Name::- Sneha Agravat
Batch:- 2020-22 (MA sem 1)
Paper 3:- (Literature of Romantic period)
Topic name:- A comparison between Pride and Prejudice and Pamela
Roll no.:-17
Enrollment no.:-3069206420200001
E-mail Id :- snehaagravat2000@gmail.com
Submitted to:- S.B.Gardi Department Of English Maharaja krishnkumarsinhji Bhavngar University
Introduction:-
In a social context of gender and classrepression (and oppression), Jane Austen managed to tell her story and the story of women in a way that still nowadays is controversial and a matter of study. How could she do that in a world ruled my men? As Anne Elliot states in Persuasion, “men have had every advantage of us in telling their own story. Education has been theirs in so much higher a degree; the pen has been in
their hands” (Austen [1813] 2012, 276). How did Jane Austen portray women and their situation? Which influences did she have and how did she use them? Is there a difference in the treatment of women, their portrayal and the portrayal of their situation in the works of a male and a female writer and, in particular, is there a difference in the way Richardson and Austen portray women? This study will focus on the way Richardson and Austen portray women and their situation in Pamela and Pride and Prejudice, in the differences that can be established in their portrayal and the motives and purposes behind them. It will also focus on the influence that Richardson had in Austen and in which senses she used this influence, the influence of a man writing about women, to portray women in her novels.
First we talk about Samuel Richardson and his Pamela:-
Samuel Richardson A man telling stories about women Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded was Samuel Richardson’s first published novel in 1740 and it had an immediate great success. It is an epistolary novel that comprises mostly the letters from Pamela (a young maiden) to her parents about the misfortunes and trials that she has to endure and overcome after her Mistress’s death and the following attacks and abuses of her former Mistress’s son, Mr. B. He is presented as an abusive, tyrannical Master that is obsessed with having Pamela and “ruining” her. Pamela will defend her virtue and innocence to the extent of almost committing suicide; and it is her goodness and virtue what will, by the end of the novel, be rewarded by Mr. B’s reformation and their following marriage, really advantageous to Pamela economically and socially speaking. There is a diversity of opinions from scholars about Pamela’s rebellious behaviour and the reasons behind it. Some of them consider Pamela as a revolutionary novel because of Pamela’s behaviour to her master when he intends to abuse her, and others see Pamela as a subordinated woman who only rebels for religious purposes and who,once married, is completely submissive to her husband. Pamela rebels against class and gender oppressions in order to maintain her virtue, as she considers God’s Will superior to her Master’s. According to Jocelyn Harris,“Pamela teaches Mr B. that there is an ordering of duties. According to the domestic conduct books which Richardson knew well, a Christian first duty should be to God’s laws, his second to himself, and his third to social relations such as that between master and servant” (1987, 30). Harris also states that “an outsider by birth, education and profession, Richardson found common cause with women in a world that needed change. Employing forms familiar to them, letters and tales of courtship and marriage, he urged his readers to train their powers of reason and morality by debating the issues.of his novels”.
Margaret Doody considers Pamela “revolutionary,” precisely because of Pamela’s rebellious behaviour to her master: “In defending her virginity so vigorously, Pamela, the first important English heroine to actually work for her living, rebels against the social attitudes which dictated that lower-class girls were not supposed to set a value on themselves.
So, what is Richardson’s purpose for making his heroine rebel (at the beginning of the novel) against her Master, a man and her superior in terms of class? Is he trying to denounce the oppressive and repressive situation of women or is he trying to make a religious defence of the principles of morality, virtue and innocence? We can think of Pamela as a heroine that rebels against gender and class oppression or as a “selfless, sexless woman” (LeGates 1976, 23) exhibiting obedience to her master. This contradiction could perhaps be explained by Richardson’s purpose when writing the novel. Was it to denounce the situation of women or to exemplify a model of Christian virtue, innocence and duty to instruct his readers? The clue to solve this contradiction may be the change of attitude in Pamela, from rebellion to obedience,
once Mr B. goes from being her tyrannical Master to her beloved husband.
