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Jane Eyre and Anthem both deal with the subject of lack of freedom
among many other subjects. In different ways, Jane Eyre and Equality 7-2521
are supressed from the freedom they strive for, and have different - yet also
similar in some ways - methods of achieving their freedom.
Jane Eyre finds the most restriction against freedom when she cannot
always love who she wants, or be with the people she wants most without
any strings attached. For example, she was orphaned, and would love to be
with her parents. She is stripped of that privilege and has to live with her
unkind aunt and the rest of her family, who bully her. Later on, she also
meets Rochester, who she loves very much. As much as she wants to marry
him, Jane still considers Rochester as married and therefore does not.
To show her discontent with Lowood, Jane took several steps. One was
befriending Helen Burns. Helen was known to be a troublemaker in school
because she was a person who used civil disobedience - she refused to obey
the rules which she felt were unjust. A notable instance where Helen used
civil disobedience was when Miss Scatcherd picked on her. Miss Scatcherd
was known to be a strict teacher, and was particularly vindictive toward
Helen for her insolence toward her. Miss Scatcherd would often tell Helen to
do unnecessary tasks that seemed to serve no useful purpose but to bother
Helen, When prompted with these tasks, Helen would refuse and later be
punished. By befriending Helen, Jane showed that she agreed with these
ideals. The very fact that she thought of a rebellious character as her best
friend gave her the mental position of being a rebel against the authority
shown at Lowood.
Regardless, when Jane feels truly free at the end of the novel, when
she marries Rochester and is able to live a free and open life, it is not entirely
without consequences. Because of the initial dishonestly between them, Jane
and Rochester cannot enjoy their marriage to the fullest. Rochester's first
wife, who was kept in secret because of Rochester's initial dishonesty, causes
a fire in Rochester's mansion. Rochester enters the burning mansion
heroically in order to attempt to save his servants. The fire damages him,
and he becomes a cripple, blind in one eye (His first wife did not survive the
fire). His other eye was harmed, but would heal in enough time to see the
birth of his first legitimate child. Although Jane and Rochester still get their
happy ending, I'm sure that at some point during the relationship the visual
defect would prove to be a drawback.
From birth, Prometheus was not only unable to make choices for
himself, but his parents could not do so either. He was raised since infancy in
a public home, as everyone else is, and was not taught love or any sort of
emotion at all. When transferred to the house of schooling, he realizes that
he enjoys thinking freely, questioning everything, and wants a career of his
own instead of one chosen by the Council of Vocations (a sector of the
government that determines what each person will have as a job for the rest
of their life). This is especially dangerous since such thoughts are forbidden,
and he feels the weight of the lack of freedom more heavily than others.
Prometheus finds a way to skim over the interests of the Council and
pursue science on his own. He is assigned as a street cleaner. On one of his
rounds, he stumbles upon abandoned subway tunnel. Unknown to the rest of
the world, the tunnel becomes his haven for pursuing his own interests.
Inside it, he rediscovers electricity (his society rejected the concept of
electric-powered light and decided to use candles instead). However, when
he attempts to show his discovery of electric light to the Scientific Council,
not only is his idea rejected, but the council attempts to prosecute him for
meddling with science when he is not authorized to. This shows that the
ordinary citizens are not allowed the slightest to pursue their own interests.
Finally, Prometheus and Gaea truly free at that point of escape. They
find an abandoned house on a hill and live in it happily ever after. The rest of
society has a long way to go before they break free of their liberty-restricted
world, but progression is made nonetheless. Prometheus and Gaea finally
find freedom. They can freely enjoy and immerse themselves into a world of
knowledge, history, and science, as there is a library in their house, and can
have as many children as they like and raise them in anyway they like. They
also support freedom by vowing to allow any person who happens to wander
by to pursue any interest they like.
Jane Eyre, Prometheus, and Gaea all achieve freedom in various ways
from their previous restrictions. They achieve the freedom to love, the
freedom of interest, and the freedom of expression. All of them turn their
backs on their restrictive societies and are free to do what they like.