Most tips about dating targeted at single women amount to a Sisyphean course of self-improvement, whether the focus is on their appearance as complicit with the beauty mandate or with interpersonal skills such as listening and hobby development, all are designed to make women a better match and ring ready, which culture has emphasised since they were knee-highs. Instead of regarding every date as a potential Prince Charming, it might be more useful to utilise the Rochester Rule as a primary criterion for finding a good man. Put simply, Charlotte Brontë’s novel unintentionally illustrates how much one can learn about a man from the way he treated women in past relationships, only her titular Jane Eyre was too much of an inexperienced sap to give the evidence full consideration. When you have a man’s track record to consult, do so with the knowledge that he’s not going to be an entirely different man with you. You can anticipate who he was with other women will remain consistent in the current relationship. In the case of Brontë’s Edward Rochester, a man who locked his wife up in the attic for a decade, just to keep control of her dowry, Jane would have to wonder what he’d do once she became inconvenient, put on some weight or asked too much of him. Marry him? Reader, she should have busted ass for the nearest exit.
Edward Rochester stands as a familiar romantic figure in popular culture. He’s usually attractive but in an unconventional fashion. A Rochester presents himself as a ‘deep’ or ‘tortured’ soul, a misunderstood genius, a man prone to emotional outbursts, passionate exclamations and who makes wild demands on a lady. After the 19th century original, there were several other men who fit the Rochester template, a leading man who should give women pause, including Charles Boyer in the classic Gaslight, Orson Welles, Ted Hughes, probably Richard Burton, Ike Turner, Charles Bukowski and Jack Nicholson. The Rochester type gets off on treating women like crap, by building himself up through reminding women how little they matter in the end. With outsized ego and a dissembling manner, Mr. Rochester manipulates women while remaining oblivious to the distress he causes.
Scarlett Johansson should take note of the Rochester Rule now that she’s moved in with Sean Penn. Any dude who imagines a divine intervention in terms of licence to blow rails and buy women, where god commands: ‘you’ve tortured yourself enough. Two hookers and the eight ball are inside’ (starts 9:16 mark) probably isn’t going to cozy up to monogamy, especially when he likens it to self-imposed water boarding. Penn rates close to Charlie Sheen’s level of wacked out entitlement, public rages, a total disregard for a woman’s well-being, with only a slight differential of talent in his favour. Ms. Johansson, go ahead and have your fling, but do it without the mistaken belief that you can heal or redeem him. Robin Wright tried that route and looks positively shell-shocked as a result. Vagina ain’t the Red Cross, ladies. Let the Rochester type save his own damn self.
Anthea McTeirnan
Croí na Duibhlinn
Aoife Barry
Aoife McLysaght
Arlene Hunt
Attracta McCarthy-McKenna
clairehennessy
Ann Cronin
Amanda Brown
Eleanor Fitzsimons
Edel Coffey
Anna Carey
Lauren Murphy
Jennie Ridyard
Jude Leavy
Hazel Katherine Larkin
Léan Ní Chuilleanáin
Leigh
Lisa McInerney
Laura Slattery
Maman Poulet
Megan McGurk
Clare Kleinedler
Molly
Rosita Boland
Catherine Crichton
Sinéad Gleeson
sarahefranklin
siobhandowling
Susan Daly
theantiroom
Nuala Ní Chonchúir
I see what you are saying, and generally I agree with you. Particularly that ingrained idea that we can fix those terrible bad boys.
I somehow, disagree with the Rochester example. (Mind you, this was my interpretation of him, which could have been affected by my mediaeval upbringing) But I always felt that he was actually a good man, forced into this cold facade by society and his situation. He had loved his first wife, and did not want to get rid of her. He was protecting her–after all she was mad and dangerous. He was taking care of his ex lovers little girl, he ran into the fire to try to save the madwoman… he was not evil.
I sound so naive. But knowing mental illness in person, and the way that caregivers must protect themselves from their reality, I see Rochester in a different light.
