Jane Eyre Quotes

Jane Eyre: Sir, I need to have a leave of absence for a week or two, to see a sick lady who's asked for me.

Edward Fairfax Rochester: What sick lady?

Jane Eyre: Her name is Reed. She's my uncle's wife.

Edward Fairfax Rochester: Uncle? You told me you had no family.

Jane Eyre: My aunt cast me out when I went away to school.

Edward Fairfax Rochester: Why?

Jane Eyre: Because I was poor. And she did not like me.

Edward Fairfax Rochester: And she sent you to Lowood without so much as a word or a visit in nearly ten years. So why does she suddenly want to see you now?

Jane Eyre: Her son John is dead. He ruined himself. She's now struck down with his misfortune. I'll only be gone two weeks, I hope.

Edward Fairfax Rochester: Two weeks? That's not possible.

Jane Eyre: You have company, sir.

Edward Fairfax Rochester: Very well. But promise me, you'll not stay with this undeserving aunt more than a week.

Jane Eyre: I cannot promise you. She is dying. I cannot set a time on that.

Edward Fairfax Rochester: Of course, you'll go. I haven't got the power to stop you. You must have some money. Can't travel without money. I haven't given you any salary yet, remember? How much have you, Jane, in whole the world?

Jane Eyre: Five shillings, sir.

Edward Fairfax Rochester: Here, take fifty pounds.

Jane Eyre: No, Sir. You only owe me fifteen. I have no change.

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St John Rivers: We sail in six weeks. We must make marriage preparations.

Jane Eyre: Why can we not travel as brother and sister? As equals?

St John Rivers: That would be impossible.

Jane Eyre: St. John, you do not love me.

St John Rivers: Love is not an ingredient in this matter.
[Jane turns away from him, thinking]

St John Rivers: I fear you have not forgotten your old association despite the harm he tried to do you.

Jane Eyre: I'll never see any of them again. But I owe a debt to my friends at Thornfield Hall. In many ways, I started my life there. I became Jane Eyre.

St John Rivers: God made Jane Eyre! You surely don't give this man Rochester any credit for that!

Jane Eyre: Of course not. I've always known myself. But he was the first to recognize me. And to love what he saw.
[long pause]

Jane Eyre: I'll give you your answer St. John soon, don't worry. And if I go with you that will be my decision. You'll have him to thank for that.
[leaves the room]

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Jane Eyre: Hurry, Hannah. We must light the fires before they arrive.

Hannah: [to St.John] She wants fire in every room, in places where they never were.

Jane Eyre: What's the use of five thousands pounds if you can't light a few fires at Christmas?

St John Rivers: Twenty thousands.

Jane Eyre: St. John, I'll not hear another word. We've been over it again and again. Our uncle left a nephew and three nieces. We must all profit from his will equally.

St John Rivers: Jane, you've never had money. You do not know what use you may put it to.

Jane Eyre: And you've never been without family. I will have a brother and sisters, and a home.

St John Rivers: I'll be a brother to you, whether you share the money our uncle left you, you and only you, or not.

Jane Eyre: Leaving you with nothing, unable to realize your dreams and me with a fortune. I know enough about money to realize that will not make me happy

St John Rivers: What of the future? If you should marry?

Jane Eyre: I'll never marry.

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Jane Eyre: [Gets out of the coach a couple miles from Thornfield] Take my trunk on up to Thornfield, would you?

Coach Driver: Won't you ride, Miss? You've had a very long journey.

Jane Eyre: No, I'm nearly home. It's my favorite walk.

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Edward Rochester: A true Janian reply! Good angels be my guard! She comes from the other world: from the abode of people who are dead and tells me so here, alone. If I dared, I'd touch you to see if you were substance or shadow. Truant! Truant! Absent from me a whole month- and forgetting me quite, I'll be sworn!

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Edward Fairfax Rochester: So this St. John person you've been mentioning so often. What of him?

Jane Eyre: Well, he's tall. He has blue eyes and a Grecian profile.

Edward Fairfax Rochester: He's handsome then, compared to me.

Jane Eyre: Oh, he's much more handsome than you. And he's a far better Christian of course than you ever were.

