore and Nico Rathburn as I did with Jane Eyre and Edward Rochester during these moments. In contrast with the tears and despair shown by Rochester, Mr. Rathburn gets angry and quite agitated. In reaction, Jane becomes despondent and slightly scared by Rathburn. She returns to her room will full intention to leave the premises.
Chapters 21-22:
Jane packs that night, in her preparation to leave Thornfield Park. She reluctantly leaves Thornfield Park and everything she knows, and prepares to venture out into the world with no plan and very little money. At first, one might take this as a rather rash and ill-considered decision, but Jane describes for the reader her reasoning as to why she chose to leave in the manner that she did and why it was the best decision. Most of her reasoning pertained to the fact that Mr. Rathburn scared her a bit and, despite her love for him, she knew she needed to go and make a new life for herself. She also resolves to go somewhere where he cannot find her. However, I wonder if Jane is actually trying to convince herself that she has made the right decision. Jane flees to a town called New Haven where the University of Yale resides. She assumes there will be college students, relatively cheap housing, and plenty of job opportunities at Yale. Sadly, when she arrives she realizes that housing is far more expensive than she planned for, she isn't a very appealing potential roommate, considering she has no job or much money, and she cannot get a job, because she is not qualified to do much and has no references to provide. Her last, and most promising, reference was Nico Rathburn, and of course she does not want him to know where she is.
Once on the road, Jane begins to stress and become frantic over the idea that she has no place to sleep that night, and no food and no money. She goes to a café in the town and gets a bagel while there. She was greeted by a waitress that was very kind and takes care of her well. As Jane sits in the quaint establishment, Jane studies the pages of a yellow book advertising a homeless shelter or a boarding house. Jane pays her bill and ventures out to find some place to stay. She comes up with nothing and finds herself destitute and weary.
Feeling desperate, she returns to the café, probably hoping to see the kind waitress and ask for advice, and Jane finds the restaurant hours indicate it is open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. She decides to go in and order another bagel. This time, she encounters a different waitress who is unkind to her and, out of sheer exhaustion and despondency, Jane begins to cry. Thankfully, Jane's previous waitress comes over, asks Jane why she is crying, and Jane tells her of her defeat in finding shelter for the evening and her general lack of a place to live. The waitress takes compassion on her and tells Jane her name is Diana. She represents the Diana of Jane Eyre in this story. Diana takes Jane home to meet her brother River and her sister Maria. Jane has just met the St. John family! The brother is now River St. John? I found that comical, honestly, when compared to St. John Rivers in the classic novel, Jane Eyre. I don't know whether to find Lindner's adaptation unoriginal or pleasingly identical. It might have been fun, once in awhile, to have a bit of guesswork involved, to bring a bit of suspense to the remake. It is not to be, I suppose.
In keeping, also, with the original novel, Jane disguises her last name and changes it from Moore to Martin. She is given a hearty welcome by the St. John siblings, but Jane quickly grows ill and has to stay in bed for a long time. This is also reminiscent of Jane Eyre; except, in this novel, I find this to be a bit melodramatic, due to the fact that Jane did not have to spend even one night in a bad place and, despite the fact that the food she had was a little less than what she normally eats, it was still at least some sustenance. The most, at least that I can tell, which Jane endured that day was a great deal of stress.
When Jane awakens, the three siblings help her eat and ask her many questions, just as the three siblings did in Jane Eyre. She answers the, but intentionally keeps her answers vague. The siblings discuss with her about living there and paying a small rent for an extra room when she can get a job, to which River says she can volunteer regularly at the soup kitchen with him until he can find her another a job. He certainly is a humanitarian, as was St. John Rivers in the original story. Jane readily accepts his offer, and there is some foreshadowing of a romantic encounter occurring between them. You see this from Diana's intent observance of Jane and River, and also Jane describing River as "one of the most attractive men [ she ] has ever met." I only wonder if Jane Moore will return that affection to River more than Jane Eyre did.
The concluding significant event in these chapters is that Jane wraps her phone in white tissue paper and mails it off to a place called "35 Oak Street, Sacramento, CA. " She does this to eliminate any chance of Mr. Rathburn finding her. Here we see foreshadowing again. Our author, April Lindner, makes it quite apparent that this will likely come back around in the story at some point. I predict it will not have to do with Nico Rathburn; rather, it will open a completely new door in Jane's life.
However, at the end of the day, I suspect all may turn out as it did with Jane Eyre. It would be nice if our author would bring an element of surprise with some unexpected and unique twist in the remaining storyline. All, so far, has been just about as expected and highly analogous to the original. Still, I am enjoying the modern day journey, with Jane Moore.
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