(Rereading what I just wrote–perhaps the White Sargasso Sea may have affected my opinion)
Mae, there’s much in the novel to suggest that Rochester isn’t the great guy he protests to be. While she’s at Lowood, Jane learns from Miss Temple and Helen Burns that if she wants to be persuasive with the story of how wronged she was by her aunt, she should tell her story plainly, without embellishment or hyperbole. But when Rochester tells the story of his marriage, he is wildly emotional in his account and most hysterical when he denounces Bertha as a vile savage. By her own education, Jane should have learned not to believe him. There’s no proof other than his word that she was mad before she was condemned to the attic. Who wouldn’t be driven so after a decade in crude captivity? If he loved her, he would have sent her for proper care rather than hiding her like a dirty secret just so he could keep paws on her £30,000. Or he could have been honourable and divorced her, sent her home with the money. Nope. He wanted the cash. Also, he made Grace Poole a captive to watch Bertha all those years sitting in the dark with only booze as a comfort. Rochester was a tyrant who held sway over all the women (and little Adele) in the house. He was a jerk by stringing along Blanche Ingram as well. The dude was a gentleman, but bad news all the same. One last example: he changed Jane’s name to Janet, a cue which Rhys picked up for her creation of Wide Sargasso Sea, wherein Bertha was originally named Antoinette.
I completely agree with you! I’ve never understood what women see in the tortured type who spends more time torturing the woman than themselves…
Deirdre, girls have been enculturated to see it as romantic. Le sigh, right? Look at that chaste vampire boy as another example of thinly veiled abuse packaged as love.
I hate to state the obvious: some women like bad guys. At least that is my solace.
Charlie, Rochester doesn’t really fit the standard bad guy model, even so, much of pop culture sets his type up as an interesting ideal for girls in order to prime them for a life of willing masochism where they think getting treated like crap is just the way it is, if not aspirational.
Wait, wait! You’re doing Mr Rochester a disservice here. He hadn’t locked up his wife to keep control of her diary – though many men did that in the 18th and 19th century, to be sure.
Rochester’s first wife was a homicidal maniac, as the text assesses; with none of the mental hospitals that are available today, he had secured her where she could not harm herself or others, with a nurse to care for her.
In the book she makes repeated attempts to kill herself and others, and finally succeeds.
A very good point, though; couldn’t agree more. We love as we are; our love is expressed through our own nature. A controlling person, a spoilt person, a narcissistic person, a selfish person, will love only through his own need. A loving, generous, considerate person will love out of his own kindness.
Thank you!!! Im glad I am not the only one standing for Edward.
Page turners, I’ve read the novel 7 times and fail to recall the evidence of which you speak. How is Bertha a maniac? She had plenty of provocation. Trying to burn up her husband and the marital bed seems like a pretty sane response to a decade of ill treatment. It’s not enough of an excuse to say Rochester had no choice when there were plenty of enlightened care facilities available for treating women of Bertha’s station at the time. Lisa Appignanesi’s ‘Mad, Bad and Sad: A History of Women and the Mind Doctors’ reports how the Quaker influence held sway in directing therapy and kindness for those with psychological afflictions at the time, rather than in past models of locking folks up like animals.
What you deem ‘madness’ I’d recognise as an understandable reaction to ten long years of abuse. It’s the original burning bed scenario, long before Farrah showed up.
Great post Megan. Any attempts that I’m aware of to save a man from himself has ended in copious tears…and not his I might add.
I’m sure there are female equivilants too who leave a trail of destruction in their wake but in this unfair world, were superficiality is valued and women are harshly judged on their appearance, time and gravity tends to catch up with them.
Eleanor, yep, plenty of femme fatales to point to in fiction or film. They never seem to have the same degree of power as a Rochester though, because it’s usually limited to sexuality. Excellent point about the tears not falling from the Rochester. Well maybe only in the case when she wises up and leaves.
