The Fellowship Of Marriage And Marriage

In the Regency Era, marriage was a necessity for both genders. Men and women looked for sensible spouses who would be socially acceptable to marry. During this time, it was not uncommon to arrange a marriage or marry for money or status. In Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, Mr. Collins and Charlotte Lucas illustrate the primary reason for marriage during the Regency Era: economics.

In Pride and Prejudice Author Jane Austen claims that marriage should be between a man and women who love each other equally. Austen's disgust of Marriage and decorum in British culture is written through the eyes of main the main character in Pride and Prejudice, Miss Elizabeth Bennett. It is sad to think that marriage could be bought or in Elizabeth Bennett’s case not afforded. Marriage shouldn’t be the only measure of worth for women. Someone should not feel “repugnance” for a marriage due to situation.

Throughout ’Pride and Prejudice’ Jane Austen conveys the theme of marriage of being of paramount importance. The first line of ‘Pride and Prejudice’ defines the main themes of Austen’s’ novel, as well as subtly giving the reader an insight of Austen’s views of marriage. Her use of hyperbole ‘That a man in possession of good fortune, must be in want of a wife’ hints at a somewhat mocking and ironic tone on Austen’s part, which indicates to the reader that Austen doesn’t agree with the general perception of marriage during her time.

“It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.”(Austen 1). Austen gives us the insight of what it was like back in the 1800s when marrying was not done for solely love but more for money and that only a man of good class and fairly good amount wealth can have a wife. Elizabeth Bennet, A character brought to life by Austen in Pride and Prejudice, fights against the norms of her time and marries for love, even though there was a lot of money that along with it love was the main reason. Jane Austen novels

Jane Austen’s’ novels are one of the most commonly read and regarded works in the history of English literature. Austen’s adeptness comprehends the subject of marriage and love in all its complexity, practicality, and goodness. In all of her novels, Jane Austen focuses on courtship and marriage. In each case, readers see society, which had narrow and rigid expectations for women, through the eyes of lively and perceptive young heroines. Filled with wit and good humor, Austen’s novels at the same time provide a realistic picture of relationships between men and women.

Austen addresses this issue by showing how women were obligated to marry men for convenience rather than love. She also shows how men of higher class looked for wealthy women to marry in order to keep money in the family. She recognizes the struggles of middle class women trying to marry off before the entail took away their chances. Through this evidence, the reader is able to see the issues of women's oppression in

(THESIS) Jane Austen’s didactic novel Pride and Prejudice (1813), written during the patriarchal Victorian Era examines the intricate relationship between love and financial security in marriages. Similarly, Fay Weldon’s postmodernist epistolary novel Letters to Alice (1984) argues for the importance of morally instructive texts as well as supporting the importance of finding a balance between love and financial security within marriage. (CONC SENT) By examining Austen’s Pride and Prejudice in conjunction with Weldon’s feminist assessment of Regency values, an enhanced understanding of the institution of marriage is achieved.

Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice focuses on the restrictive gender roles of early 19th century England. The only possibility of upwards social mobility for women is through marriage. However, the prospect of marriage is directly by men, leaving women at their mercy. Austen depicts marriage as a social construct designed to maintain gender roles in England’s Regency era.

In a typical marriage vow, both members of a couple tell each other “I promise to be true to you in good times and in bad, in sickness and in health. I will love you and honour you all the days of my life,” marking the beginning of a new chapter in life for both of them. The novel Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen describes the Bennet sisters’ struggles to reach this new stage in life in the context of social expectations of the Regency era. While the novel reveals many of the established beliefs of female inferiority, Austen demonstrates how the Regency era was a time of change through Elizabeth’s difficult journey to a successful marriage contrasted against other characters who are conformists; it was a time when gender roles and expectations had just begun to transform.

The ideals that are represented in Austen’s writing are similar to the feminist writings of Mary Wollstonecraft. Austen realized and highlighted the important role that marriage played in the lives of eighteenth century women, as did Wollstonecraft. As previously stated, this focus on marriage and courtship has led to Austen’s works being ignored or disregarded by feminist theorists. As Julia Brown states, “To Jane Austen, the selection of spouse is of crucial importance to the individual and society, for the individual is the agent of a social purpose” (Brown 7). This focus on an individual’s agency and marriage as a means of influencing society lines up with Wollstonecraft’s ideas.

In the past, marriage is a necessary process of life. It was very unusual for people to delay marriage or stay single for their whole life. Marriage was just like a custom that everyone needed to follow. However, according to the research of Anderson and Payne (2016): “In the mid-1950s, the median marriage age at first marriage was at a record low of just over 20 for women and 22 for men, but by 2014, the median age is 27.9 for women and nearing 30 for men (p.1)”. The data shows that there is an apparent late marriage tendency, which means that American people delay their marriage about six years later than 50 years ago. There is a Chinese old saying that marriage is the tomb of love, which shows young people’s hesitation and fear of marriage. What caused this trend? Why has marriage become less attractive today? Is it a phenomenon that happened by accident or an inexorable trend that is happening all over the world?

Marriage for the sake of fulfillment relates only to societal norms and not into romance or cohesive partnership. During the 19th century in Britain, the emotions were not driving the matrimony wagon, but rather wealth and class defined the game of marriage. Charlotte Lucas tells Elizabeth Bennet, “I am not a romantic...considering Mr. Collins’s character, connections, and situation in life...my chance of happiness with him...entering the marriage state” (109). Charlotte displays the elements of being fulfilled, connections and situation in life. “Marriage has always been her object: it was the only honorable provision for well-educated young women of small fortune” (107).

Matrimony has always been a controversial topic in each and every time period. Jane Austen does a good job of capturing many of the different views on relationships and the views of marriage during the Regency era. In today’s society, relationships develop out of love, however this was not the standard during the Regency era . The reader from the beginning of the novel is given the “standard” of marriages during this time, “It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.”() This quote shows the patriarchal society and views of relationships and reasons for wanting a wife. These reasons will be shown and develop during the novel into the standard of marriage we see today.

to women as they were able to work and thus earn a small, and in rare

The previous study has shown different views about Jane Austen’s novel Pride and Prejudice, within it marriage. Whereas this study will be different from the prior one, in which it will indicate the social factors that forced women back that time, to marry whomever is available, only to secure their life, even if it is a marriage of convenience rather than