Why can Jane return?
She is no longer economically dependent or socially isolated. Her inheritance and recovered family make the decision genuinely hers.
What changes between Jane and Rochester?
Rochester's physical losses end his position of effortless mastery, while Jane arrives with money, experience, and the power to leave.
What happens to Bertha?
She burns Thornfield and dies after jumping from the roof; Rochester is injured while attempting to save the people inside.
Why end with St. John?
His final letter supplies a counterpoint to domestic happiness: Jane chooses earthly companionship, while St. John pursues a solitary religious vocation toward death.
Themes and What the Ending Means
Love and self-respect: Jane wants attachment without surrendering her moral identity.
Freedom and confinement: The red-room, Lowood, Thornfield's attic, and Jane's poverty create different forms of captivity.
Religion: Helen, Brocklehurst, and St. John embody sharply different uses of Christian belief.
Class and gender: Jane repeatedly confronts systems that ask poor women to be grateful, silent, or available.
The Gothic double: Bertha externalizes rage, secrecy, and female confinement that the controlled narrator also understands.