Marriage system in Hard Times and Today

 Hello readers,

Today I'm going to discuss about marriage system with the reference of the novel "Hard Times" by Charles Dickens. This task is given by our professor Dr. Dilip Barad sir. So let's start… 

Introduction

Hard Times: For These Times [commonly known as Hard Times] is the tenth novel by Charles Dickens, first published in 1854. The book surveys English society and satirises the social and economic conditions of the era. Hard Times is unusual in several ways. It is by far the shortest of Dickens's novels, barely a quarter of the length of those written immediately before and after it. Also, unlike all but one of his other novels, Hard Times has neither a preface nor illustrations. 

Moreover, it is his only novel not to have scenes set in London. Instead the story is set in the fictitious Victorian industrial Coketown, a generic Northern English mill-town, in some ways similar to Manchester, though smaller. Coketown may be partially based on 19th-century Preston. 

◆Hard Times :-

Charles Dickens’s Hard Times deftly weaves a gripping narrative dealing with industrial growth, huddled human lives devoid of warmth and love; a persistent tussle between fact and fancy life and mechanisation, deteriorating familial relations between husbands and wives son/daughter and father friends turned relatives/strangers and crushed childhood, in a society based on Jeremy Bentham’s doctrine of Utilitarianism. Dickens shows the adverse effects of Utilitarianism on education as well as labour in Hard Times to critique this policy which focussed on 

“the greatest happiness for the greatest number”. 

The novelist, however, views it as extracting maximum output from labour at the cost of their health and similarly making ‘little vessels’, ‘little pitchers’ and ‘empty jars’ to be filled with facts only, thus completely neglecting and negating the spiritual and imaginative side of life that later results in the rudderless existence of the Gradgrind children Louisa and Tom and their subsequent disillusionment. 

This blog, however, limits its discussion to the issue of marriage and divorce during the Victorian era and Dickens’s concern for the poor labourers for whom seeking a divorce could never have been possible given the intricate processes and huge expenses. The paper specifically addresses Stephen Blackpool’s case to reflect how divorce was actually the privilege of the rich and not a right of the poor. James Eli Adams contends that the novel grapples with a grave “injustice, Stephen’s inability to divorce a drunken and dissolute wife who long since had abandoned him”. Apart from it, the case of Josiah Bounderby and Louisa would also be considered to highlight how even the rich in some circumstances could not have procured divorce. 

◆Marriage:-

A Statement on the Religious Morals of 19th Century British Society The Victorian era in England gave birth to the first real industrial society the world had ever seen. With the rise of industry came large cities, an expanded working class population and the rapid rise of imperialism. Although England was progressing towards a more powerful place in the world, its citizens seemed to be drifting in the opposite direction. Oppressive laws and working conditions set clear boundaries between classes in England. The most oppressive social and state laws were those regarding to marriages and divorces. Just as the people of England felt trapped in the unequal social structure of England, the same is true for those trapped in unwanted marital relations. Marriages were regulated by society and the government, therefore, making them more of a materialistic union than a holy or spiritual one. The marriages in Hard Times represent “industrial society” in England during the Victorian era and portray a separation of society from religion. Mr. Gradgrind ready to marry his daughter with his old friend mr. Bounderby, who was very rich. So, if we talk about today's perspective we find lot many example of that type of marriage when, a man is old and a girl bride is young. And all this happen because of money. People want money and money, for that they do anything ! We can assume that anything… 

The system of marriage is increase in 21st century. Parents gives permission to their daughter to marry whom they like. Measure of love marriage is now increase. The practice of monogamy, absence of widow remarriage lack of facility for easy divorce and chastity are regarded as important ideals now we see that changes have occurred in the institution of Hindu marriage, because of several factors such as urbanization, industrialization, secularization, modern education impact of Western culture, and marriage legislations; changes are taking place in Hindu ideals, forms and values of marriage.

◆Three pair of marriage :-

We find three pairs of couple in the novel,

1. Mr. Bounderby and Louisa

2. Stephen Blackpool and his wife 

3. Mr. And Mrs. Gradgrind

But, there are no happy marriages in Hard Times. In Stephen's case, it focuses instead on a missed opportunity for true companionship. In the case of the Gradgrinds, you've got an entirely intellectually unequal match where spouses are indifferent to each other. Then there's a loveless disaster where husband and wife grow to hate each other in the case of Louisa and Bounderby. The only happy unions are mythic, have occurred in the past, or are just barely implied, as in the case of the Jupes or Sissy and her eventual family. 