When you have a man’s track record to consult, do so with the knowledge that he’s not going to be an entirely different man with you
I sort of agree and disagree with this – I made it a rule when I was about 19 not to go out with people who don’t have good relationships with at least some of their families or their exes, since both seemed like a good indicator of how they treated people they were close to. And I don’t think you should go into a relationship planning to change someone. But relationships are always about the dynamic between two people: I’ve been a horrible passive-aggressive person in previous relationships because that was the vibe between us, and I can’t blame that totally on my ex. I think you can have a really unhealthy dynamic with one partner and establish something totally different with another.
Also, Scarlet Johansson may have no dream or intention of trying to “heal or redeem” Sean Penn! She might just fancy a bit of hot sex with someone who she knows is totally unsuited for a long-term relationship. Women do do that too! There’s a cultural myth that women who go out with “bad boys” are secretly hoping for the Long-Term Happy Ever After – well, no. Sometimes women are making a perfectly rational decision to pursue a bit of short-term hedonism!
Mary, I’m well acquainted with the joys of short term hedonism to be had from a passionate fling. The point of concern here is that Ms. Johansson moved into Penn’s house. That sets her up for more than a tryst with the dude and certainly puts her in the position of relinquishing the power dynamic in his favour.
After reading Jean Rhys’ ‘Wide Saragossa Sea’ it totally changed my conception of Rochester and his situation, and indeed “the madwoman in the attic”, we knew nothing of his first wife’s situation previous to her imprisonment in Thornfield, and only from Rochester’s point of view.
The ‘hysteric’ woman was a handy defense for the patriarchal society of Charlotte’s novel.
You’re so right, Zoe in how much Rhys’ novel gave context to the original. Rochester ran around the world indulging his appetites which made him a man. In terms of Bertha and any she might have had, it made her a monster in his reckoning. And Antoinette/Bertha’s family sold her away to hell without giving a shit what happened to her.
I have no idea is Rochester was evil incarnate or not, but Sean Penn is a bit of a self important Divo. And also– dare I say it- and bit of smoked ham.
Arlene, every time I see Penn I remind myself to quit smoking someday soon.
I wish I’d known some of this 20 years ago when I met the man I married. I was the sap who thought she could heal this troubled soul with her love. He talked badly about his only ex (we were both very young) but I thought it was just that she wasn’t right for him and I was. I almost bled out feeding his insatiable needs in the time we were together and it took years to understand exactly what was happening as I had been so well trained to put him first. One of the sites that helped me understand the dynamic of our marriage, and which has a good if long piece on all this is Heartless Bitches:
http://www.heartless-bitches.com/rants/manipulator/special.shtml
Sharon, don’t beat yourself up. Rochester is practically a rite of passage for women. I spent two years locked up with one which I shudder to now recall.
Megan, wow I loved the way you wrote this one, a masterclass piece.
As for the sentiment you are on the mark with the idea that the bad boy/tortured soul/womanizer/Javier Bardem part in the movies rarely changes his spots. As much as that bemused me in the past it is just a given and it defies rational analysis.
Aw, thanks Aidan! I wonder what women could accomplish if they set the same degree of zeal on projects of transformation other than some dude. If we could take a young woman’s tenacity to change him to a lab and put it in one of those centrifuge machines to spin off the bad crap, to leave only the pure essence of confidence. We’d have a whole lotta creative and successful women running around.
I think Scarlett is well able to take care of herself. She’s a self-proclaimed bad girl and from what I’ve read and seen of her I doubt she’s looking to tame Sean Penn. I’d say he has a better chance of leaving this union heart-broken than she does…
Clare, I’ve failed to see any reference to her self-proclaimed badness. Of all the young women in Hollywood, Johansson seems least likely to garner the label, right up there with some other women such as Rachel McAdams. How is she a bad girl? She works hard, was married early on, there’s no pictures of her snapped falling out of clubs or in the arms of multiple partners. And again, she moved into Penn’s house which makes her dependent on him to some degree. She hardly risks the walk of shame.
Sorry, I should not have used the term “bad girl,” it was misleading.
What I meant was that Scarlett isn’t one to expect a forever-after fairytale; she’s expressed her unconventional views on monogamy on several occasions and the sentiment is that she doesn’t think it’s natural for humans. Yes, she gave marriage a go but her views on it are quite unorthodox.
