The journey of Miss Jane Eyre begins at Gateshead where she is in the care of her cruel aunt who treats her like someone off the streets. In the words of Maggie Berg, a critic who wrote Jane Eyre: A Companion to the Novel, Jane sees herself as a "rebellious slave" and "hungerstricken". She is clearly the "scapegoat of the nursery" (pg. 47). In the eyes of her wicked aunt she was a "precocious actress" and was therefor regularly locked up like a dog. According to Berg the effect of these accounts drew attention to her self-dramatization. From the very moment Jane was able to read she was constantly attracted by the disguised portraits that she make for herself in books, ballads, and dolls. The recurring theme of self-awareness I saw in Jane Eyre started from the first time Jane saw hersel

Do you think I can stay to become nothing to you? Do you think I am an automaton?-a machine without feelings?...Do you think, because I am poor, obscure, plain, and little, I am soulless and heartless? You think wrong!-I have as much soul as you-and full as much heart! And if God had gifted me with some beauty and much wealth, I should have made it as hard for you to leave me, as it is now for me to leave you. I am not talking to you now through the medium of custom, conventionalities, nor even of mortal flesh: it is my spirit that addresses your spirit; just as if both had passed through the grave, and we stood at God's feet, equal-as we are! (281)

At Gateshead Jane undergoes a physical and spiritual transition away from her inner confinement. She is very strong-willed and decisive from what I've seen. For example when she explored beyond the gates at Thornfield she is unwilling to return to the "gloomy house.... the gray hollow" (148). She sees all this through glass doors.

The second account was to the apothecary who didn't yield too much sympathy, but the third, to Helen Burns was one of no tolerance or sympathy in the least bit. Helen firmly says, "Would you not be happier if you tried to forget her severity, together with the passionate emotions it excited? Life appears to me too short to be spent in nursing animosity or registering wrongs" (90). This turns out to be a lesson about herself that Jane chooses to take with her for the future progression of her identity. We know that she has progressed by examining the account of the same incident to Mrs. Temple for the fourth time.

The first encounter of self-awareness Jane experienced at Thornfield is when the gypsy tells her she has "resigned to a feelingless universe because she won't admit to her aspirations". The oracle seems to tell Jane more than she is prepared to acknowledge. She does although declare herself capable of realizing her fantasies and creating her own reality.

The consequence of being called a liar was being called innocent. Miss Temple believed her as did her fellow pupils. This was a turning point in her life because it gave her self worth having the approval of the majority of the school. Yet Jane was not satisfied with her view. She had expanded her self-awareness to such a great degree that the school was hindering her from expanding.

My future husband was becoming to me my whole world; and more than the world; almost my hope of heaven. He stood between mea and every thought of religion, as an eclipse intervenes between man and the broad sun. I could not, in those days, see God for His creature: of whom I had made an idol. (302)

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Approximate Word count = 2108
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page double spaced)