Marriage in the Victorian era was hardly an example of an equal partnership. When a woman got married, she gave up all her rights to her husband. The husband controlled all assets in the marriage, including any assets his wife may have had before the marriage. The three main marriages described in Hard Times are those between Louisa Gradgrind and Mr. Bounderby, Mr. and Mrs. Gradgrind, and Stephen Blackpool and his wife. None of these three marriages are loving or prosperous. The inequality in these marriages and the pain caused by them gives insight into the characteristics of real life marriages during this time. For example, the one marriage that affected Louisa’s upbringing the most was that between her parents. From the beginning of the novel, Mr. Gradgrind is described as, “A man of realities. A man of facts and calculations. A man who proceeds upon the principle that two and two are four, and nothing over, and who is not to be talked into allowing for anything over”. The reader sees him as a strong, intelligent, no nonsense figure. However, when Mrs. Gradgrind is described, she is described as the complete opposite of her husband. She is introduced as, “Mrs. Gradgrind, a little, thin, white, pink-eyed bundle of shawls, of surpassing feebleness, mental and bodily; who was always taking physic without any effect, and who, whenever she showed a symptom of coming to life, was invariably stunned by some weighty piece of fact tumbling on her”. Mr. and Mrs. Gradgrind’s marriage displays not only inequality, but also the first signs of incompatibility in a marriage in the book. Already in the novel, Mrs. Gradgrind is oppressed and even burdened by Mr. Gradgrind’s “fact” lifestyle. Mr. Gradgrind’s world of facts is essentially the basis of oppression in marriages during the 19th century.

◆Divorce:-

The fact was, once two people were joined in marriage, it was extremely difficult to get out. In Anne Humpherys’ “Louisa Gradgrind’s Secret: Marriage and Divorce in Hard Times”, she describes the processes of divorce in 19th century England: 

“As Bounderby makes clear to Stephen, divorce in 1854 was difficult, complicated, and costly”. 

The only "cause" for divorce was adultery, which for women suing had to be "aggravated" by incest or bigamy, though, in fact, legal separations were granted women for abandonment and cruelty. (There were only four full divorces granted women prior to 1857.) Three separate legal actions, including a bill in the House of Lords, were necessary. Legal separation ‘from bed and board’ was possible, but women in that position had no legal rights, nor a right to their own earnings, nor to custody of their children, nor could either party remarry”. Facts were the law. Just as Mr. Gradgrind’s facts were not to be disputed, the law was not to be broken. Any woman who violated the law could be punished by the society. It's one type of disappeared rule that once you got married you can not leave the home of your husband at any cost. In rural area we find that the parents tell their daughter that "your husband and his house is everything for you, if you are in trouble then solve it at your husband's home, now this is not your home, if want any help then tell us but, don't leave your husband's home, it's about our reputation". 

◆Mismatched Marriages:-

There are many unequal marriages in Hard Times, including those of Mr. and Mrs. Gradgrind, Stephen Blackpool and his unnamed drunken wife, and most pertinently, the Bounderbys. Louisa agrees to marry Mr. Bounderby because her father convinces her that doing so would be a rational decision. He even cites statistics to show that the great difference in their ages need not prevent their mutual happiness. However, Louisa’s consequent misery as Bounderby’s wife suggests that love, rather than either reason or convenience, must be the foundation of a happy marriage. In this 21st century we fine lot many example of mismatched marriages because a girl want to see her family happy and special her father and brother. So, they sacrifice her all aims and dreams to see her family happy. In many movie we can see that type of scenes that a girl is agree to marry someone only because her father said them to marry. 

Conclusion

So we can see that Stephen and Bounderby, the labourer and the mill owner, respectively represent diverse strands. The readers feel sympathy for the former and disgust for the latter. Stephen is virtuous, honest, and a man of principles and integrity; while Bounderby is full of vanity and deceit. Given the situation of both, Bounderby can pay the amount of divorce as he is rich and can enact a Private Act of Parliament; Stephen cannot as he is poor. However, Bounderby cannot get divorce as his wife has not committed adultery. Therefore, he can live separately as the Ecclesiastical Court would grant him permission but cannot remarry as the House of Lords would not permit it. Louisa also cannot find an escape from this “miserable marriage”. Stephen cannot even move to the Ecclesiastical Court as he cannot even pay the requisite amount as he has all the necessary grounds as his wife has committed adultery and is therefore, genuinely to be pitied for. It is quite evident here, after analysing the characters of both, Stephen and Bounderby, that Dickens pleads more the case of Stephen as he is a real victim despite being honest. As Efraim Sicher writes:

“Stephen performs the role of neo-Christian saint of forbearance and kindness, a martyr to the masters’ hardheartedness and criminal negligence, who maintains an all-too perfect moral integrity in the muddle of hypocritical laws made for the wealthy and privileged members of society”.

