1858– Volume 12 of The Journal of Psychological Medicine and Mental Pathology publishes an article called “Sussex Lunatic Asylum.” The volume, edited by L. Forbes Winslow was published about a decade after the time of Jane Eyre, and in the article, it details Victorian society and the progress made in how it treated people with mental illness (Mattingly). This contrasts with the words and actions of Mr. Rochester as he details how he has locked up his wife, Bertha Mason, because she is a “lunatic.” Instead, in the article, Winslow explains the “civility and forward-thinking with which the asylum is operated and overseen” (Mattingly). Additionally, the Victorian era sparked progression in how mental asylums were structured, to favor more humane conditions, as government policies ordered for better asylum conditions (Machayya). Winslow describes how the asylum tries to treat the patients like normal people with normal lives (Mattingly). 

This contrasts with how Rochester speaks of Bertha and her family, as well as how he treats her–by locking her up and hiring Grace Poole to care for her. Rochester describes to Jane, “‘My bride’s mother I had never seen: I understood she was dead. The honeymoon was over, I learned my mistake; she was only mad, and shut up in a lunatic asylum’” (Brontë 274). Here, we can see Rochester’s distaste for Bertha’s mom and her illness. He continues and says, “‘There was a younger brother, too, a complete dumb idiot’” (Brontë 274). This further shows the negative view held towards people with mental disorders. Perhaps in the time between Jane Eyre and the “Sussex Lunatic Asylum” was published, more regulations were put in place in order to fix conditions in insane asylums, or the characters in Jane Eyre are reflecting certain negative views, due to their class. 

However, in the Victorian era, female independence was also seen as a sign of madness (Moore). If a woman rejected the gender-based role of being domestic, the woman’s father or husband could have her locked in an asylum until she “conformed to more natural, feminine behavior” (Moore). So while this era could’ve eventually marked progression in asylum conditions, there were also misogynistic ideas that caused women to be locked up, who were simply the victims of oppression. This could align with Rochester’s ideas, especially since Bertha is his wife, and we’re not given other details on how she suddenly became “mad.”

Works Cited

Brontë Charlotte, and Deborah Lutz. Jane Eyre. W.W. Norton and Company, 2016. 

Machayya, Roshan. “Bertha Mason and Mental Illnesses- A Victorian Context With a Special Reference to Huntington's...” Medium, Medium, 25 Jan. 2019, https://roshanmachayya.medium.com/bertha-mason-and-mental-illnesses-a-vi...

Mattingly, Henry. “The Victorian Asylum and Jane Eyre.” The Victorian Web, 28 Jan. 2009, https://victorianweb.org/victorian/authors/bronte/cbronte/mattingly.html. 

Moore, Kate. “The American History of Silencing Women through Psychiatry.” Time, Time, 22 June 2021, https://time.com/6074783/psychiatry-history-women-mental-health/. 

Image Citation

“Winson Green Asylum. Birmingham UK.” VL McBeath, https://valmcbeath.com/victorian-era-lunatic-asylums/#.YesJzfXMIUs. Accessed 21 Jan. 2022.