His portrayal of womanhood in Pamela Women are variously characterized in Pamela. They are praised for their modesty,prudence, humility, virtuosity, etc. As Pamela explains by the beginning of the novel, Mrs Jervis is pleased at her for her “prudence” and “modesty:” “and told me that she was very well pleased to see my prudence and modesty, and that I kept all the fellows at a distance”. When women are criticized it is for being artful, hypocrite, not submissive or rebellious. “’O the little hypocrite!’ said he; ‘she has all the arts of her sex; they werebborn with her.”. Pamela is criticized, especially by Mr B., when she is rebellious and decides not to please him and be submissive.
Let's see Pride and Prejudice novel by Jane Austen:-
Jane Austen and feminism:-
Jane Austen is considered a feminist in the sense that she places women in an epistemological key position; her stories are focalized through a woman’s gaze. Austen makes emphasis on the social differences and inequalities between men and women, and how women are placed in a much inferior, less advantageous position. Even if all her heroines end up getting married, and marriage could seem the main goal of the narrative, there has to be aldifference established between the “story” and Austen’s ‘discourse’. As Robyn Warhol states, “in Austen, the interplay between story, in which the independent heroine must, as some critics have it, ‘swindle into a wife’, and discourse, through which traditional power relationships can be subverted, carries important implications for feminist literary theory” (1996, 22).
Brown also raises questions about whether marriage can be seen as a “narrative goal” in her novels or whether “her satiric treatment of love and marriage in some works . . . does arise from the feminist’s skepticism, not about sex and marriage per se, but about the way in which both have functioned in the woman’s identity? (1973, 324). We could conclude that Austen, apparently writing stories where all her heroines end up happily marrying, which actually seems to be the goal of the narrative, raises questions.about the situation of women, the inequalities between gender and the oppression and repression that women suffered. As Brown states “Jane Austen’s treatment of marriage in her work is best understood in relation to her skepticism about male definitions of female emotions, sexuality, education and modesty” (1973, 336).
In Pride and Prejudice, Elizabeth ends up getting married to Mr Darcy, so, she actually “swindles into a wife” (Warhol 1996, 22), but throughout the novel we can see her opinions about different matters concerning the situation of women. Elizabeth is, in fact, an intelligent heroine, mostly praised because of her intelligence and her “quickness” and it is this intelligence and her capacity of expressing her opinions what makes Mr Darcy fall in love with her. Many questions regarding women and their place in society are presented in Pride and Prejudice: the problem of inheritance for women, the need of getting married, the education of women, the high expectations and many attributes that a woman must possess to be ‘accomplished’, etc. As we have mentioned, Elizabeth Bennett states her own point of view (that perhaps we could see as similar to Austen’s) in every one of these aspects. Jane Austen makes use of her characteristic irony toemphasize these controversial questions and satirizes the traditional descriptions of women in order to denounce, or at least make the reader notice existing class and gender oppressions. Her portrayal of womanhood in Pride and Prejudice In the very first chapter of Pride and Prejudice we can see Mr Bennett praising Elizabeth because she “has something more of quickness than her sisters” who he classifies as “silly,” “ignorant” and “vain.” This pattern will be repeated throughout the whole novel:On the other hand, Elizabeth, who has been already described as “quick” by her own father is described by Mr Darcy on their first encounter as “tolerable; but no handsome enough” (12). However, he soon starts taking notice of her: “he began to find it [her face] uncommonly intelligent by the beautiful expression of her dark eyes”
We can see that the first positive adjective that he uses to describe her is “intelligent.”Manyinstances of the situation of inequality between men and women are to be found in Pride and Prejudice. The problem with the Bennet’s state, to be inherited by Mr Collins
rather than by the daughters, the incapacity of women to be more or less independent without a father or a husband, etc. As Mrs Bennet states at the beginning of the novel, it is impossible for her and her daughters to go visit Mr Bingley without Mr Bennet’s presence: “Indeed you must go, for it will be impossible for us to visit him, if Mrs Bennet’s obsession with marrying her five daughters, which is the main goal of her life, speaks for the necessity of young women to get married, especially if not from a high social class, to avoid being left with nothing after their father’s death.We can see Elizabeth’s own opinion on the matter of marriage after turning down
Mr Collins’s proposal, even when really advantageous for her. She does not accept Mr.Collins’s proposal because she knows he would not make her happy (regardless of the convenience of the marriage for the family.
