Jane Eyre's Childhood as a Precedent for All Troubles Jane Eyre's literary success of the time was marketed cheaply. In other words, Bronte's novel never got the appreciation it deserved, in the sectors it deserved. Many 19th-century critics simply assigned literary themes to their reviews to "get it over with." Critics have praised Jane Eyre for everything from its themes to its form. However, their superficial examinations are worth nothing without careful consideration of the deeper background of Jane's life, from which their hasty principles originate. Jane's widely discussed free will, her strong individuality and independence are segments of a larger project, her life. For example: Jane's childhood sets the most important precedent for all self-realism, although this purpose is largely ignored. Although "many have celebrated Bronte's carefully crafted description of his protagonist's first eighteen years for its vivid pathos, no one has yet accorded this childhood its deserved weight in the novel's final resolution." (Ashe 1) Jane Eyre's genius develops in a series of internal reactions to external circumstances rather than in superficial judgments about those internal events. The external circumstance is Jane's childhood while the internal events are Jane's emotional struggles. These emotions are later labeled as themes of “reason,” “passion,” or “maturation.” However, these emotions do not stand alone. Jane Eyre is about facing and reacting to fate and its actions in the face of unchanging circumstances. Jane's fate consisted of the disaster of her childhood. “From the perspective of modern child psychology, Jane's background: ten years gone by... middle of paper... and” (11) To finalize my point about Charlotte Bronte's intent in describing Jane Eyre, the parallels between Bronte's life and her character Jane must be examined. Bronte herself experienced “a period of depression and ill health” (Rollyson 5). It was known that Bronte felt "deeply the loneliness of his existence". (25) “The most basic facts of Bronte's life reveal a story of loss of cunning similar to that of Jane” (26) The name under which Jane Eyre was originally published was “An Autobiography.” From this it can be deduced that Bronte wanted to underline something more than a superficial feminist argument in his book.