Jane Eyre, As Read by Sigmund Freud Charlotte Brontes Jane Eyre has been a popular source of literary debate

for nearly as long as it has been in print. Critics have interpreted and reinterpreted its symbolism and themes, analyzing it from colonial, post-industrial, feminist (of three types), socialist, humanist, and many other viewpoints. Dianne F. Sadoff adds to this tradition with her psychoanalytical essay The Father, Castration, and Female Fantasy in Jane Eyre. In her essay, Sadoff considers the relationships between Freudian psychoanalytical concepts, such as the oedipal complex, sadistic/masochistic behavior as a result of repressed desires and emotions, and phallocentricity, and Jane Eyre. Sadoffs main argument is that there is an inherent erotic desire of the daughter for her father as demonstrated in beating fantasy which several of Freuds female patients reportedly experienced. This fantasy, she argues, is a central motif in Jane Eyre, responsible for or visible behind many actions and relationships in the novel. Her psychoanalytical reading of the work attempts to identify many of Freuds ideas which are either poorly explained in the essay or far-fetched from the outset. In her explanations of psychoanalytical techniques and ideas, Sadoff neither gives nor refers to much evidence to support these ideas veracity. Sadoffs overarching argument is that Jane and other characters exhibit masochistic behavior as a result of repressed desires. Here Sadoff defines masochism using one of Sigmund Freuds experiments with a number of female patients. These patients all had dreams of someone beating a child, later identifying the abuser as their father, then the child as themselves. The patients then dreamt of their father beating another, male, child. Freuds analysis of these dreams is that the first phase, after the adult has been identified as the father but the patient does not recognize the child as herself, is interpreted as the subjects strong attachment to the father, the child being whipped representing an unwelcome rival for the fathers attention. The second phase, after the patient realizes who the child is, signifies a fantasized substitute for sexual desire of father by daughter as well as punishment for that desire (520). The third and last phase shows a generic father figure, or a member of the class of

fathers, beating a small boy, showing the patient protecting her forbidden love for her father by removing them both from the situation. Masochism, in the psychoanalytic sense, is defined as the self-destructive, sexually-based desire exemplified in the beating fantasy. Sadoff also uses the term sadism to describe certain actions, events, or emotions where one character is expressing or imposing these destructive desires upon another. Sadoff uses Freuds concept of the beating fantasy and sadism/masochism to analyze the subtleties of the red-room scene. This scene begins with Jane being forced into the room and threatened with being tied down with garters (24), which suggests sexual bondage. Furthermore, as Sadoff points out, the room is filled with symbolic female spaces secret drawers, wardrobes, jewelcaskets Jane understands her humiliation, in the same way that the female child in the beating complex understands hers. Later that evening, Jane believes she sees Uncle Reeds ghost, come back from the dead to punish her unknown misdeeds. Again, Sadoff relates Janes hallucinations to Freudian psychoanalytic theory: *Janes+ Aunt Reed resents the love her husbandbestowed upon his sisters orphaned child. As metaphorical oedipal daughter, Jane has eclipsed her rival, her aunt and surrogate mother, in the affections of her uncle, her substitute father (521). Whether Jane has accomplished this via some repressed desire to do so, or through sheer luck, may be difficult to ascertain. Janes inherent and universal desire for independence shows further evidence of the oedipal complex and other Freudian theories in the novel. One part of the text wherein she is most concerned with independence is when she attempts to marry Rochester for the first time, stating, It would, indeed, be a relief, if I had ever so small an independency; I never can bear being dressed like a doll by Mr. Rochester.if I had but a prospect of one day bringing Mr. Rochester an accession of fortune, I could better endure to be kept by him now (267). The term independency suggests not simply riches, which Jane might simply bestow upon Rochester, but free reign over her life and thoughts, which she only attains in the last pages of the text. Sadoff postulates that Janes unconscious urge to punish her

lover for his tyranny appears in the nighttime deeds of Bertha Mason Rochester (527), and indeed, Bertha tends to reflect Janes most distraught moments with violent action against Rochester and Thornfield Hall. The roles Jane and Berth play in their relationships with Rochester suggests another oedipal complex, where Jane treats Rochester and Bertha as her figurative parents and therefore seeks to depose Bertha and possess Rochester. Her subconscious desire to punish Rochester is a tactic Jane wishes to use in order to put Rochester and she on equal terms, so that she has the capability to posses him. Janes need to punish Rochester is exemplified in the concept of figurative or symbolic castration in Jane Eyre. The Freudian concept of castration is one that has been heavily debated in literary circles. Sadoff points out numerous critics who see Rochesters punishment as a castration, starting with Richard Chase, who *was+ the first of many critics to read Rochesters punishment and injury as a symbolic castration (527) with an emphasis on punishing Rochester. Others claim Rochesters castration had different causes and motivations. Gilbert and Gubar, for example, claim the castration was not intended to punish Rochester so much as raise Jane up to his level; others who deny Rochesters castration or dismiss it as inevitable suffering due to an imbalance in power dynamics (Heilbrun) or as necessary to continue Janes character growth . Chase supports his version of the debate by invoking Freuds belief that the eye and the phallus are linked in dreams and fantasies via the unconscious mind. Blindness, he writes, signifies castration in Freuds lexicon, just as the gaze signifies male desire (528). This connection helps Sadoffs argument on the matter, that Rochester loses his sight as punishment for his desires for Jane, who is his metaphorical daughter, thereby granting Jane power over him. Rochesters loss of sight also represents his changing sexual views about Jane from lusty and wild to quiet and respectful. Sadoff traced the origin of this scene of castration, as in the father-daughter desire between Rochester and Jane, to the Oedipus complex. Through this process the male child is persuaded to

