We ended last week’s class discussion talking about the ways
in which Richardson describes physical beauty versus ugly forms. I am still
thinking about this discussion and I want to expand on it a bit as it continues
to manifest in the second half of the book. For the most part, everyone notably
good like Pamela was described as beautiful; those blatantly bad were described
as particularly unattractive ugly. Richardson never really goes into detail
when he describes beauty; Pamela’s beauty is stressed, for example, in the
letters back and forth to her parents (in fact her father even warns her not to
let men’s compliments on her beauty get to her head) but what her beauty
actually looked like is never really discussed. In start contrast, the ugly are
described vividly as we have seen in Pamela’s description of Mrs. Jewkes. It’s
as if Richardson is warning his readers that if they are not moral and virtuous
people, their wrong doing will manifest itself physically; and if they are
virtuous, like Pamela, they will attain indescribable beauty.
While this last assumption may be a
bit of a stretch, my thoughts were further reinforced when Richardson
reinforced these ideals of virtuous physical manifestations. For example, when
he describes Lady Davers in Vol II he notes, “In the Character of Lady Davers,
let the Proud and the Highborn see the Deformity of unreasonable Passion, and
how weak and ridiculous such Persons must appear, who suffer themselves, as is
usually the Case…” (456). Accordingly, he uses visuals of physical deformations
to describe her passions. While we aren’t entirely sure if she is physically ugly,
and perhaps it is her treatment towards Pamela and her general attitude which
manifests deformity is being described, Richardson nonetheless gives this and
many other examples of the ways poor character is associated with physical appearance.
No one wants to be ugly.
On a
different note, class difference plays a very important role in the way the
tale unfolds. Pamela is, in part, an exceptional tale because she is a servant
who remains virtuous despite the temptations of wealth offered to her by Mr. B
as well as the vulnerabilities she endures being away from home. While we have
speculated whether or not Richardson cheats a little with making Pamela
technically the daughter of middle class parents, I believe Richardson still
follows through with the fact that she is a servant when the action unfolds—and,
in any case her parents were experiencing difficult financial burdens.
Towards the end of the tale, Richardson
places a very revealing conversation between Mr. B and his sister Lady Davers
on class relations and marriages, and the reasons why his marriage with Pamela
was able to work at all without affecting his status as an aristocrat. In this
conversation, Lady Davers is angry of Mr. B’s choice to marry a servant from
the lower class, and asks him what the difference would have been if she had
married one of her father’s grooms. After asking her to put her pride aside, he
says, “The Difference is, a Man ennobles the Woman he takes, be she who she will; and adopts her into his
own Rank, be it what it will; But a
Woman, tho’s ever so nobly born, debases herself by a mean Marriage, and
Descends from her own Rank, to his she stoops to” (422). To Mr. B, and as
perhaps a general reflection of the way double standards worked during
Richardson’s time, a man can’t generally go lower in class ranks, whereas an
aristocratic woman can descend in nobility by marrying someone in lower ranks. He
continues to note that the reason is because the man is the head of the
household. He asks rhetorically, “But, when a Lady descends to marry a Groom,
is not that Groom her head, as her husband? For what Lady of Quality ought to
respect another, who has made so sordid a Choice, and set a Groom above her?
(422). Accordingly, Mr. B pleas to his sister that he is not making any risky
rank choices in terms of his social status by marrying Pamela, because it is
the man who determines his wife’s rank regardless of where in echelon she
starts off. This likely served many advent lower class readers who took this
text to be a true account as moral compass towards a hopeful destiny.
I look forward to further exploring
these class issues in our next meeting on Thursday. I wonder how people of different classes received the text. While we know that the tale created a media event, and did have some backlash, I wonder how long it remained influential on its own for and whether or not it was acclaim was affected by the later parodies?
I thought this was a very interesting quote: "The Difference is, a Man ennobles the Woman he takes, be she who she will; and adopts her into his own Rank, be it what it will; But a Woman, tho’s ever so nobly born, debases herself by a mean Marriage, and Descends from her own Rank, to his she stoops to” (422).
ReplyDeleteIt really highlights social class as a theme in Pamela. I was always hesitant of Mr. B and was sort of upset that Pamela marries the rake. Of course, I understand that her marriage brings her economic stability and because of Pamela's position, she may not have any other suitable offers. However, I don't appreciate Mr. B's character at all. That quote truly represents his ideals on women being subordinate to men, and it makes me wonder which part of him has actually reformed. I think he's had a physical reformation in that he doesn't have to be physically aggressive towards Pamela and try to rape her; however, I think he is still aggressive in his ideas and thoughts. This is another reason why I think Pamela becomes passive in volume 2. She's married the reformed rake, she doesn't have to prove her virtue anymore, so was her concern with Mr. B all about her body after all?
I really am interested in this discussion on body vs. mind in this novel.
^Sorry, that was my sister's blog; I didn't realize she was logged into her blog on my computer. Please excuse that and consider the reply mine!
ReplyDeleteI think you've really hit on something with your observation that, in choosing not to detail those aspects of Pamela's physical appearance that render her so attractive, Richardson suggests that Pamela's beauty is so extensive as to be indescribable. This recalls to me a moment in the novel Twilight. (I'm afraid I'm too much of a book snob to admit to having read this without the disclaimer that my sister made me, telling me I had to because it was the worst book she'd ever read, and she wanted to make fun of it with me.) Anyway. I often recall one moment in that infamous novel in which the main character was described, approximately, as looking "like someone you'd see on a magazine cover." This, of course, basically means nothing, but it is significant to our discussion of Pamela in that both Richardson and Stephanie Meyers strive, by omitting a literal description, to engender in their readers a nebulous vision of ineffable beauty. Divorcing a woman from reality in this way is, I believe, another means of rendering her Other, an example of which can certainly be found in the highly idealized character of Pamela. That her outer beauty is, as you say, a direct manifestation of her inner beauty seems a significant part of such a mythology.
ReplyDeleteafter our class discussion I too was interested in how Richardson described in great detail the ugliness in his characters and yet his no description on her beauty. It is as if he is telling the reader that you will be beautiful and men will love you if you are virtuous and kind. But if not you will be hideously disfigured. Her physical appearance is too incredible to describe but Mrs. Jewkes extreme ugliness is not? By taking away any description of her being I think almost makes her more of an object.
ReplyDeleteThe quote you chose from Mr. B about classes is one of my favorites. Only because I think that it's so awful and really sums up the double standard between men and women.
after our class discussion I too was interested in how Richardson described in great detail the ugliness in his characters and yet his no description on her beauty. It is as if he is telling the reader that you will be beautiful and men will love you if you are virtuous and kind. But if not you will be hideously disfigured. Her physical appearance is too incredible to describe but Mrs. Jewkes extreme ugliness is not? By taking away any description of her being I think almost makes her more of an object.
ReplyDeleteThe quote you chose from Mr. B about classes is one of my favorites. Only because I think that it's so awful and really sums up the double standard between men and women.