However, Dickens largely appeals for happy married lives as there is no use living with a person when life turns out to be a real hell devouring all happiness. It is for this reason that he dealt with the marriage laws in his Household Words and advocated lenient laws so that not only women but also men could find an escape from an otherwise caged existence. 

●Summary analysis :

1911 words 

Character study of Jude Fawley and Sue Bridehead

 Hello readers,

Today I'm going to discuss about two character Jude and Sue Bridehead of thomas Hardy's "Jude the Obscure". This activity is assigned by our professor dr. Dilip Barad sir. So let's start…

◆Author’s Biography◆

Thomas Hardy, English novelist and poet, was in born June of 1840. As the son of a local stonemason, he found himself without the family funds to pursue a formal education and left school at the age of sixteen. It was then that he endeavored to apprentice under a local architect; a talent that would see him go on to receive many accolades and eventually take him to London. 

Thomas Hardy 

However, despite enjoying a successful career, he often felt out of place in his new city, largely because of his astute awareness of how socially inferior he perceived himself to be. A large number of his poems and novels were influenced by Romanticism, and he had a particular fondness for anything akin to William Wordsworth. Despite having penned many novels, Hardy considered himself a poet above all else even though his first collection of poetry was not published until 1898, several years after he wrote his formative novels 

• Far from the Madding Crowd, 

• The Mayor of Casterbridge, 

• Tess of the d’Urbervilles and 

• Jude the Obscure.

The vast majority of his literary works focus on tragedy, telling the tale of disadvantaged characters who battle social circumstances and, of course, love. As a Victorian cum modernist novelist, Hardy is preoccupied with depicting the reality of the time for which he wrote. One major motif that runs through the modern narrative is disillusionment. Ayo Kehinde (2005) rightly posits that the modern novel is  characterised by the tone of disillusionment and awash with alienation, despair, cruelty, absurdity, urban terrorism, crime, pain, dissonance, espionage, poverty, dislocation, disintegration, famine, frustration, anarchy, misogyny, betrayal, nihilism, isolation, dehumanisation and all forms of anomie. Thus, the tone of the modern novel, like Hardy’s Jude the Obscure, is pessimistic and jeremiad as a result of multiple challenges that human race struggles with. 

●Summary of the novel :

◆Jude the Obscure◆

Jude the Obscure did not receive critical acclaim from the public, and this was largely due to the strong nature of sex, religion and marriage. More importantly, it was considered to be an attack on the institution of marriage and caused stress in his own struggling relationship as his wife felt it was autobiographical in nature. Many booksellers are reported to have sold the book in brown paper bags, it is even believed that the Bishop of Wakefield set his copy on fire. Of course, Hardy saw this as humorous and has been quoted as saying, 

“After these hostile verdicts from the press its next misfortune is to be burnt by a bishop probably in his despair to not being able to burn me.” 

Jude the Obscure is a portrayal of the fractured world. It presents the narrator’s world set in within the madding crowd. In this novel, “we find carried to the furthest extreme conflicts which have been gaining in definition and momentum as Hardy’s novels have continued: the self - estrangement of the individual, the clash with social institutions and, emerging out of this clash, an increasingly sharp sense of the needs of the present time”. It is in line with the foregoing that this study investigates the trope of disillusionment in Hardy’s Jude the Obscure. 

●Here is video about the review of the novel :

Jude Fawley:- 

The novel’s protagonist, a poor orphan who is raised by his great-aunt after his parents divorced and died. Jude dreams of attending the university at Christminister, but he fails to be accepted because of his working class background. He is a skilled stonemason and a kindly soul who cannot hurt any living thing. Jude’s “fatal flaw” is his weakness regarding alcohol and women, and he allows his marriage to Arabella, even though it is unhappy, to distract himself from his dream. He shares a deep connection with his cousin Sue, but their relationship is doomed by their earlier marriages, society’s disapproval, and bad luck. Jude starts out pious and religious, but by the end of his life he has grown agnostic and bitter.

