Fire Symbol Analysis

Jane Eyre. A strange child, difficult to love. A lonely only child. She’s left to deal with so much pain at such a young age—the aftermath of death, the absence of love. It’s Mr. Rochester who gets burned in the end. I know how that feels. All of it.

Even the circus freak side of my face—my damaged half—was better than the alternative, which would have meant death by fire. I didn’t burn to ashes. I emerged from the flames like a little phoenix. I ran my fingers over the scar tissue, caressing the contours. I didn’t burn, Mummy, I thought. I walked through the fire and I lived. There are scars on my heart, just as thick, as disfiguring as those on my face. I know they’re there. I hope some undamaged tissue remains, a patch through which love can come in and flow out. I hope.

I smiled at her. Twice in one day, to be the recipient of thanks and warm regard! I would never have suspected that small deeds could elicit such genuine, generous responses. I felt a little glow inside—not a blaze, more like a small, steady candle.

“But you’re not smart, Eleanor. You’re someone who lets people down. Someone who can’t be trusted. Someone who failed. Oh yes, I know exactly what you are. And I know how you’ll end up. Listen, the past isn’t over. The past is a living thing. Those lovely scars of yours—they’re from the past, aren’t they? And yet they still live on your plain little face. Do they still hurt?”

Polly the plant had died that morning. I’m fully aware of how ridiculous that sounds. That plant, though, was the only living link with my childhood, the only constant between life before and after the fire, the only thing, apart from me, that had survived. I’d thought it was indestructible, assumed it would just go on and on, leaves falling off, new ones growing to replace them. I’d neglected my duties these last few weeks, too busy with hospitals and funerals and Facebook to water her regularly. Yet another living thing I’d failed to look after. I wasn’t fit to care for anyone, anything. Too numb to cry, I dropped the plant into the bin, pot, soil and all, and saw that, throughout all these years, it had been clinging on to life only by the slenderest, frailest of roots.

These days, loneliness is the new cancer—a shameful, embarrassing thing, brought upon yourself in some obscure way. A fearful, incurable thing, so horrifying that you dare not mention it; other people don’t want to hear the word spoken aloud for fear that they might too be afflicted, or that it might tempt fate into visiting a similar horror upon them.