Jane Austen fans are romantics at heart. We read her novels for many reasons, her subtle wit and amusing observations, her craftsmanship, her unique plots, characterizations, and settings, but most of all, we long for our favorite heroines to overcome obstacles and find true love. At the end of the novels, we’re gratified to assume the fortunate couples will live happily ever after. Still, I find myself wondering what Jane reveals about her own thoughts on marriage based on how it is portrayed in her stories. Towards that end, here is a review of some of the married partners in each novel using the criteria of attraction, shared values, and compatibility to categorize them as either happy or disappointed. Attraction almost always plays a part in bringing couples together, but happiness depends on shared values and compatible personality traits.
Pride and Prejudice
Happy
Mr. and Mrs. Gardiner qualify as a happy couple based on their behavior towards each other and their nieces, they seem to have all the key ingredients in place. They appear to be very compatible, are loving parents, and kindly disposed towards their nieces which is evidence of shared values. Mrs. Gardiner cautions Lizzy about her “warm recommendation” of Mr. Wickham and to remember her family obligations; “You must not let your fancy run away with you.” Jane is invited to stay with them in London and later, Lizzy is invited to travel with her aunt and uncle to visit Lambton where she has a pivotal encounter with Mr. Darcy. They take an incorrigible Lydia under wing until her marriage to Wickham can take place. They are amiable, caring, and generous which ultimately reflects on them as a happy, well-adjusted couple who are mindful of the happiness of others.
Disappointed
Mr. and Mrs. Bennet are decidedly not happy. Surely attraction brought them together, but shared values and compatibility are missing which makes for an unsuitable marriage. He copes by using his droll sense of humor to tease and belittle his wife and daughters (all save Lizzy), and by withdrawing to his library to avoid taking responsibility for his family’s future. Mrs. Bennet is described as “a woman of mean understanding, little information, and uncertain temper. When she was discontented, she fancied herself nervous. The business of her life was to get her daughters married.” Shared values have not found a home with the Bennet’s, leading to an incompatible home life in which surely Mr. Bennet is the disappointed party. Thankfully, the marriage of three daughters over the course of a year relieved some of the vexation from Mrs. Bennet’s life but I doubt it made them any more compatible or him any less disappointed in his choice of a wife.
Satisfied
I couldn’t overlook the marriage of Mr. and Mrs. Collins so I was forced to create a new category just for them. As annoying as Mr. Collins could be, Charlotte realized exactly what she signed up for when she married him, and she wisely set about establishing a relationship that encouraged him to pursue his interests which provided her more time for herself. “When Mr. Collins could be forgotten, there was really a great air of comfort throughout, and by Charlotte’s evident enjoyment of it, Elizabeth supposed he must be often forgotten.” While Mr. Collins was no doubt happy, Charlotte was well satisfied.
Sense and Sensibility
Happy
John and Fanny Dashwood seem the height of compatibility and shared values so surely, they qualify as happy. They are selfish, self-centered, grasping, insensitive, and thoroughly self-absorbed. They and their child are the center of the universe, and they justify any behavior, no matter how unkind, if it serves to support their own financial gain and social status. In settling on giving the Dashwood’s 500 pounds a year amongst the four of them, Fanny heartlessly asserts “what on earth can four women want for more than that? They will live so cheap! Their housekeeping will be nothing at all. They will have no carriage, no horses, and hardly any servants; they will keep no company and can have no expenses of any kind! Only conceive how comfortable they will be.” Perhaps the only thing to vex them is the marriage of Robert Ferrars to Lucy Steele who is equally self-serving, and the delicate family balance is disrupted due to the ill-will between Fanny and Lucy.
Disappointed
Sir John and Lady Middleton qualify for this category. He is amiable, jovial, outgoing, and oblivious to the feelings of others but seems to enjoy great felicity in life; he even likes his mother-in-law, Mrs. Jennings. Lady Middleton appears to be a less than compatible companion. Her only enjoyment appears to come primarily from the attention paid to her children no matter how misbehaved they may be. It’s difficult to imagine that this is a match made in heaven but far more likely one of financial advantage. Shared values and compatibility are not visible, and one imagines Lady Middleton is often importuned by her jovial husband’s insensible behavior. The same could be said for Lady Middleton’s sister, Mrs. Palmer, except that it is her husband who is continually importuned by his wife’s loquacious silliness. Lady Middleton and Mr. Palmer are the disappointed parties in this novel.
Persuasion
Happy
One cannot help but find Admiral and Mrs. Croft an endearing couple who seem compatible in every way and live life to the fullest thanks to attraction and shared values. “How many days was it, my dear, between the first time of my seeing you, and our sitting down together in our lodgings at North Yarmouth?” “We better had not talk about it, my dear,” replied Mrs. Croft, pleasantly; for if Miss Elliot were to hear how soon we came to an understanding she would never be persuaded that we could be happy together.” This description of their brief courtship, as well as their adventurous life together on board the ships in his command, and their loving concern for the happiness of her brother, Captain Wentworth, all display felicity in marriage and a kind regard for others.
Disappointed
Happiness in the marriage of Charles and Mary Musgrove is limited by her narcissism. Much like her father and eldest sister, Mary is consumed with her own needs and expects those around her to follow suit. While perhaps not as vain as Sir Walter or Elizabeth, she is preoccupied with her family’s social status and looks down on suitors of the Musgrove sisters based on her elevated sense of herself. Her husband maintains his equanimity by pursuing his own interests in hunting and raising dogs and ignoring his wife’s self-centered demands for attention. Compatibility is unachievable and shared interests are limited to their two children. Even his family expressed disappointment that Charles married Mary after Anne refused him.
