We will read Charlotte Bronte’s intense, emotional novel Jane Eyre, published 1857, a novel still loved and still influencing its readers today. It is a story that charts the moral and emotional growth of its heroine as she navigates the constraints of 19c society in her pursuit of independence, self-respect, and love. One of the novel’s most mysterious characters is Bertha Mason, confined to the attic of Thornfield Hall.

In her Wide Sargasso Sea, published in 1966, Jean Rhys reimagines Bertha as a Creole woman, Antoinette Cosway, who also pursues self-respect and love in a society that challenges and opposes her. Rhys reconsiders Rochester, Jane’s great love. The setting and language of Rhys’ novel is lush, intense, evocative as she transforms Bertha from a shadowy figure in Jane Eyre to a fully realized protagonist and Rochester from a romantic hero into a far more complex character.

Reading these two powerful, engaging novels together will both challenge and expand our understanding of identity (race and gender), power and justice in literature. Together, these novels will let us discuss the complexities of voice, perspective, and historical contexts.