For most of Jane Eyre’s childhood, she has endured much oppressive and submissive treatment from the Reed household without resistance. Then comes the pivotal moment when she musters up the courage to speak out against her aunt. “SPEAK I must: I had been trodden on severely, and MUST turn: but how? What strength had I to dart retaliation at my antagonist? I gathered my energies and launched them in this blunt sentence…” (Bronte 35) To understand Jane’s actions we can look at two works from Audre Lorde: The Transformation of Silence into Language and Action and The Master’s Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master’s House.

In Lorde’s The Transformation of Silence into Language and Action, she states that “if you keep ignoring the part of you that wants to speak out, it gets hotter and hotter and one day it will just up and punch you in the mouth from the inside.” (Lorde 42) Jane has been containing much of her anger within herself until it reached its cap. The cap finally broke when she remembers the promise that her late Uncle Reed forced her aunt to make which was to treat Jane like her own child. Realizing her aunt had broken this promise, Jane finally had the confidence to go against her aunt knowing that her own uncle was supporting her. Lorde also states that “My silences had not protected me. Your silence will not protect you.” (Lorde 41) After all these years of abuse, Jane realizes that this unethical treatment isn’t going to end anytime soon if she remains silent. To stay silent is to accept the belittlement and inferior status placed upon Jane by her aunt. By lashing out, Jane is able to criticize her tyrannical aunt’s wrongdoings and more important validate her own status as an equal human being.

In The Master’s Tool Will Never Dismantle the Master’s House, Lorde states “Those of us who stand outside the circle of this society’s definition of acceptable women; those of us who have been forged in the crucibles of difference — those of us who are poor, who are lesbians, who are Black, who are older — know that survival is not an academic skill.” (Lorde 2) The essence of Jane’s mistreatment was due to that fact that she was a poor orphan who was placed under the care of her aunt. In the Reed household, Jane was viewed as inferior and a burden due to her social status. However, Jane affirms to Mrs. Reed that she too is human. “You think I have no feelings, and that I can do without one bit of love or kindness; but I cannot live so: and you have no pity.” (Bronte 35)