Edward Fairfax Rochester: Well I thanked God last night for your sudden reappearance. The other night I cried out to Him in my despair. Called your name too. What about his brain this Rivers fellow? Find yourself getting bored when he speaks?

Jane Eyre: He doesn't say very much, but what he says is to the point. His brain is first rate.

Edward Fairfax Rochester: Did he study much? Taught you things?

Jane Eyre: Oh yes, he taught me languages.

Edward Fairfax Rochester: [frustrated] All right, why did he do that?

Jane Eyre: He wanted me to go with him to Africa.

Edward Fairfax Rochester: He wanted you to marry him?

Jane Eyre: He asked me to marry him.

Edward Fairfax Rochester: You're lying. You made this up to torment me.

Jane Eyre: He asked me more than once.

Edward Fairfax Rochester: Well I think you might take yourself off and go elsewhere! And why are you still here? You've done your duty. You've assured yourself that I am still living, still living a tenth of a life! You, heiress!

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Edward Fairfax Rochester: Jane, I want a wife. I want a wife, not a nursemaid to look after me. I want a wife to share my bed every night. All day if we wish. If I can't have that, I'd rather die. We're not the platonic sort, Jane.

Jane Eyre: [Take his face in her hands as she faces him] Can you see me?
[Rochester nods yes]

Jane Eyre: Then hear this Edward. Your life is not yours to give up. It is mine. All mine. And I forbid it.
[Begin kissing, camera pans out, music swells]

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Jane Eyre: I was myself still, without obvious change. Yet where was the Jane Eyre of yesterday? Where were her hopes? Where were her prospects? My hopes were all dead: struck with a subtle doom as in one night fell on all the first-born of Egypt. I looked on my cherished wishes: they lay still, stark corpses that could never revive. I looked at my love: it shivered in my heart like a suffering child in a cold cradle.

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Edward Fairfax Rochester: There you are! You're back! Ungrateful thing, I give you leave for a week and you're gone a whole month! I want my money back, since you have me so little in your thoughts.

Jane Eyre: I said I was going to be gone for as long as I was needed. And I was. And you still owe me wages.

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Edward Fairfax Rochester: Give me back nine. Jane, I have need of it!

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Edward Rochester: My bride is here, because my equal is here and my likeness!

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Edward Fairfax Rochester: She saves me from an inferno and she's glad she happened to be awake.

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Edward Fairfax Rochester: I wish at times I were a trifle better adapted to match with her, externally. Tell me now, fairy that you are, you couldn't give a charm or a filter or something of the sort?

Jane Eyre: I would be past the power of magic, sir.

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Blanche Ingram: [as she and Rochester emerge from the house into the garden: ] It is a beautiful place, your Thornfield.
Edward Rochester: As a dungeon, it serves its purpose.
Blanche Ingram: Dungeon? Why, it's a paradise! [Rochester grunts. Blanche goes on: ]
Blanche Ingram: Though of course, if one lived here, one would really have to have a house in London, wouldn't one?
Edward Rochester: [dry: ] Unquestionably. And a little apartment in Paris, perhaps a villa on the Mediterranean.
Blanche Ingram: How delightful that would be! But Thornfield would always be there, as a retreat from the world. A green haven of peace and... and love.
Edward Rochester: Love? Who's talking of love? All a fellow needs is a bit of distraction. A houseful of beautiful women every now and then to keep him from brooding on his woes - [chuckling: ]
Edward Rochester: peering too closely into the mysteries of his heart.
Blanche Ingram: That is, if he has a heart. And sometimes I wonder, Edward, if you really do have one.
Edward Rochester: [unperturbed: ] Have I ever done or said anything to make you believe that I have? If so, I assure you it was quite unintentional.
Blanche Ingram: Are you never serious?
Edward Rochester: Never more than at this moment, except perhaps when I'm eating my dinner.
Blanche Ingram: Really, Edward, you can be revoltingly coarse sometimes.
Edward Rochester: [not as a question: ] Can I ever be anything else.
Blanche Ingram: Can you? [She lays a hand on his arm and draws him around to look at her] <

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Edward Rochester: Are you always drawn to the loveless and unfriended?
Jane Eyre: When it's deserved.