Comparison between both novels:-
Similarities in the treatment of women and feminine characters in Pride and Prejudice and Pamela:-
Some similarities can be found between the protagonists of Pamela and Pride and Prejudice. Pamela rebels against the oppressions of her abusive and tyrannical master and Elizabeth does it against social and gender oppression, she finds a way of stating her opinion on those matters affecting the inequality of women. As for the plot of the novels, there are also some similarities in the lives of our protagonists. They both end up falling in love and marrying the men that they hated at the beginning of the novel, men that are superior to them in social class and that consequently turn out to be really advantageous marriages for both of them. Obviously, their situation is very different too: Pamela is Mr B.’s servant and he actually tries and almost gets to abuse her, she is even abducted against her will by him, she is oppressed almost to the point of committing suicide. The situation between Darcy and Elizabeth is, by far, not similar to that. Taking into account this major difference, they both end up marrying for love, we see how their feelings towards the men change radically throughout the novel and how they both end up with very advantageous marriages. To get to that marriage, Pamela and Elizabeth both turn down a first proposal of marriage that was also very convenient for them. Pamela turns down the proposal of Mr Williams because of her parents, because she wants to go back to them, and because she considers herself too young to get married. As for Elizabeth we have already seen that she turns down Collins for the sake of her happiness. They have different reasons, but at the end they both turn down proposals made by men that they don’t love and that would be very convenient for them. They both have to confront a powerful, superior woman related to their present (in the case of Pamela) or future (in the case of Elizabeth) husband that is against the marriage. Lady Davers (Mr. B.’s sister) and Lady Catherine DeBourgh (Darcy’s aunt) both use their power to confront Pamela and Elizabeth. Lady Davers tries to make Pamela confess about her marriage with Mr B. and Lady Catherine DeBourgh tries to dissuade Elizabeth from marrying Mr Darcy. Neither Pamela nor Elizabeth are intimidated by the powerful women and they maintain their positions and opinions. Plenty of instances of class and gender inequality can be found in both novels. We have seen in both novels how some situations can be very different for men and for women: virtue and the importance to maintain it in Pamela and economic independence in Pride and Prejudice.
Richardson and Austen both acknowledge the inequalities women suffered, mostly women of a low social class; and in different ways and perhaps for different purposes they make the readers notice these inequalities and oppressions.