I used to see her around quite a bit when I worked in entertainment journalism in Hollywood, and she has always come across as whip-smart and as someone who knows what she wants (and usually gets it). She just doesn’t strike me as someone who’d take on a notorious bad boy like Penn expecting to change him. In fact, quite the opposite – I’m willing to bet that she might like the guy a whole lot but doesn’t have any major expectations. People “move in” with each other all the time in Hollywood and it doesn’t mean anything serious…it’s just another day in La La Land.
You’re so right, Megan! I re-read Jane Eyre recently and was so disgusted by the bad boys can change narrative. While my recent split mightn’t be due to the Rochester effect, I realised that several months of trying to change someone were just making me angrier.
I’m currently using a variety of your Rochester rule for my single life- if a guy talks trash about his exs, walk away.
Dawn, if I had a coin for every woman who settled because she thought he was the best she could do or was too afraid to leave for whatever reason, I’d be a rich woman. Count yourself lucky that you had the clarity and strength to move on. There are a million lessons to be gleaned from reading novels. This is one of my faves.
What a terrible thing to write. Without the tendency of women to see second best as a challenge or as a fixer upper or as having hidden depths (I wonder where that tendency comes from? Probably not mothers, yeah almost certainly not mothers) then knuckle draggers like me would be doomed to live and die alone.
It’s not my fault that I am as content as a pig in shit and am therefore unable to see any need for improvement (again I’m not blaming mothers for producing men, that are happy in their arrogant contentment).
That men are congenitally incapable of change is wonderfully demonstrated by Scarlet Johannson. I’d walk over broken glass for her, but I’m not going to notice my bloody footprints ruining her hardwood floors.
Paul, I’m one of those helplessly square ladies who believes the best in men. When I met my husband twenty years ago, he was a total grown up, with a work ethic, ambition, empathy, communication skills and a desire to commit. He was no fixer-upper and he’s capable of change and growth. How foolhardy am I that I didn’t settle! And that I don’t expect him to do something silly like walk over glass in order to prove what I already know.
Brilliant. You made me laugh. And you speak truth.
But it’s worth noting that classic good old low self esteem makes many women incapable of recognising that her honey is a bad ‘un (or simply ‘just not that into her’) – as she feels she deserves abuse and that his bad behaviour toward her is justified. He’d treat her with respect and love if only she was prettier, skinnier, more successful, funnier, smarter…. it’s not his fault, it’s hers, etc.
So, let’s remember to stand by our sistahs and give them constant positive affirmations. (Without pointing out her partners flaws or telling her she’s an eejit of course, as the messenger is likely to be killed, and you’ll stop them confiding in you ever more… She’ll get there eventually.).
Having said that – I think Scarlett is going to be just fine… he may well end up as the one sobbing into his pillow with a newly Juvaderm filled balloon head trying to keep time at bay and keep her interested. Please God.
Hah. Good one on the Juvaderm, Veronica. For sure this Rochester appeal resonates as some level with a woman’s struggling self-esteem. If they could only transfer the confidence they have in changing men to something with a better reward.
Megan, I’m coming to this rather late but thanks fore such a smart, sassy, witty post. I laughed deliciously. As a long-ago recently-divorced friend of mine once said: “I wish I’d met up with his ex-wife before I married him”, which sadly just doesn’t have the poetic ring of: “Reader, I married him”.
‘Vagina ain’t the Red Cross, ladies.’ That’s about the best line I’ve heard all year! It should go on tour to all secondary schools for 14+ across Ireland, Europe, then the world.
Jennie, more folks should quote your friend at any rate. Poetic prose is nice on the page except it may not extend the same lustre in our real lives.
June, I wasn’t fortunate enough to have counsel with older women when I was a youngster. I wonder would I have listened before I shacked up with my version of Rochester for two years? Let’s hope so.
I know its not the main point of your article, but the bit at the start about most tips to women being about self-improvement to catch a man rings false to me. the most common tip I hear given to both sexes when going on a date is “Be yourself”. Yes it may be trite, but its still the most common one I hear.