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Jane Eyre: Have you a pocket comb about you, sir?
Edward Fairfax Rochester: What for?
Jane Eyre: I need to comb out this shaggy black mane. I find you quite alarming this close and you accuse *me* of being supernatural.
Edward Fairfax Rochester: Am I hideous, Jane?
Jane Eyre: Very sir. You always were, you know.
Edward Fairfax Rochester: You haven't lost your wickedness, wherever you've been.

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Jane Eyre: [Gets out of the coach a couple miles from Thornfield] Take my trunk on up to Thornfield, would you?
Coach Driver: Won't you ride, Miss? You've had a very long journey.
Jane Eyre: No, I'm nearly home. It's my favorite walk.

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Young Jane: My parents died when I was very young. I went to stay with my Aunt who didn't love me.

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Jane Eyre: I have lived a full life here. I have not been trampled on. I have not been petrified. I have not been excluded from every glimpse that is bright. I have known you, Mr. Rochester and it strikes me with anguish to be torn from you.
Rochester: Then why must you leave?
Jane Eyre: Because of your wife.
Rochester: I have no wife.
Jane Eyre: But your are to be married.
Rochester: Jane, you must stay.
Jane Eyre: And become nothing to you?... [near tears]
Jane Eyre: Am I a machine with out feelings? Do you think that because I am poor, plain, obscure, and little that I am souless and heartless? I have as much soul as you and full as much heart. And if God had possessed me with beauty and wealth, I could make it as hard for you to leave me as I to leave you... I'm not speaking to you through mortal flesh. It is my spirit that addresses your spirit, as it passes throguh the grave and stood at God's feet equal. As we are.
Rochester: [taking her hand]As we are.
Jane Eyre: [trying to pull away]I am a free human being with an independent will, which I now exert to leave you.
Rochester: Than let you will decide your destiny. I offer you my hand, my heart. Jane, I ask you too pass through life at my side. You are my equal, my likeness... Will you marry me?
Jane Eyre: Are you mocking me?
Rochester: Do you doubt me?
Jane Eyre: Entirely.

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Rochester: I know you; you're thinking. Talking is of no use, you're thinking how to act.
Jane Eyre: All has changed sir. I must leave you.
Rochester: No. No. Jane do you love me. [Jane nods]
Rochester: Then the essential things are the same. Be my wife.
Jane Eyre: You have a wife.
Rochester: I pledge you my honor, my fidelity...
Jane Eyre: You cannot.
Rochester: ...my love until death do us part.
Jane Eyre: What of truth?
Rochester: I would have told you the truth.
Jane Eyre: You are deceitful sir.
Rochester: I was wrong to deceive you. I see that now, it was cowardly. I should have appealed to your spirit as I do now. Bertha Antoinette Mason, she was wanted by my father for her fortune. I hardly spoke with her before the wedding. I lived with her for 4 years. Her temper ripened, her vices sprang up, violent and unchaste. Only cruelty would check her and I'd not use cruelty. I was chained to her for life Jane. Not even the law could free me. Have you ever set foot in a mad house Jane?
Jane Eyre: No sir.
Rochester: The inmates are caged and baited like beasts. I spared her that at least. Jane?
Jane Eyre: Yes I pity you sir.
Rochester: Who would you offend by living with me? Who would care?
Jane Eyre: I would.
Rochester: You would rather drive me to madness than break some mere human law.
Jane Eyre: I must respect myself.
Rochester: Listen to me. Listen. I could bend you with my finger and my thumb. A mere reed you feel in my hands. But whatever I do with this cage, I cannot get at you, and it is your soul that I want. Why can't you come of your own free will?
Jane Eyre: God help me.

