Shakespeare's Sherlock ("The Merchant of Venice", 1596), French writer Molière's Albagon ("The Miser", 1668), Balzac's Grandet ("Eugenie") "Grandet", 1833), Plyushkin ("Dead Souls", 1842) written by the Russian writer Gogol, in just 250 years, four miser images with similar personalities can be deeply rooted in the hearts of the people one after another. It must be regarded as a great miracle in the history of Western literature. Among the four misers, Sherlock and Grandet each have a daughter; Albagon has a son and a daughter; Plyushkin has a son and two daughters, but the youngest daughter died young and does not appear in the text. All four books deal with the plots of miser's daughters and others in private life - Jessica (Sherlock's daughter), Alexandra Stepanovna (Plyushkin's elder) Female) eloped with Lorenzo and an officer respectively; Alice (daughter of Albagon) secretly made a love pact with the housekeeper Farel; Eugenie Grandet (daughter of Grandet) was killed by her cousin Xia. Erzhi's demeanor was fascinated and secretly promised, and then fell in love with each other, and swore to each other "always belong to you". This article attempts to sort out the emotional problems of the daughters of the four miserly devils, and analyze why they conflict with their fathers and then rebel against their authority on marriage issues.
First of all, the reason why daughters have private lifelong commitments with others is in direct conflict with their father-daughter kinship, which has a lot to do with the absence of their mothers. The mothers of Jessica, Alice, and Alexandra Stepanovna all died young and did not appear in the book. Although Eugenie Grandet's mother did not die early, because of her weakness in body and mind, her control over the family was far less than that of her husband Grandet, and even she herself was completely submissive to her husband. Promiscuous power - "has long been oppressed to become a slave of obedience". Therefore, Jessica and others have to take on part of the role of the hostess of the house, which is neither interesting nor romantic for a young lady, and may even delay their life-long events. Moreover, this kind of role commitment makes the father and daughter lose the buffer space when there is a conflict. Although the daughters exercised part of the power of mistress on behalf of the absent mother, it was clear that their own marriages were excluded from that power, so that in Shylock, Albagon, Grandet, Plyu In Shikin's family of four, the marriage of the daughters, a major matter that should have been handled by the mother, was completely placed under the authority of the fathers. However, Sherlock and Plyushkin apparently forgot their responsibilities in choosing a son-in-law for their daughter, as well as their daughter's emotional needs. Novna's elopement with others laid a foreshadowing, and also made a full and reasonable explanation for their elopement. Albagon seems to care about the marriage of his children and takes care of the marriage affairs for his children early, but in fact he just wants to let his children get married early and not spend his money, so he can choose a daughter for the reason of "no dowry". unacceptable person. This marriage is clearly out of step with Alice's emotional expectations, even if she isn't in love with Farrell.
Grandet, on the other hand, was the opposite of the other three misers. He oversaw his daughter too strictly, and took great pains to raise Eugenie into a miser like him. He carefully watched everyone in the family, using his own thoughts to manipulate his wife and daughter, killing the vitality and nature of the family. Because of this, at least in terms of relationships, Eugenie is the most tragic of the four miser's daughters - also with her lover for life, Jessica, Alice, Alexandra. Stepanovna at least managed to have a lover and become a family, but Eugenie could only become the prey of the money chaser after her first love was sacrificed. To sum up, it can be concluded that the contradiction between the daughters' needs for feelings and marriage and the father's neglect and disrespect for their needs forced the daughters to secretly enter into secret marriages with others.
