Jane Eyre explores themes of motive in marriage and the rights people in this time could claim when it came to marriage and divorce.
In the novel, Jane is a governess in the home of Edward Fairfax Rochester, a gentleman above her in class and in authority. But their love for each other brings them on equal terms when she agrees to marry him. Though their marriage is doomed before it has a chance to start by the presence of Rochester's mentally unhealthy wife Bertha Mason.
Jane rebuffs a marriage proposal given by St. John Rivers, who wishes her to be a wife in name only. Knowing she will never be loved or love as she did with Rochester, she cannot accept him.