Jude is a young man, born and raised in the town of Marygreen. He has lofty dreams of pursuing his post - secondary career at the prestigious university in Christminster. However, burdened by fate, Jude was nothing more than an orphan raised by a lower-working class aunt and would never be capable of paying for higher education. Instead, he found employment as a stonemason. 

Jude is obscure in that he comes from uncertain origins, struggles largely unnoticed to realize his aspirations, and dies without having made any mark on the world. He is also obscure in the sense of being ambiguous: he is divided internally, and the conflicts range all the way from that between sexual desire and knowledge to that between two different views of the world. Jude is, therefore, struggling both with the world and with himself.

He is not well equipped to win. Though he is intelligent enough and determined, he tries to force his way to the knowledge he wants. Though well - intentioned and goodhearted, he often acts impulsively on the basis of too little objective evidence. Though he is unable to hurt an animal or another human being, he shows very little concern for himself and his own survival, often needlessly sacrificing his own good. He never learns, as Phillotson finally does perhaps too late, to calculate how to get what he wants. In short, he is more human than divine, as Hardy points out.

He is obsessed with ideals. Very early he makes Christminster into an ideal of the intellectual life, and his admitted failure there does not dim the luster with which it shines in his imagination to the very end of his life. He searches for the ideal woman who will be both lover and companion, and though he finds passion without intellectual interests in Arabella and wide interests but frigidity in Sue he maintains the latter as his ideal to his deathbed. Recognizing the Christminster holiday just before he dies, Jude says, 

"And I here. And Sue defiled!"

Jude is reconciled to his fate before he dies only in the sense that he recognizes what it is. In a conversation with Mrs. Edlin he says that perhaps he and Sue were ahead of their time in the way they wanted to live. He does not regret the struggle he has made-, at the least, as he lies ill he tries to puzzle out the meaning of his life. At the very end, however, like Job he wonders why he was born. But then so perhaps does every man, Hardy seems to imply. 

Jude's death at the young age of thirty (the approximate age of Jesus Christ at his death) indicates that he has been "crucified" by society. But even the flaws that contributed to his downfall are not really faults. If his sensitivity, kindness, sense of honor and idealism are considered weaknesses, they are also his strengths. His only real weakness is a tendency to drink when in despair, although he is not a drunkard.

His death in Christminster on Remembrance Day and his loneliness and desolation has a strange poignancy. The reader is left with a feeling of bitterness and waste at the ruin of a promising life. 

Sue Bridehead :-

The novel’s other protagonist and Jude’s cousin. Sue’s parents were divorced and she was raised in London and Christminster. She is an extremely intelligent woman who rejects Christianity and flirts with paganism, despite working as a religious artist and then teacher. Sue is often described as “ethereal” and “bodiless” and she generally lacks sexual passion, especially compared to Jude. Sue marries Phillotson as a kind of rebuke to Jude for his own marriage to Arabella, and is then repulsed by Phillotson as a husband. She is portrayed as inconsistent and emotional, often changing her mind abruptly, but she develops a strong relationship and love with Jude. Though she starts out nonreligious, the death of her children drives Sue to a harsh, legalistic version of Christianity as she believes she is being punished for her earlier rebellion against Christianity, and she returns to Phillotson even though she never ceases to love Jude. 

It is easy for the modern reader to dislike Sue, even, as D. H. Lawrence did, to make her into the villain of the book. (Lawrence thought Sue represented everything that was wrong with modern women.) Jude, as well as Hardy, obviously sees her as charming, lively, intelligent, interesting, and attractive in the way that an adolescent girl is. But it is impossible not to see other sides to her personality: she is self - centered, wanting more than she is willing to give; she is intelligent but her knowledge is fashionable and her use of it is shallow; she is outspoken but afraid to suit her actions to her words; she wants to love and be loved but is morbidly afraid of her emotions and desires.

Hardy captures Sue's quality of unpredictability and elusiveness. She buys nude statues of Greek divinities, then repents and conceals them from her landlady. She snaps irritably at Phillotson, then regrets it later. Sue is sometimes reckless and then diffident, stern and then kind, warm and then standoffish, candid and then evasive. In portraying these glimpses of Sue her unceasing reversals, her changes of heart and mind, her conflicting behavior Hardy creates a complex, fascinating character. The reader sees her telling Jude, 

"You mustn't love me" 

(Part III, Chapter 5) 

and then writing to him, "you may." After her marriage she forbids Jude to come to see her, and then she revokes the ban and invites him the next week. Later, she cancels the invitation. Hardy indicates that along with her changing moods, she has a tendency to shift ground under pressure. 

