In Eighteenth-century Europe, women believed that marriage was only to increase family wealth or to gain social class. In the novel Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen, two sisters, Elinor and Marianne, find people they love but soon after the sisters realize that their love interest is already engaged or were already obligated to a promised family engagement. In the Regency Era, traditionally families would see marriage more as a business deal rather than a choice to join together in love thus leading to secrecy in the relationships (Teachman 54). Whether the attachment was a man or a woman looking for an increase of income, many valued the business deal while some valued love.
Austen believes that marriage should be with someone you love and care about deeply, not about sticking to society’s ideas of proper etiquette of social/monetary gain. Austen explores the idea of when trying to be the most pristine couple, one may surprisingly discover the heartache of a secret engagements. This form of secrecy is not good and goes against the ideal standards of proper etiquette. Austen creates two characters, Elinor and Marianne, to show the effects and uses their relationships, secrecy and marrying for money has on two completely contrasting personalities.
Austen’s characters Elinor and Marianne are complete opposites, Elinor is extremely sensible, thinking of the practical things and holds the ideals of proper etiquette in relationships. While Marianne is on the high end of the sensibility scale, she believes firmly that one should be directed by feelings, not logic, and she doesn’t quite meet the standards of proper etiquette. Though Elinor and Marianne would both rather marry for love than wealth, Austen contrasts the two’s values in courtship to prove that the marriage values of her society are wrong and trying to live up to those ideals leads to secrecy in relationships.
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The idea of marriage in the 1800s was that the eldest son inherited everything, the estate, and the fortune, therefore someone would want to marry the oldest son. When being the eldest son needed to ensure that he followed the exact rules and boundaries his parents set for him or else he would be disinherited. When looking for a wife, he needed to have polite manners and correctly present himself, as well as consider the parents’ approval of the person of interest. Wilkes writes that while the men are searching for the right woman the “young ladies must guard their reputations at all times” (118).
With this guarding of reputation, it could eventually mislead the men and prevent the women from ever revealing their true personalities, hindering the opportunity of social interactions to solidify possible relationships (Wilkes 118). Penelope Joan Fritzer’s book “Social Intercourse” helps identify the influence that social interactions have on building a relationship. Fritzer states, “In Austen’s time much social life consisted necessarily of visits and talk, and one’s conduct and conversation were of significant consequence” (52). This can prove that just by the way an individual communicates with others, they can draw attention to themselves potentially helping and/or hurting them.
Fritzer argues that if you find your certain someone then your true personality will come out. Austen uses this technique to ultimately reveal that some of her characters have found their one love even if they do not get engaged to them. For example, Marianne was completely head over heels for Willoughby, they hung out together all of the time talking and displaying her true identity to him. Elinor, influenced by the ideals of her society, the perfect example of sense and proper etiquette, thinks that Marianne is being too open with Willoughby, and that “this generosity [is] overstrained, considering her sister’s youth, and urged the matter farther, but in vain; common sense, common care, common prudence was all sunk in Mrs. Dashwood’s romantic delicacy” (Austen 63).
Marriage was incredibly important to young ladies as it could destroy or secure future contentment, and to Austen, the importance of marriage could be considered three different ways. First, in terms of marriage and its importance to society, the importance to the individual had, as well as its importance in terms of morality and virtue. In Sense and Sensibility, marriage is important as a means of socioeconomic mobility, the upward or downward movement of an individual’s social class or economic level to another. For example, Willoughby goes the connection he has with Marianne and marries Miss Grey simply for her money to help him remain relevant and in high status in their society.
Austen’s exploration of morality and proper etiquette of marriage and as a social contract that affects the wider community, asocial influence so powerful it causes couples that marry for love to conduct their relationship in secret. Marriage in Sense and Sensibility is not all about love. It’s often more about wealth, uniting families, and gaining social standing. It is even common for the extended family and parents to decide engagement matches, as much as or more than the individual. This novel Sense and Sensibility started to open up the eyes of the European society by introducing that marrying for love rather than money was acceptable. This disapproval of marrying for love does eventually lead to secret engagements whether that was for the safety of the couple or the safety of their inheritance.