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[last lines]Rochester: [sightless]Who's there?
Jane Eyre: [takes his hand]
Rochester: This hand. [touching her face]
Rochester: Jane Eyre. Jane Eyre.
Jane Eyre: Edward, I am come back to you... Fairfax Rochester with nothing to say?
Rochester: You're altogether a human being Jane.
Jane Eyre: I conscientiously believe so.
Rochester: [passionate kiss]I dream.
Jane Eyre: Awaken then. [they embrace]

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Rochester: [sitting on the steps]This spring, I came home heart sore and soul withered. Then I met a gentle stranger whose society revives me. With her, I feel like I could live again in a higher, purer way. [looking at Jane]
Rochester: Tell me... Am I justified in over leaping an obstacle of custom to obtain her?
Jane Eyre: There's an obstacle?
Rochester: A mere conventional impediment.
Jane Eyre: But what can it be? If you cherish an affection, sir than fortune alone cannot impede you.
Rochester: Yes.
Jane Eyre: And if the lady is of noble stock and has indicated that she may reciprocate.
Rochester: [bewildered]Jane, of whom do you think I speak?
Jane Eyre: Of Ms. Ingram.
Rochester: [rising to his feet]I am asking what Jane Eyre would do yo secure my happiness.
Jane Eyre: I would do anything for you, sir. Anything that was right.
Rochester: ...You transfix me quite. I feel I can speak to you now of my lovely one. If you've met her and know her. She's a rare one, isn't she? Fresh and healthy, without soil or taint. I'm sure she'd regenerate me with a vengeance.

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Rochester: What is it? Jane Eyre with nothing to say?
Jane Eyre: Everything seems unreal.
Rochester: I am real enough.
Jane Eyre: You, sir, are the most phantom-like of all.

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Rochester: I offer you my hand, my heart. Jane, I ask you to pass through life at my side. You are my equal and my likeness. Will you marry me?
Jane Eyre: Are you mocking me?
Rochester: You doubt me.
Jane Eyre: Entirely.

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Rochester: [to Jane]I knew you would do me good in some way. I saw it in your eyes when I first beheld you.

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Rochester: From whence do you hail? What's your tale of woe?
Jane Eyre: Pardon?
Rochester: All governesses have a tale of woe. What's yours?
Jane Eyre: I was brought up by my aunt, Mrs. Reed of Gateshead, in a house even finer than this. I then attended Lowood school where I received an education as good as I could hope for. I have no tale of woe, sir.
Rochester: Where are your parents?
Jane Eyre: Dead.
Rochester: Do you remember them?
Jane Eyre: No.
Rochester: And why are you not with Mrs. Reed of Gateshead now?
Jane Eyre: She cast me off, sir.
Rochester: Why?
Jane Eyre: Because I was burdensome and she disliked me.
Rochester: [Incredulous]No tale of woe?

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Rochester: I can see in you the glance of a curious sort of bird through the close-set bars of a cage, a vivid, restless, captive. Were it but free, it would soar, cloud high.

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Young Jane: You said I was a liar. I'm not. If I were I'd have said I loved you, and I don't. I dislike you less than anybody in the world. People think you are good, but you are bad, and hard-hearted. I will let everyone know what you have done.
Mrs. Reed: Children must be corrected for their faults.
Young Jane: Deceit is not my fault.
Mrs. Reed: You are passionate.
Young Jane: Uncle Reed is in heaven. So are my mother and father. They know how you hate me and wish me dead. They can see, they see everything you do, and they will judge you Mrs. Reed.
Mrs. Reed: Get out.

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Rochester: [after Jane and Mr. Rochester have put out a fire that was set to his bed]Say nothing about this. You are no talking fool.
Jane Eyre: But...
Rochester: I'll account for the state of affairs. Say nothing.
Jane Eyre: Yes, sir.
Rochester: Is that how you would leave me? Jane, fire is a horrible death. You've saved my life. Don't walk past me as if we were strangers.
Jane Eyre: What am I to do, then? [Rochester offers his hand, which she hesitates before taking. He covers her hand with his and draws closer]
Rochester: I have a pleasure in owing you my life.
Jane Eyre: There is no debt.
Rochester: I knew you would do me good in some way. I saw it in your eyes when I first beheld you. Their expression did not strike my very inmost being so for nothing. People talk of natural sympathies. You...
Jane Eyre: Good night then, sir.
Rochester: You will leave me, then.
Jane Eyre: I am cold.
Rochester: Go.

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Rochester: [to Jane]Although you are not pretty any more than I am handsome, I must say, it becomes you.

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