In short, she is something less than the ideal Jude sees in her; like him she is human. She is also a nineteenth-century woman who has given herself more freedom than she knows how to handle. She wants to believe that she is free to establish a new sort of relationship to men, even as she demands freedom to examine new ideas. But at the end she finds herself in the role of sinner performing penance for her misconduct. As Jude says, they were perhaps ahead of their time.

If she is not an ideal, she is the means by which J tide encounters a different view of life, one which he comes to adopt even as she flees from it. She is also one of the means by which Jude's hopes are frustrated and he is made to undergo suffering and defeat. But it is a frustration which he invites or which is given him by a power neither he nor Sue understands or seems to control. 

Though a female character, Sue in Jude the Obscure embodies the important characteristics of the Byronic hero, such as: attraction, rebelliousness, liberalism, cruelty, hypersensitivity, mysteriosness, intellectuality, and exile. The paper pursues these characteristics as they appear in the character of Sue by stating the critics' views and therelated remarks from the novel. By this, Sue can be considered a Byronic heroine. 

Thank you...

1868 words

The Rover Summary of Article

This thinking activity is assigned by our profesor dr. Dilip barad sir about "The Rover". Here I'm going to discuss about the summary of the play "The Rover", based on two article. Here is this two articles: 

1. Aphra Behn's The Rover engages with the social, political and sexual conditions of the 17th century, as well as with theatrical traditions of carnival and misrule. Elaine Hobby introduces Behn's play and explores how it was first performed and received

2. Rape and the Female Subject in Aphra Behn's "The Rover" Published By: The Johns Hopkins University Press

Aphra Behn was the first professional female playwright. When The Rover appeared her career as a professional playwright was already well established. "The Forc’d Marriage" is her first play, and it had been followed by The Amorous Prince, The Dutch Lover, Abdelazer (her only tragedy) and The Town-Fopp, all with her name on their title pages.

◆The Rover : plot, character, theme analysis video

After the great success of "The Rover", Behn continued to write regularly for the Duke’s Company, and she was one of the few playwrights still having new plays performed in the 1680s after London audiences fell off as political tensions rose. At the same time she also established herself as a respected poet, translator and author of prose fiction (her most famous work, Oroonoko, which tells of a slave uprising, was published in 1688).

That success was not without its gender-specific challenges. Behn’s postscript to The Rover suggests that it was partly because she was a woman that critics were quick to accuse her.

Behn as the first professional female playwright :-

(Portrait of Aphra Behn by Sir Peter Lely)

Aphra Behn demarcates a set of faulty interpretive practices and directs the audience to the proper reading of her play by negative example. Aphra Behn's The Rover engages with the social, political and sexual conditions of the 17th century, as well as with theatrical traditions of carnival and misrule. Elaine Hobby introduces Behn's play and explores how it was first performed and received. It is in keeping with these sorts of cuts that by 1760, The Rover had fallen out of fashion; we know of no further performances until the 20th century. 

Marriage and Libertinism :-

In late seventeenth-century London, Aphra Behn was the first woman to earn her living as a writer. As a playwright, she wrote plays that reflected historical and cultural aspects of the Restoration from a female perspective. In 1677, she penned one of her most notable plays, The Rover; or The Banished Cavaliers. Behn’s play debuted during the height of the Restoration period, which for theater meant more female agency on the stage because women were allowed to take on female roles for the first time. Behn places the action of her play in Spanish Naples, just before Lent in the midst of carnival, which is a setting fit for emphasizing the urge to break free from societal constraints. Through the stories of Florinda, Hellena, and Angellica, Behn integrates strong elements of feminism and libertinism by focusing on issues of marriage, self-identity and representation. Each of these character types represents a different aspect of a woman’s struggle to define herself during the Restoration. Within this Naples framework, Behn explores the roles available to Restoration women and men, and the implications of the libertine idea that marriage was an outmoded institution. Here, the play’s most powerful voice is that of Angellica, who sees prostitution as a better choice than marriage. When the rakish Willmore remonstrates with her for charging for sex, she points out to him that men routinely have sex for money: when a man marries he gets his wife’s dowry.

The Spanish sisters Florinda and Hellena (and their cousin Valeria) are dominated by their brother Pedro. Pedro is confident that he can force Florinda to marry his powerful friend Antonio, and save the cost of a dowry for Hellena by sending her back to her nunnery. 

Restoration masculinity :-

The hypocrisy of the libertine men in The Rover leaves space for Behn's criticism of their behavior. Restoration comedies often begin with a scene between male characters in which they show their friendly devotion for each other and proceed to discuss their amorous pursuits. 