Differences in the treatment of women and feminine characters in Pride and Prejudice and Pamela :-
The main difference that can be found between Pamela and Pride and Prejudice as for their portrayal of women is the way they are described and the attributes they are praised or criticised for. As we have seen, in Pamela women are praised for being virtuous, modest and innocent; and in Pride and Prejudice they are praised for being.intelligent, for their quickness or liveliness of mind. The attributes for which women are praised in Pamela are clearly passive attributes, related to the Christian doctrine, whereas the best characteristics attributed to women in Pride and Prejudice imply activity. As we have seen, Mr B. and Darcy fall in love with Pamela and Elizabeth precisely because of these attributes, virtue and intelligence respectively. What is particularly different in the situation of these two couples after their marriage is the way women behave to their husbands. Once married, Pamela becomes a submissive wife, accepts everything her husband says and does everything in her power to please him. On the other hand, Elizabeth’s character does not change after marriage, she keeps being challenging to Darcy.This statement of Mary actually comprises the thesis of Richardson’s Pamela: how important it is to preserve the virtue and how unequal it is to men and women. Even if Mary’s idea of virtue and its importance is equal to the one that Richardson exposes in Pamela, Elizabeth’s answer to Mary’s statement could say something about Austen’s real opinion on the subject: “Elizabeth lifted up her eyes in amazement, but was too much oppressed to make any reply. Mary, however, continued to console herself with such kind of moral extractions from the evil before them” (290). Elizabeth (and perhaps Austen herself) is “amazed” at Mary’s statement; this amazement could be due to the particular situation the family was suffering in that moment. However, we could also consider it as Austen’s own opinion on the subject of virtue in women. As we will see in the following section, it is known that Austen was a reader and admirer of Richardson and perhaps this opinion of Mary could be a direct reference to Pamela, because of how exactly it describes the main idea of Richardson’s novel. What could be established as the major difference between the two novels is the purpose that the authors had when writing them. They both seem to focus their novels on the situation of women, the oppression they suffered and the existing inequalities between men and women as well as between social classes. However, what was their purpose?The purpose behind Richardson’s Pamela clearly seems to be educational or instructive. This idea can be extracted from the subtitle of the novel itself: Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded (my emphasis). Pamela seems to be a model of conduct for young girls to follow: if they remain virtuous and innocent against all temptations and dangers, they will be rewarded as Pamela is rewarded by marrying her reformed oppressor. Actually, Richardson himself makes clear his purpose in the title page of the novel:
“Published in order to cultivate the principles of virtue and religion in the minds of the
youth of both sexes.”According to Blanchard “Richardson intended his work to be an engaging source of education and edification, and the enthusiastic response that he received indicates thathe achieved his goal” (2011, 93). Richardson accomplishes the function of entertaining as well as of instructing. Pamela could be compared to a conduct book or to devotional literature because of its main purpose, to defend the values of Christianity and provide a model of conduct that acts according to it: “Pamela permits readers to enjoy the attractions both of fiction and of devotional literature at the same time and in the same work” (Watt 1967, 152). The
ultimate goal in Richardson is, then, religious, devotional and instructive.
Conclusion:-
Although some similarities can be established between Samuel Richardson’s Pamela and Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice in the way they put forward and emphasize gender and class inequalities and the oppression suffered by women, their way of portraying women is very different.
Richardson characterizes and praises women for being virtuous, modest and innocent. For being, to sum up, passive and submissive and he only defends rebellious behaviours when told by God’s law. Richardson’s women don’t rebel to prove inequalities but to remain virtuous, they only rebel for religious purposes, and these same religious, doctrinal and instructive purposes are the ones that guided Richardson when writing his novel and his portrayal of women. On the other hand, Austen portrays her heroines as intelligent, able to observe and question their reality and the situation of injustice and inequality suffered by women. Austen’s women rebel to defend their own values and to protest against inequality, neither because of religious motives nor to be a model of conduct.
We could conclude that Richardson’s and Austen’s purposes when writing their novels and portraying women were very different. Richardson writes Pamela as a model of conduct, with the purpose of instructing young men and women. Austen, on the other hand, puts forward social and gender inequalities with the only purpose of making her readers aware of the situation. The main difference between both authors (besides the way they describe women, as we have already mentioned) is their purpose when writing their novels.
References:-
Austen, Jane (1993). Pride and Prejudice. Hertfordshire: Wordsworth Editions Limited. ISBN 9781853260001.
2)Richardson, Samuel (1740). Pamela; or, Virtue Rewarded (1st ed.). London: Messrs Rivington & Osborn.
3)“Speech Creatures’: New Men in ‘Pamela’ and ‘Pride and Prejudice.’” Bowlby Rachel, 2009, www.jstor.org/stable/43151922.
Word count:-3138
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