Georgette Heyer Fans discussion
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The Nonesuch
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The Nonesuch Oct 2019 Group Read Chapters 11-20
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Jenny, I agree, but on the other hand one presumes that in the Upper Ten Thousand or whatever, everyone was pretty well known about, at the least, beforehand, and quite a few of the folk one would meet during the Season one would probably have met beforehand (or your family would have), so I guess that reduced the risk a bit. Even so, it's still horrendous, the thought of a young girl having to make a decision at that stage of her life that she could NEVER undo, unless she ended up widowed.
Plus, since they'd all been marrying each other for generations, there must have been quite a lot of 'relatives' already, and in a way it was almost a giant 'extended family'.
There is this to be said in favor of arranged marriages, as awful as they seem to us...given that one has a normal parent, who genuinely cares for their child's happiness and wouldn't contract a marriage to a brutal man simply for profit, both parties go into it with very few expectations. The best they are hoping for is liking and respect, and where those exist, love can, with time grow. They might actually have been more likely to have successful marriages than those who "fell in love" during that all-too-brief Season.Tiffany...oh, Tiffany! I went to high school with a young lady who was very like her. She was beautiful, dear GOD, she was beautiful When she walked down the sidewalk, I've literally seen cars run off the side of the road. She came from a very wealthy family, was spoiled, over-indulged, headstrong and very, very sure of her own worth. She ran rough-shod over all the young men in our school. Then she went to college, and found out what the "real" world was like. Had a torrid affair with a professor, both had to leave the school. Came home, spent money like water, ran amok until she got pregnant. Married the guy, who ran the business that her father gave him into the ground. At last report, she was on husband #4, had six children, and was living in a trailer park.
I wonder if she is still beautiful...
Rebecca wrote: "Tiffany...oh, Tiffany! I went to high school with a young lady who was very like her. "Wow. Just wow. The mind boggles. o.O
Oh, Lordy, that is a sobering lesson for us all! I wonder how many of her school chums envied her at the time at school, and would have longed to have been her.....Sometimes 'having it all' is a curse and not a blessing.
The issue of 'beauty' is, again, I think two-edged. For the bulk of us, for whom beauty is more an aspiration than a possession (!), and who have to 'work' at it (my horror would be to live in an age where no make up at all was permissible! I absolutely NEED make up - not vast amounts of it, which rarely suits anyone anyway, but enough to tip the balance in my favour!)(well, when I was young, at least, now not even Polyfilla can do that!!! :) :) ), so for the 'average' female, I'm sure most of us would 'love' to be 'naturally beautiful'......
Yet it can, as the example Rebecca relates, be troublesome. I knew one 'naturally beautiful' girl who was perpetually 'plagued' by men! She told me it really did become a nuisance in the end, and she would play down her appearance and 'dress down' quite deliberately (not to much avail alas). Even when she had a steady boyfriend the other men still beelined for her. A bowl of jam to a swarm of wasps!
On the subject of beauty/lack of it and 'temperament', I'm sure I've read articles saying that research indicates that 'beautiful people' are 'nicer' people, and the explanation is that they are always welcomed wherever they go (well, by the opposite sex at least I guess!). Everyone is nice to them, so they are nice back.Yet, at the same time, we also all know the 'spoilt brat' (male or female!) syndrome whereby, like Rebecca's school friend (if she had 'real' friends that is...)(the spoilt beauty, not Rebecca!!!!), she just swanned around being God's Gift, etc, and therefore a total pain in the proverbial.
On a more politico-socio-philosophical note, I guess, sadly, that physical appearance is the 'last inequality'.....unless we manage to create a society in which everyone is exactly the same 'level of beauty' there is always going to be a degree of 'body fascism' I think.Humans do seem, sadly, but inevitably, to perpetually 'rank' each other on various scales, even if what constitutes 'good' or bad' ranking changes.
For female beauty, of course, the biggest change in the last hundred years has been the substitution of 'fat' for 'thin', with fat women lauded (eg, by Rubens and co) at a time when the majority of women/people in the world were undernourished, and of course the opposite now, where 'fat' is unhealthy (junk food obesity!) and 'thin' is not (or, perhaps, wasn't? It's great that increasingly 'thin' is not seen as 'good' and that being 'fit' is seen as good and healthy.)