The lack of scholarly attention that Behn’s male characters receive can be explained by the fact that her protagonists like the male characters of other Restoration comedies written by men rape, scheme, lie, seduce, threaten, and connive. Indeed, the gratuitous sexual violence that takes place in The Rover can be deeply disturbing for a contemporary audience. Behn’s depiction of male characters as unapologetic libertines men who pursue sexual pleasure and have few moral restraints seems to function as an obstacle to the argument that Behn is an early advocate for women’s rights. Susan Staves, a feminist critic, responds to this difficulty and suggests that Behn was forced to appeal to a mass audience and, therefore, was unable to “imagine alternative, less misogynist constructions”. Certainly, Behn had limited space to critique libertinism when her audience would have contained male spectators who aspired to libertine values, not the least of whom was the monarchy, Charles II. However, I believe that the ironizing and mocking of male sexual aggression throughout The Rover suggests that Behn is in fact critical of sexual violence towards women. Consequently, this essay will deal heavily with the issue of sexual assault as depicted on the Restoration stage and it will investigate Behn’s motives and limitations in depicting sexual violence.

Carnival, disguise and misrule :-

The idea of the carnivalesque was developed by the Russian critic Mikhail Bakhtin in his study of the seventeenth - century prose satirist, Francois Rabelais. The carnival for Bakhtin was an event in which all rules, inhibitions, restrictions and regulations which determine the course of everyday life are suspended, and especially all form of hierarchy in society. The concept is derived from the practice of medieval carnival when the people would enjoy a holiday from their labours and in the process ridicule the authorities of church and state. Carnival was also considered a period of indulgence focusing on the pleasures of the body vis-à-vis eating, drinking and promiscuous sexual activity. Aphra Behn constructs The Rover in the Carnival preceding Lent where masquerades, costumes, disguises, overindulgence and theatricality are commonplace, allowing an exploration and subversion of social ideals and realities. A reversal, or rather an outright rejection of social roles is most apparent in the character of Hellena. As per her family’s expectations, Hellena is to join a nunnery, thus saving her father of a second dowry. 

A darker, grimmer side of the Carnival is exposed when the women in the play enter a different system of domination, outside the captivity of their homes. Willmore, a self-proclaimed “rampant lion of the forest”, assumes that any woman out on the streets during the Carnival is available for sex. He attempts to rape Florinda whilst he is drunk. Later on in the play, Florinda is also nearly raped by Blunt and Frederick. Here, Aphra Behn seems to critique how women who don’t adhere to their predefined social roles are automatically assumed to be prostitutes available for sexual domination. Behn speaks through Hellena who boldly questions,

“Why must we be either guilty of fornication or murder if we converse with you men?”

Behn also shows how chastity and prostitution are the only two alternatives available to women. The odds of having a happy ending are tipped in favour of Hellena who is chaste and untouched. Angellica Bianca, who is also in pursuit of Willmore as a lover, is forced to come to terms with the fact her profession would never allow her lead a normal married life. Her social identity would forever be that of a commodity, a means to an end. The Carnival thus also becomes a means to assess the sexual double standards by which women are judged by men. 

(This painting by Pieter Bruegel the Elder depicts the opposing, balanced forces of carnival and Lent)

Dressed as a gypsy a member of a society living at the edges of Restoration culture or as a man, a young woman can attempt to forge her own destiny. Willmore, meanwhile, tells his fellow Cavaliers that he has left the Prince (James, Duke of York) on his ship in the Bay of Naples and come ashore to ‘enjoy my self a little this Carnival’, setting the scene for his drunken assault on Florinda. 

We see the general themes in the play are : 

• Gender and sexuality, 

• Theatre and entertainment, 

• Politics and religion, 

• Satire and humour

I find one interesting video of this play , like seeing the eyes (with use of cartoon),