Mansfield Park
Happy
Sir Thomas and Lady Bertram enjoyed what must be considered a happy marriage. He was captivated by a pretty woman with “tranquil feelings, and a temper remarkably easy and indolent,” who bore him two sons and two daughters. With such a wife there can be little discord, so it is safe to assume they were very compatible, and that she shared his values as she probably had no opinions of her own that she held dearly, and “his rank, a handsome house, and a large income made for a very tolerable life.” The primary dissonance they faced had to do with the self-indulgence of their oldest son with a penchant for living beyond his means, not to mention bad behavior on the part of their daughters.
Disappointed
One need only read the opening of this story to realize that Fanny Price’s parents were not happily married. “Miss Frances married, in the common phrase, to disoblige her family, and by fixing on a Lieutenant of Marines, without education, fortune, or connections,” she thoroughly alienated her family. The very fact that their impoverished life forced them to send away their oldest daughter to the care of Mrs. Price’s married sister, Lady Bertram, is indicative of the poor choice she made in choosing a husband. When Fanny is sent home to reconsider her refusal to marry Henry Crawford, she encounters parents who have little to offer. Her father was “more negligent of his family, his habits were worse, and his manners coarser than she had been prepared for...he swore and he drank, he was dirty and gross.” As for her mother, she had “neither leisure nor affection to bestow on Fanny.” Here is an example of a marriage that was initially based on attraction but if they ever had enjoyed shared values or compatibility, it was overthrown by poverty. It seems that they were both disappointed in life.
Emma
Happy
Who could be more self-satisfied with their happy match made in Bath than the Mr. and Mrs. Elton? In Emma’s misguided effort to play matchmaker for her friend, Harriet, she mistook Mr. Elton’s ingratiating intentions towards herself. Having been scorned by Emma, he takes solace in Bath and returns with a new wife who is impertinent, egotistical, brash, and eager to usurp Emma as a leader in local society. She is such a suitable choice because her husband shares her values with an equally inflated view of his own attributes and station in life. There is no reason to doubt they will enjoy felicity in marriage except, perhaps, if he tires of hearing about the small size of their home or their lack of a carriage, for you may depend on Mrs. Elton to continue expounding on her standard of living at Maple Grove.
Disappointed
The marriage of John and Isabella Knightly may have had its challenges because she shared the same hypochondriac tendencies as her father, Mr. Woodhouse. She had a “general benevolence of temper” like her father but she “was delicate in her own health, over-careful of that of her children, had many fears and many nerves.” Though it may not have been an unhappy marriage, after all they had five children, but it resides in this category because she may have tried her husband’s patience by being rather high maintenance as was her father.
Northanger Abbey
Happy
Our introduction to the parents of Catherine Moreland indicates that the key ingredients for happiness are in place. Her father was a respected clergyman with two good livings and her mother was “a woman of good sense, with a good temper and a good constitution” who bore her husband ten children. There was no pressure on their children to be accomplished and the parents provided the education; writing and accounts by her father and French by her mother who “wished to see her children everything they ought to be.” Surely this is an example of two compatible parents with shared values, concerned for the best interests of their children. Their interest in the welfare of Catherine is established when they allow her to travel with neighbors to enjoy new experiences and entertainments available in Bath. When she returns after being abruptly dismissed from Northanger Abbey, they embrace her with tenderness and when Henry Tilney pursues Catherine and asks for her hand, they are wise enough to insist the young people wait in hopes of getting the blessing of General Tilney for the match. They were like-minded and loving which bodes well for marital happiness.
Disappointed
Although she is deceased and we have no way of knowing, surely General Tilney’s wife must have been very unhappy being married to such a malignant narcissist as evidenced by the fear his children experience living with him and his churlish behavior towards Catherine when he dismisses her from his estate in the middle of the night. No one could be happily married to such a man.
Can we evaluate Jane Austen’s views on marriage based on her novels? The characters in her stories are created as plot devices to help drive the narrative so they don’t necessarily reflect her views. They may be composites of people with whom she was acquainted, and she was an adroit observer of people and the times in which she lived.
The importance of wealth is a theme that highlights the need for eligible young women to have suitable dowries. The Bennet sisters in Pride and Prejudice along with the Dashwood sisters in Sense and Sensibility have limited prospects because of this. Mrs. Austen shared these concerns for her two daughters although neither sister married. Cassandra was engaged but financial concerns prevented her from marrying right away only to have her fiancé die later. Jane accepted a proposal that would have brought wealth and security to her family but was unable to enter a loveless marriage knowing she would surely be disappointed in her life if she did.
Women had little agency and were at the mercy of the men who had financial responsibility for them. Fanny in Mansfield Park and Jane Fairfield in Emma are examples of women who lacked agency over their own fates. Jane and Cassandra experienced the same situation when their father died, and they became dependent on the generosity of their brothers to survive and moved from place to place until they finally settled at the cottage in Chawton.
Women could be forced into marriage such as the ward of Colonel Brandon’s father who was obliged to marry his older brother while he was sent away to military service. She abandoned the marriage and died leaving behind a daughter who in turn was seduced and abandoned.
Jane reveals the challenges that women faced in her time and that marriage was not necessarily a matter of falling in love and living happily ever after In Regency times, but we can still enjoy our own fantasies that our favorite heroines are happy rather than disappointed in their marriages.
Comments