renounce his desire for his mother by the fear of castration, whereas the female, having no phallus, fears instead that she has already lost it. In this way the boys Oedipus complex is neutralized, but the girls is introduced. Sadoff argues that the girl must now renounce the love of her mother, as that is the fathers realm, transfer her love to her father, and change the aim of her sexuality from active to passive (529). This Oedipus complex is characterized by the daughters dependence on the father, as opposed to the male complex, wherein the boy mimics the fathers activity and independence. Teresa Brennan suggests that social structures, like the patriarchal institutions of family, marriage, and education, support and enforce psychical structures, providing a narcissistic short-cut to a secure identity for the boy and a fixity of sexual identity for both sexes (529); Unfortunately for Sadoff, her argument becomes stranger and stranger as she delves into the concept of Freudian castration. She discusses at length, for example, the daughters desire to be the phallus for her mother (530), and how the daughter can acquire a phallus, as proposed by Dutch psychoanalyst Jeanne Lampl-de Groot:
To acquire the phallus she lacks, the girl imagines (by a symbolic equation of substitutive body parts as objects) that she will have a child by her father; she fantasizes cutting off his penetrated penis, which emerges from her body as a baby. The girl, then, learns indeed must learn in a patriarchal, heterosexually imperative culture to take pleasure in her bodys penetration (530)

While this strange hypothesis was not developed by Sadoff, its inclusion in her essay suggests it must have some merit towards furthering her argument. Not only is it absolutely irrelevant to Jane Eyre, it seems a non sequitur even in a psychological discussion. Sadoffs inclusion of this utterly useless and mildly disturbing tidbit is a minor flaw, however. Perhaps the most grievous error in her essay is its basis around the beating fantasy. If there were empirical evidence to support this idea of a chain of dreams present in multiple subjects, it might make a strong psychological phenomenon to that could certainly develop interesting and fruitful literary criticism. The only part of this idea we can trust, however, is that several of *Freuds+ women patients 4

reported fantasies in which they watched the beating of a child, and through questioning Freud was able to determine that the child was in fact the patient (519-20). The second stage of the fantasy where Freud determines the abuser is the patients father, is never recollected but only reconstructed in analysis (520). How, then, was this second stage identified? The essay gives no mention of the method of analysis. No matter how it was analyzed, however, Freuds interpretation of the stories of a few women was probably biased by his own subconscious, and basing a central theory on a few madeup analyses of somewhat similar psychological phenomena does not lend credibility to Freuds theory of the beating fantasy, or to Sadoffs liberal use of it to analyze Jane Eyre. Freuds, interpretation of the stages of the beating fantasy in no way solidify Sadoffs argument as logical or intuitive. Sadoff summarizes Freuds interpretation of the the three dream stages as:
In the first phase the subject hates the child who is being beaten and interprets it as taking the fathers affection away from herself; this phase signifies, My father does not love this other child, he loves only me. The second phasesignifies a fantasied substitute for sexual desire of father by daughter as well as punishment for that desire. This repressed phase signifies the girls humiliation and deprivation of love; the daughter turns her mortification against herself and sees the fathers chastisement as proof or sign of his love and her guilt.Because punishment *in the third phase+ is displaced onto a child of the opposite sex, Freud says, the subject protects herself from the degradations and deprivations of paternal love by removing herself and her father from this fantasied situation. (520)

If the ideas presented here arent rampant speculation, they certainly arent supported anywhere in Sadoffs essay. Unfortunately, like much of psychoanalysis, Sadoffs hypothesis is no different from any other it is a guess. Since there is no way to test this claim, or, for that matter, many of Freuds more basic concepts, like the existence of the Oedipus complex, Sadoffs main argument is purely speculative and only marginally supported by fact. Freuds basic work is used as the foundation for modern psychoanalysis because it is so extensive and because it does not often contradict itself, not because anyone has been able to confirm the truth of any of his theories. While his work may be useful in treating the insane, it appears there is little place for Freudian theory in literary criticism. It is unusual, 5

then, that Sadoff chose to use Freuds work as a basis for her arguments, since more modern psychoanalytical theories from other sources the work of Jacques Lacan, for example are much more applicable to literature. Despite the incoherence and downright strangeness of some psychoanalytic concepts Sadoff presents in The Father, Castration, and Female Fantasy in Jane Eyre, she makes some excellent points. Using a psychoanalytic interpretation of the work, she is able to explore character dynamics and motivations in ways impossible within traditional interpretations of the work. If we could assume all of Sigmund Freuds theories on the human psyche were true, Sadoff essay would be a remarkable analysis of Brontes work. Hidden desires for independence, oedipal complexes in Jane and Rochester, Rochesters inherent fear of symbolic castration, and how the fear of castration in the human psyche affects Janes sexual behavior and desires make for a very different reading of Brontes classic work. As it is, the psychoanalytic reading of Jane Eyre falls to shambles in the face of light scientific inquiry, and is necessarily as much unchecked hypothesizing as Freuds claims themselves.