To conclude we can say that as feminist critics have established, Behn often portrays libertinism in a negative way. However, it is not only through her female characters that Behn portrays certain libertine behaviors in an unfavorable manner, but through her construction of masculinity. Yet, such an argument is complicated by the complexity of Behn’s loyalties. Certainly, Behn has a concern for female agency that is not only explicit in many of her plays, but also in her prefaces to them. In the preface to The Lucky Chance (1686), Behn begs for the same freedom of expression that is given to her male counterparts, calling her “masculine part the poet in [her]” (Behn 2001, 1428). On the other hand, Behn is limited in her ability to express her opinions publicly for a number of reasons. Willmore, is not only a romantic and comic hero, but he is also a reflection of Charles the II. Behn, a staunch royalist, is faced with the political imperative to not insult her monarch by casting such a protagonist in an unfavorable way. From an economic perspective, the plays must attract a paying audience and Behn, therefore, must portray her libertine hero in a desirable fashion according to the expectations of the time. Thus, Behn offers what appears to be a very conventional treatment of Restoration masculinity. However, if it is true that Behn faces obvious limitations in her criticism of libertinism, but that this criticism can be found in her plays, one must ask what portrayal of the libertine rake emerges from her comedies. Behn subscribes to the customary standards of royalism and libertinism; yet, within the necessary conventional forms that she adopts, one can perceive a subtle strain of critique of libertine masculinity. Without explicitly attacking libertinism, Behn reveals its limitations and contradictions. Libertinism is a crumbling edifice that, though still standing, is exposed by the plays of Behn to be ridden with 

cracks, flaws, and imperfections. 

1743 words

Character of Cecily in the importance of being earnest

Hello learners,

Today i want to discuss about character sketch of Cecily Cardew of the play "The Importance of Being Earnest". "The Importance of Being Earnest, A Trivial Comedy for Serious People" is a play by Oscar Wilde. First performed on 14 February 1895 at the St James's Theatre in London, it is a farcical comedy in which the protagonists maintain fictitious personae to escape burdensome social obligations. Working within the social conventions of late Victorian London, the play's major themes are the triviality with which it treats institutions as serious as marriage, and the resulting satire of Victorian ways. Some contemporary reviews praised the play's humour and the culmination of Wilde's artistic career, while others were cautious about its lack of social messages. Its high farce and witty dialogue have helped make The Importance of Being Earnest Wilde's most enduringly popular play. 

Here I'm going to share some v points about character of CECILY CARDEW. There are four female character in this play :

• Lady Augusta Bracknell, 

• Gwendolen Fairfax, 

• Cecily Cardew, 

• Miss Prism

The female character which is the most attractive to me among this all is Cecily Cardew. Because she is portrayed as realistic character among all the women in "The Importance of Being Earnest".

She is of a very nice age; she is 18. She has a governess Miss Prism who tutors her for a long time. She is a very romantic, imaginative, kind, sensitive girl who feels the repression of Prism's rules. Cecily is a little bit silly and naïve girl, and we understand it after she declares that she wants to meet a "wicked man." Also, she is described as less sophisticated than Gwendolen.

◆Dreaming Lady:-

She is known as “dreaming lady” for the reason that she always remains in dreams. “Earnest” is unknown to her yet she is engaged to him. She even writes him letters. She deeply in love with the name of Ernest, the younger brother of uncle jack ( in reality there isn't any character name Ernest, it's imaginative character by her uncle jack ). But she don't know about that. Even she once tell to uncle jack that she wants to meet his younger brother Ernest. If we think about today's generation some of us are living in dream world, they aren't think what is real, but they were like to live in that dreamy world. And sometimes they are fail to accept the reality which can hurt them a lot.

◆Habit of Writing Diary:-

She writes a diary on regular basis with the logic that she would forget everything if she does not write a diary. Furthermore, she is a keen observer. This is very good habit to write diary, if we forgot anything so we can see in it and take it advantage. If we see it with today's perspective we find that in day to day life we forget many things which is important for us. In ancient time people write diarys for their to remember. Some people still uses diary for their better convenient, but many of us uses mobile phone for saving and writing anything which is important and useful. The blog is one of the part of them. Cecily is clever and cunning with her exchanges with Gwendolen. 

◆Satire through Cecily :-

It is also matter of fact that most of the satirical dialogues are uttered from the mouth of Cecily Cardew. It seems that Oscar Wilde has created her for the purpose of satire. As compared to other characters of “The Importance of Being Earnest”,  she is sensible. We find many examples of satire through Cecily. Let's see some of them:

CECILY: Algy, would you wait for me till I was thirty-five? ALGERNON: Of course I could, Cecily. You know I could. 

CECILY: Yes, I felt it instinctively, but I couldn’t wait all that time. I hate waiting even five minutes for anybody. It always makes me rather cross. I am not punctual, myself, I know, but I do like punctuality in others, and waiting, even to be married, is quite out of the question. ALGERNON: Then what is to be done, Cecily? 

CECILY: I don’t know, Mr. Moncrieff. 

