She’s pretty but she doesn’t realize it. She’s smart but she doesn’t realize it. She’s into cool, practical things, not silly, frivolous ones. She would never use her charms for her own gains because she doesn’t realize she has any. She’s respectable. She comes from humble beginnings. She’s kind and capable and more than a little lonely. She’s a rare jewel in an ocean of flashy skin deep baubles. She’s . . .
Not Like Other Girls.
Bella Swan. Alina Starkov. Katniss Everdeen. YA fantasy is bursting with so many manifestations of this heroine that she is now a cliche but where did she originate and why did she become so prominent?
The rise of Dark Romance as a genre in YA fantasy began largely with Twilight in the early 2000s but if you remove the supernatural element the genre bears a striking resemblance to the works of the Bronte sisters way back in the 1850s. The brooding bad boy who is able to see the Not-Like-Other-Girl’s worth bears a striking resemblance to the Byronic hero of the Romantic Era. Manifestations of the Byronic hero are found in both Emily Bronte’s Heathcliff and Charlotte Bronte’s Rochester.
The Bronte sisters were unique in their time because they wrote from an underrepresented woman’s perspective. Because of this, their heroines were not the picture perfect paragons of beauty, warmth and goodness that the male gaze of the time expected them to be. Instead of the flawless but unobtainable Estella of Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations or Mina, the lovely damsel in distress from Bram Stoker’s Dracula we have the wild, pragmatic Catherine of Wuthering Heights and, of course, the small, plain, practical Jane Eyre.
Jane Eyre is a textbook Not-Like-Other-Girls. She comes from humble beginnings. She’s satisfied with little and doesn’t expect much. She’s not stunning. She has no special skills or abilities. She doesn’t spend time chasing men or thinking too much of herself like her first rival Miss Blanche Ingim or have dangerous fits of violence like poor Bertha in the attic. She’s moral and would never dream of becoming someone’s mistress like her pupil’s mother, Celine Varens. When Rochester confesses his love for Jane he compares her to all his past lovers, declaring that he had given up finding a woman who could make him happy until he had met her.
Jane’s first obstacle between her and Rochester’s affections is Miss Blanche Ingram. Blanche is written as a walking stereotype of everything a high class woman was meant to be at the time. Beautiful. Refined. Elegant. Rich. Charming. In contrast to Jane, however, she is also superficial, vain, and calculating. Jane herself expresses compassion for her, recognizing that she was raised to be that way, but the narrative itself paints her as less desirable and silly. Even as far back as the 1800s women like Jane were made to feel lesser for not meeting the feminine ideals of the time while women like Blanche were simultaneously villainized for meeting them.
Rochester’s apparent affection for Blanche, however, turns out to be a ruse. He casts her aside once he is convinced that Jane is jealous. Jane rebukes him for playing with Blanche’s feelings but he convinces her that she never cared about him anyways. The narrative appears to accept his statement as fact but there is no way he could actually know it to be true. A similar attitude is taken toward Miss Rosamond later in the story when her romantic hopes are dashed. The man who chooses not to marry her despite loving her shrugs it off, saying she is pretty and will have lots of options. From a practical standpoint this may be true but it is callous to both women’s feelings and suggests that Bronte believes women who fit the beauty standards of the time more closely were necessarily more shallow and less deeply hurt by rejection.
The real obstacle standing between Jane and Rochester is, of course, Bertha Rochester, the wife he is hiding in his attic.Jane herself shows compassion for Bertha when she learns of her. She tells Rochester “It is not her fault that she is mad.” but the narrative still frames Bertha as monstrous and unnatural. Rochester swears he never loved her, that he was pressured into the marriage, that her ailment was concealed from him. He even goes so far as to call her a “demon”. It is never once questioned that locking a woman with poor mental health in the attic is the obvious thing to do.
Blanche and Bertha are the primary obstacles between Jane and Rochester but they are not all the other girls that Jane is not like. There is also Adele’s mother, the actress Celine Varens along with his other mistresses he has taken since his marriage to Bertha. Rochester expresses nothing but contempt for these women and even the usually compassionate Jane does not rebuke him for this. His complete lack of respect for these women is why Jane decides that she absolutely will not live as Rochester’s mistress and flees.
Ultimately Rochester does not go unpunished for his poor treatment of the women in his life. While Jane receives an unexpected inheritance Rochester’s house burns down. Even though Bertha dies and he is free to marry Jane he is blinded by the fire. Jane marries him not as the powerful employer that she had fallen for but a humbled older man who is dependent on her for basic needs. It is not unremarkable that a story that is so focused on the male gaze ends with the man in question unable to see. It could be argued that the narrative is more aware than it first appears of how much of a villain Rochester actually is. His sins are not unpunished and he must repent before he can be allowed to have happiness with Jane.
Despite this retribution, the reformed Rochester still presents a dangerous message. In the narrative Jane is not like all these other women in his life. She is special enough to cause him to repent. The fantasy that a woman can be kind and good and wonderful enough to tame a monster is an old one. It makes an enticing and powerful story but not only can this narrative encourage women to stay in a relationship with a chronic abuser it also perpetuates the idea that the women who came before deserved the abuse in one way or another. Because they were shallow. Because they were crazy. Because they were sluts. Don’t be like those girls. Behave and everything will work out in the end.
Jane marries Rochester. She says she is happy but is she? Is it not only a matter of time until she becomes Bertha, trapped in her husband’s home while he pursues a younger upgrade?
All girls are not like other girls. The paragon of feminine perfection does not exist. The reason this trope has become so prominent is that it is relatable. All girls feel they fall short of the standards of perfection they are constantly compared against.
Jane’s ordinariness is what makes her such a badass heroine. She doesn’t have to be pretty to be amazing. She doesn’t have to have special talents or good fortune. She is worthy of love and she knows it. This is what makes her so iconic and why she is a stronger character than later Not-Like-Other-Girls. From the very beginning she defends her own worth.
Still, there is a danger in the way Jane is constantly compared against the other women in her story. It is satisfying to see the underdog win but there is still that undercurrent of competition between women rather than support. Jane sees her worth from the beginning. Does she really need Rochester to validate it? Could she not celebrate herself while also celebrating Blanche, Bertha, and Celine? The paradox of the Not-Like-Other-Girls is that rather than free women from unrealistic expectations she represents a different set of expectations.
Ultimately whether someone is Like or Not-Like Other-Girls is irrelevant. People of all genders should be free to express themselves and enjoy themselves the way they choose. We could all learn something from Jane and choose to own our worth regardless of others’ expectations of us but perhaps we can learn to do so without pitting ourselves against each other and trading one kind of comparison for another.
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