December 8, 2006

• Charlotte

  My tooth is much better after fussing with it all day and some super-duper fluoride rinse. Thanks for your concern! David and Michael return home from Florida tomorrow. It’s hard to believe that yet another week has gone by.  I spent some of the afternoon wrapping Christmas gifts, and I was pleased to discover that I have more for each child than I thought. Still, I have much to do, especially for the extended family.

  Tonight, TGD and  the Hunter head to a Penn State wrestling match.  LibbyK and I are planning to watch the 2005 version of Pride and Prejudice. She’s never seen any version of the real story. I’m looking forward to it!  Perhaps next week, we can start watching the A&E version. I’ve only seen it once, and that was many years ago.

  Speaking of Pride and Prejudice,  Mamaglop asked a wonderful question, “Here’s what I want to know:  for all her brave talk, was Charlotte happy in her marriage, or did she resign herself to being unhappy long before she married anyone?” 

  About how many of the husbands in your church or husbands of your friends do you say, “I don’t know how she could have married him! I certainly couldn’t have married him!”  I bet you might need more than one hand to count.  Yet, these people have happy marriages!  How can that be? 

  Mr. Collins is described well in Chapter 15.  (I’ve made the passage numbered by points for easier reading.)

  1. Mr. Collins was not a sensible man, and the deficiency of nature had been but little assisted by education or society.
  2. The greatest part of his life [had] been spent under the guidance of an illiterate and miserly father.
  3. Though he belonged to one of the universities, he had merely kept the necessary terms, without forming at it any useful acquaintance.
  4. The subjection in which his father had brought him up had given him originally great humility of manner.
  5. [His humility] was now a good deal counteracted by the self-conceit of a weak head, living in retirement, and the consequential feelings of early and unexpected prosperity.
  6. The respect which he felt for [Lady Catherine's] high rank and his veneration for her as his patroness, mingling with a very good opinion of himself, of his authority as a clergyman, and his rights as a rector,  made him altogether a mixture of pride and obsequiousness, self-importance and humility.
  
  It seems many of these faults might be mended by a wife. Charlotte seems a sensible sort, the type of person who would call a spade a spade, and a man puffed up in self-importance could not fail to be affected by that type of woman.  He would no longer be living in retirement, and his prosperity would not be so new and unexpected as the years wore on.  As to Lady Catherine, how many of our husbands have a boss or colleague who is prideful or irritating?  More than a few, I’d bet!
  
  Now, on to Charlotte.  I’ve not come across any real explanations of her yet (through Chapter 15–I’m keeping on track!), except that she belongs to a family of some size, is in her late 20s, and has sense.  Whether that sense is, as Elizabeth says, “not sound” (Chapter 6, “You know it is not sound, and that you would never act in this way yourself.”), stands to be seen.
  
  I think that my ideas of Charlotte changed even more in her favor after reading Melissa Senate’s modern-day Charlotte story in Flirting with Pride and Prejudice. In this excerpt, Charlotte and Elizabeth (both 30-something career women) are talking. Elizabeth confronts Charlotte about dating Willy Collins. 
  
  [Elizabeth] “But the point is they start our marrying someone they love–”
  “I can love a life,” [Charlotte] said. “I can love not sitting home on Valentine’s Day or New Year’s. I can love that I never have to hear my relative tell me how bad they feel that I’m all alone, that ‘my day will come, especially if I lose a few pounds and straighten my hair.’ I can love that my mother will stop sending clippings for singles dances.  I can love that I don’t have to feel like no one chose me. I can love that I’ll be engaged, married.  That the option of having a baby isn’t suddenly wrested away from me because I couldn’t find the guy.”
  
  Then later in the short story, Elizabeth says, “You know what I think, Charlotte? I think you compromised. But I don’t think you compromised yourself. There’s a big difference.”
  
  Is Collins annoying? Sure he is!  Is he irredeemable? I don’t think so.  Is Charlotte doomed to a life of misery?  Not necessarily. 
  
  We get a glimpse into their marriage when Elizabeth visits in Chapter 28. “She saw instantly that [Mr. Collin's] manners were not altered by his marriage; his formal civility was just what it had been, and he detained her some minutes at the gate to hear and satisfy his enquiries after all her family. [H]e addressed himself particularly to her, as if wishing to make her feel what she had lost in refusing him. But though every thing seemed neat and comfortable, she was not able to gratify him by any sigh of repentance; and rather looked with wonder at her friend that she could have so cheerful an air, with such a companion. When Mr. Collins said any thing of which his wife might reasonably be ashamed, which certainly was not unseldom, she involuntarily turned her eye on Charlotte. Once or twice she could discern a faint blush; but in general Charlotte wisely did not hear… To work in his garden was one of his most respectable pleasures; and Elizabeth admired the command of countenance with which Charlotte talked of the healthfulness of the exercise, and owned she encouraged it as much as possible.”
  
  In Elizabeth’s eye, he is not changed at all. She still can’t stand him. But, recall that every narrator, even the beloved Miss Bennet,  is biased.  Perhaps Charlotte is happier than Elizabeth wants to believe?

  PS-I got the BBW Christmas CD, Kristen, and like it very much. Since it was $10 and I had a coupon for anything up to $13 free with a $10 purchase, I got Warm Vanilla Sugar glitter spray for free. Thanks for the recommendation!

  
  

  • 4:48 pm
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