Jane Eyre's Lessons In Inner Beauty

The notion of beauty, what it is and whether it is an inner or outward quality, has been long debated. For centuries people, and particularly women, have struggled with the concept of their own inner beauty as something as important, if not more important than their outward, physical beauty. This is no less true in literature. The idea of female inner beauty has not always been valued. In Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre, the protagonist, Jane, rejects her own outer beauty in favour of nurturing her intellect, her humility and those other inner qualities that she herself views as beautiful. She respects her wisdom and philosophy before any of her physical attributes, partly because of her need as a child to read, partly from the lessons she is taught. The ideas she embraces as a child regarding outer beauty are reinforced as they reappear in...
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