---●Cecily consults Algernon about the new requirement set down by her guardian, Jack: She can’t be married without Jack’s permission until she reaches the age of thirty-five. Algernon’s willingness to wait years confirms Cecily’s suspicion of his ambivalence about marriage. Here we see dominance of parents are upon to their children and children have to be performed like them. Here I'm sharing one video of the original play for understand the real conversation and dialogue.

* Video of Original Play :-

Gwendolen and Cecily meet in Act II of The Importance of Being Ernest. Gwendolen has traveled to Jack's country house to surprise him, but he is out when she arrives, so she meets Cecily. When the women first meet, Gwendolen finds out that Cecily is Jack's ward and feels somewhat threatened by Cecily's good looks. She says to her:

''. . .I wish that you were fully forty-two, and more than usually plain for your age. Ernest has a strong upright nature. He is the very soul of truth and honour. Disloyalty would be as impossible to him as deception. But even men of the noblest possible moral character are extremely susceptible to the influence of the physical charm of others.''

---●Here we can see the jealously between two womens. They think that they both are fall in love with same person named Ernest.  

Cecily may be younger, less fashionable, and less sophisticated than Gwendolen, but she can give as good as she gets. We can see it in this conversation:

Gwendolen: Are there many interesting walks in the vicinity, Miss Cardew?

Cecily: Oh! yes! a great many. From the top of one of the hills quite close one can see five counties.

Gwendolen: Five counties! I don't think I should like that; I hate crowds.

Cecily: [Sweetly] I suppose that is why you live in town? [Gwendolen bites her lip, and beats her foot nervously with her parasol.]

Gwendolen: [Looking round] Quite a well-kept garden this is, Miss Cardew.

Cecily: So glad you like it, Miss Fairfax.

Gwendolen: I had no idea there were any flowers in the country.

Cecily: Oh, flowers are as common here, Miss Fairfax, as people are in London.

---● Here we can see that Cecily is gives an answer to Gwendolen. Here she makes satire on this. 

◆Realistic Character :-

She is the most realistic character of the play “The Importance of Being Earnest”. Crcily is second most realistic character after jack. As we know that all characters are living double life for their benefits, like Jack (who make story of his elder brother Ernest) but jack is very reasonable man. He never do bad thing with the help of his imaginative character, and Algernon (who make story of his friend Banbury) moreover he become Ernest for Cecily. Thus we talk about the female characters we can see that lady Bracknell who is firstly won't agree with the engagement of Algernon and Cecily but after knowing the wealthiness of Cecily Cardew she agreed with the engagement of Algernon and Cecily. How selfish she is ! Cecily won't wear any mask for her personal ambition and desire. She speaks truth despite its bitter. 

If we talk about  present time,

"Real are Rare"

People live multiple lifes. They have lots of masks for hiding their truth, reality and relations. 

◆Jolly Nature:-

Like other characters of “Importance of Being Earnest”, Cecily has a good sense of humor but her nature is “jolly”. She does not like Uncle Jack’s seriousness. She has very good level of understanding. Furthermore, she is a keen observer. She knows that Dr. Chasuble is in love with Miss Prism. She develops link between them. If go through the play we can see that Cecily is very beautiful.

◆The Country Girl :-

Part of what makes Cecily attractive to Algernon is her seeming simplicity. She’s not intellectual like Gwendolen, who very early on scolds Jack, "Ah! that is clearly a metaphysical speculation, and like most metaphysical speculations has very little reference at all to the actual facts of real life, as we know them".

We can’t really imagine Cecily talking about metaphysics or facts, for that matter. Cecily does everything she can to vigorously avoid Miss Prism’s attempts to educate her. She’s innocent Gwendolen might say ignorant. She waters the plants, writes in her diary, and waits for the day that Ernest will come and propose.

In conclusion, The Importance of Being Earnest strongly focuses on those of the upper class society and the vanity of the aristocrats who place emphasis on trivial matters concerning marriage. Both Algernon and Jack assume the identity of “Ernest” yet ironically, they both are beginning their marital lives based on deception and lies. Lady Bracknell represents the archetypal aristocrat who forces the concept of a marriage based on wealth or status rather than love. Cecily and Gwendolyn are one type of women who loves the name ERNEST without knowing anything about him. Through farce and exaggeration, Wilde satirically reveals the foolish and trivial matters that the upper class society looks upon as being important. As said earlier, a satiric piece usually has a didactic side to it. In this case, Lady Bracknell learns that the same person she was criticising is actually her own flesh and blood.

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