'Happiness in marriage is entirely a matter of chance. If the dispositions of the parties are ever so well known to each other or ever so similar beforehand, it does not advance their felicity in the least. They always continue to grow sufficiently unlike afterwards to have their share of vexation; and it is better to know as little as possible of the defects of the person with whom you are to pass your life.' This speech of Charlotte Lucas/Collins always strikes me as very 'Wildean'....ie, deliberately perverse. I'm not sure it rings true with her character, and I feel Austen is just indulging herself (rather than her character) in clever and provocative wordplay (ie, just like Wilde does all the time!)
It's a bit disingenuous too, because, after all, five minutes in Mr Collins' company would have immediately shown that he was not, indeed, 'a sensible man'.
Though, that said, the whole issue of Charlotte's marriage is debateable - in many ways I think she made a 'good' choice. After all, Collins is an idiot, but he is not cruel, or selfish, or mean-spirited or bossy - he is goodnatured basically, and wants to 'do well'. He does not have faults of temperament, only of intelligence. I think he will do his best by his own lights, eg, to his servants and when he inherits Longbourn. In a way, Charlotte, I'm sure, will be the making of him! She will, as she is already doing, subtly and skilfully guide him along, letting him think he is coming up with her good notions himself, and will, probably, improve as time goes by, thanks to her.
I think he will make a fond, if fussy father, and all in all, both Charlotte, and their eventual children, could have done a lot worse.
Beauty is, indeed, two-edged! I never had to worry about that. My mother, NOT the most stable person I ever knew, once told me, "Work on your sense of humor and your personality, Darling. You'll never get by on your looks!" And the funny thing about that is (yes, I really do find it sadly funny), she NEVER understood why I refused to follow fashions, or wear makeup or get my hair done on a regular basis! I lived makeup free, and in jeans and tees or peasant tops.As for my "friend," well. Had she been born in Regency England, her father would have married her off to a man of good sense who would have known "how to handle her." I don't know that she'd have been any happier, but she almost certainly would have lived a more secure life. LOL, come to think of it, I may have been happier in the long run if my father had chosen my husband. My choice was far less than stellar, being based on "better take the offer, you may not get another one."
Rebecca wrote: "There is this to be said in favor of arranged marriages, as awful as they seem to us...given that one has a normal parent, who genuinely cares for their child's happiness and wouldn't contract a ma..."You make a very valid point, Rebecca; most parents want the best for their children. They want them to be happy and useful and content with their lives, and if they're intelligent parents, they also want a spouse for their children who will complement them, even complete them. They'll be careful in those who come calling.
There's a great song in Fiddler on the Roof where Tevya asks his wife Golde, "Do You Love Me?", after all the years of their arranged marriage. I think that although it seems to us that it's as though two strangers are marrying, in reality it's not the same thing; we're not taking into account those who are actually arranging the marriage, whether parents or marriage brokers. They're people who understand backgrounds, temperaments, and even wealth. Of course, they make mistakes, but I still think the predictor of good marriages is the goodness of the people involved, and if a lot of the miscellaneous irritations/expectations have been taken care of, maybe there is something to be said for it!
Rebecca wrote: "Beauty is, indeed, two-edged! I never had to worry about that. My mother, NOT the most stable person I ever knew, once told me, "Work on your sense of humor and your personality, Darling. You'll ne..."That made me laugh, probably because I identify with it; maybe that's why I'm considered so funny...
And as far as Tiffany and your beautiful "friend", I do have to wonder if the kids wouldn't fare better with a stable father, too!
Rebecca, your mum sounds like mine! :) :) :)I think the concept of an arranged marriage, where the parents want happiness for the couple, is not bad at all. Where the concept breaks down completely is when the parents are simply 'ambitious' for their children, or are obsessed, say, with 'marrying your cousin to keep the money in the family' or whatever.
In a way, a lot of marriages are 'de facto' arranged, with friends 'throwing two people together' etc'.
What I think is really really hard is for parents (or, indeed, friends) seeing someone fall for someone who is obviously going to be a disaster!
I think all wealthy families have to be very careful about how they bring their children up - If the parents are 'new money' then they can find it very hard if their children are next generation 'old money' (as in, they have grown up with it.)
In the world of GH, it could be really 'helpful' in that respect to own a family estate, because parents would raise their children to understand that the estate took priority - or, perhaps, to put it this way, as I once read (or might have come from Downton Abbey, come to that!) 'We borrow the estate from our grandchildren'....
'Happiness in marriage is entirely a matter of chance. If the dispositions of the parties are ever so well known to each other or ever so similar beforehand, it does not advance their felicity in the least. They always continue to grow sufficiently unlike afterwards to have their share of vexation; and it is better to know as little as possible of the defects of the person with whom you are to pass your life.'