Overcoming Barriers Famous singer Tupac Shakur once stated that, “Reality is wrong. Dreams are for real.” Shakur may have been talking about successfully reaching your biggest hopes, but this quote reflects a different meaning in Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre. As Jane has recurring strange dreams, she does not realize that her dreams foreshadow her future reality. Instead of trusting her symbolic dreams, Jane disregards them and instead focuses on her current life with Rochester, as everything seems in place for their upcoming marriage. Jane’s dreams provide insight into Rochester’s puzzling behavior, foreshadowing her despair and choices she must make when Rochester’s secrets are revealed. Jane’s dream about an infant who mirrors Rochester’s actions symbolizes the confusing mixed signals he sends Jane. Jane tells Mr. Rochester that in her first dream, she cares for a child who sometimes laughs and cries. As Jane “dabbles the infant's hands in running water” (188) in her dream, this foreshadows the event in …show more content…
Jane’s dreams mainly focus on the effect that Bertha has on her relationship with Rochester, and they do not tap into final stages of their relationship at the end of the book that Bronte gives her readers. Charlotte Bronte teaches her readers feminism and independence, as seen in Jane’s dreams where Jane has to act independently in order to take care of the “infant” (240) and Jane having to make a difficult choice about leaving the only man in her life. Jane’s dreams show readers, especially women, that no woman has to depend on a man; if a relationship curve knocks you off your feet, feeling a sense of independence will help to make better choices about a suffering relationship. Just as Jane did, woman can learn to put their needs first before their significant other’s. Perhaps Jane does regain her balance and can come back stronger after