Jane and Rochester Almost Marry

Jane and Rochester’s wedding nearly takes place toward the end of June, which is particularly interesting because of the symbolic weather that whips through Thornfield after Jane finds out about Bertha Mason's existence.

Toward the very end of Chapter 26, it reads, "A Christmas frost had come at midsummer; a white December storm had whirled over June; ice glazed the ripe apples, drifts crushed the blowing roses; on hayfield and cornfield lay a frozen shroud: lanes which last night blushed full of flowers, to-day were pathless with untrodden snow; and the woods, which twelve hours since waved leafy and flagrant as groves between the tropics, now spread, waste, wild, and white as pine-forests in wintry Norway.  My hopes were all dead—" (Bronte 345). 

Snow in June seems so absurd and unlikely, it makes the weather feel extra intense as a symbolic representation of Jane's emotions and the desperation of her situation as she prepares to flee from Thornfield and Rochester.

Bronte, Charlotte. Jane Eyre. Barnes and Noble Classics, 2003.

Associated Place(s)

Event date:

circa. The end of the month Jun 1808