How Jane Eyre drew on Paradise Lost
A documented line of influence: Charlotte Brontë demonstrably engaged John Milton’s work. The commentary below is Gröblé’s, verbatim from each work’s page.
The source
Paradise Lost
John Milton · 1667
RenaissanceThe influenced
Jane Eyre
Charlotte Brontë · 1847
The Age of the NovelRelevance
8/10
On Jane Eyre’s page
- Jane Eyre is built on Milton — and against him: the consensus reads it as a feminist revision of Paradise Lost, told from Eve's side
- The allusions are on the surface, not buried: Rochester quotes the "fallen serpent of the abyss," he and Jane trade Miltonic references like a verbal tennis game, and Jane's vision of Death repeats Paradise Lost's Book 2 word for word
- Read the epic first and Brontë's quarrel with it — who falls, who is to blame, who gets to speak — comes into full focus
On Paradise Lost’s page
- Milton's epic is the text Jane Eyre argues with — scholarly consensus reads the novel as a feminist revision of Paradise Lost, retold from Eve's perspective
- Rochester quotes it directly (the "fallen serpent of the abyss"), and he and Jane trade Miltonic allusions in what reads like a verbal tennis game
- Brontë even paints Jane's vision of Death in Milton's own words, quoting Paradise Lost's Book 2 verbatim