An important relationship depicted in Sense and Sensibility are those between parents and children; Austen seeks to redefine the commonly accepted conventions of familial obligation and duty by implying that children must break free from their family’s expectations to find their happiness. For example, being the eldest son would need to follow the exact rules and boundaries your set for him by his parents or else he would be disinherited (Wilkes). When looking for a wife he would need to have polite manners and correctly present himself as well as consider his parents’ approval of the person he wanted to marry (Wilkes). If a parent doesn’t approve of the couple, they would tend to make the attachment a secret until the person in charge of their inheritance passed away. Take Lucy and Edward for example, Edward felt like he loved Lucy and at the time of their engagement, yet he knew that because they were so young his mother would not approve of their marriage leading the couple into a secret engagement.
“Four years engaged… and heaven knows how much longer we may have to waist… because you must know of what importance it is to us, not to have it reach his mother; for she would never approve of it, I dare say. I shall have no fortune, and I fancy she is an exceedingly proud woman” (Austen 95-96)
When Mrs. Ferrars, Edward’s mother, finds out about their engagement she became enraged because she only cares about her son’s wealth and socioeconomic status. Though Mrs. Ferrars does not care if Edward loves Lucy, she demands him to cut all ties with her and tries to influence the decision of whom her son will marry. She then seems to think that the decision of whom Edward will marry is her choice to make for him. Because the marriages are more about their whole family than about their desires, mothers tend to think they have the right to force their children to marry the person that they seem most fit. However, this theory of men needing to follow a specific rule and social etiquette to find the woman that he would like to marry causes parental influence to put a damper on the prosses of accepting marriage out of love.
Austen herself does not support the idea of secrecy in relationships, her views on proper etiquette involving marriage in her society were shown by the complete outbreak of the two main characters, Elinor and Marianne when told terrible news about their intended loves. Traditionally families would see marriage more as a business deal rather than a choice to join together in marriage out of love (Teachman). This caused many in that era to begin asking themselves what they wanted for themselves out of their relationships, to marry for wealth or marry because of love and attraction (Teachman). Jane Austen often shows this idea when talking about her two main characters and explains the reasoning for her character’s actions. Elinor is the character that does believe in love in marriage, just not as extreme as Marianne. Marianne thinks that you will only have one love in your entire life.
This belief of only having one love and marring that person was frowned upon in the time of the Regency Era. While many people in the novel often marry for reasons other than love (Willoughby and Miss Grey), Elinor and Marianne ultimately do end up marrying for love. For Marianne, this means redefining her notion of love and allowing herself to develop affection for her new love Connell Brandon. While Austen hints that her society views marriage often as economics, she depicts those relationships of love. Through her main characters, Marianne and Elinor prove to Austen’s society that marriage does not necessarily have to be this way, that marriages can also be for love. Marriage brings families together, creates new family units and, it can create strong and lasting bonds of familial love.
As a middle ground between the economically motivated marriage and marriage for love Austen gives us examples of both, Willoughby and Miss Grey (money), Marianne and Colonel Brandon (love). Austen’s idea that only “money can only give happiness where there is nothing else to give” backs up her view that marriage for love it the better option and she supports that (53). The engagements of Marianne and Elinor have elements of true love and romance which exposes Austen’s favoritism towards marriage for love. Though in Regency England it is common for people to marry for money, Austen has developed a new type of female character and a new view on marriage hoping to inspire the young women in her society (Uphaus).
Austen introduces this unique, different, and advanced view of the female voice through her characters, which encourage belittled women to read her novel and be inspired by it. Austen’s exploration of morality and proper etiquette of marriage as a social contract affects the community, causing couples that wish to marry for love to be secretive. Marriage was incredibly important to young ladies as it could destroy or secure their future contentment. In the novel Sense and Sensibility, marriage is no longer seen as only caring about one’s wealth and socioeconomic status, now a new view of marriage is portraited equally as important, a new outlook on marring, one for love.
References
- Austen, Jane, and Claudia L. Johnson. Sense and Sensibility: Authoritative Text, Contexts, Criticism. New York: W.W. Norton, 2002. Print.
- Fritzer, Penelope Joan. “Social Intercourse.” Jane Austen and Eighteenth-Century Courtesy Books, 1979. pp.51-80.
- Teachman, Debra. Understanding pride and prejudice: a student casebook to issues, sources, historical documents. ABC Cleo.
- Uphaus, Robert W. ‘Jane Austen and Female Reading.’ Critical Insights: Austen, Jane, edited by Jack Lynch, Salem, 2010. Salem Online.
- Wilkes, Sue. A Visitor’s Guide to Jane Austen’s England. Pen & Sword History, 2014. EBSCOhost.