In "The Miser", the reason why Albagon's stingy character is so deeply rooted in the hearts of the people is that the repeated appearance of the line "Don't Dowry" can be said to be a great contribution, and this sentence appears when he talks about putting Ellie The reason for silk's marriage to Lord Unselmer. Why is the dowry so important, and it can even influence a father's choice for his daughter's marriage? This question may be partially answered from the marriage customs in Europe at that time. In Europe at that time, in order to allow the daughter to marry the right person, the woman’s family often prepared a generous dowry for her daughter. A woman without a dowry was very Hard to get the favor of men of the same class. The reason is as American scholar Stephanie Coutts put it in "A Brief History of Marriage", "From the early Middle Ages through the 18th century, the dowry -- cash, goods or land -- brought by a woman when she married was often a man's The largest amount of money received". In fact, this was still the case at least until the early 19th century when Eugenie Grandet and Dead Souls were born. For example, in Balzac's other famous work "The Old Man", the old man Goriot gave his two daughters to the noble Baron Resto and the banker Nuzingen, and almost devoted all of his money to the two The daughter buys the dowry. But the Marquis de Aquda, the lover of the Viscountess Beausienne, left her for a dowry of two hundred thousand francs in interest, and married Mademoiselle Rochefort. As a stingy person, to divide up a huge amount of property as a daughter's dowry, it would cost Albagon's life! As a father, Albagon couldn't wait to marry his daughter Alice to someone she didn't like because others "don't want a dowry". In order to make his son Cleont get married without spending his money, he forced his son to marry a man. rich widow. He completely disregards the wishes of his children and whether they will be happy in the future. Everything is planned with his own economic interests as the starting point. This father is not only stingy, but his selfish and domineering side is fully revealed.
Of course, on the issue of marriage and love, the fate of Jessica and the other three is not the same as Alice's, but the fathers forced their daughters to disobey their father's order and privately set their own life on the issue of marriage and love because of property issues. There is no doubt that. Taking Jessica and Lorenzo eloping as an example, we can know from the description in the play that before the elopement, Jessica wrote a letter to her lover Lorenzo, emphasizing that she would run away with property; Relying on the possessions brought by Jessica when she eloped, these can see the material needs of Lorenzo for the love object Jessica. At this point, Lorenzo and his friend Bassanio are not too far apart, and the way for both of them to get out of their debt crisis is to find a rich woman. The only difference is that Lorenzo kidnapped Jessica to run away with some of her father's belongings, while Bassanio borrowed money from Antonio to pursue Portia, a wealthy daughter who lost her father. The reason why the young nobles at that time needed to marry a woman with a dowry was, on the one hand, due to the consideration of the right household. Of course, here, the door does not refer to the family in a narrow sense, and money is also a pass to the wealthy. There is no doubt that a family that can provide a rich dowry for a daughter, even if it is only a businessman from the bourgeoisie, is a match for the aristocracy. of. Many of Balzac's novels are about people with aristocratic status who are defeated by money, especially when they are faced with the choice of marriage. This is most vividly shown in the book "Old Man Gao" when the Viscountess Beausienne left Paris sadly. On the other hand, as Stephanie quoted above, "the dowry that a woman brings when she gets married—cash, goods, or land—is often the greatest income a man can make". This is not unrelated to the western property inheritance system at that time - for example, the primogeniture system in the United Kingdom at that time, primogeniture, which means that other descendants other than the eldest son cannot inherit the title and main property after the death of their parents. At that time, the succession system of major Western countries was similar to that of the United Kingdom as a whole, and most of them continued the practice since the times of the Bible. Just as the French scholar Jean-Claude Boulogne said in "The History of Marriage in the West", in the West at that time, in order to avoid the infinite division of land and property and maintain the mode of production of feudal society, "marriage was the basic structure. The social system was thus established in the transfer of estates and fiefs. Formal marriages (the only marriages that ensured the heirs) were limited to one child per family." Afterwards, if he wants to continue to maintain his existing decent life, he must marry a woman who can give him material security. Shakespeare borrowed money from Bassanio
Interestingly, not only did Bassanio get Portia and all her property, but Rorenzo and Jessica, with the help of Antonio and Portia, also obtained the inheritance rights to Sherlock's estate. The reason why Shakespeare needs to set up the plot of Lorenzo's inheritance rights is probably because of the British heiress protection regulations in Shakespeare's time, the American researcher Charles Ross in his paper "Shakespeare's "The Taming of the Shrew" and the British Heiress Protection Regulations" "This ordinance does not prevent secret marriages. Once a girl is married, she remains married. But this ordinance seeks to prevent wealth hunters from obtaining heiress money," it said. Although Lorenzo's secret marriage to Jessica was valid, Jessica inherited his father's property after Sherlock died, and he had no hope of meddling. So, in the play, with the help of his friends, the wealth hunter finally realized his wish. For a miserly widower, what could be more terrifying than having his daughter's property taken away? It can be asserted that even if there is no religious reason, Sherlock will not agree to marry his daughter to Lorenzo simply because of property issues.
Eugenie Grandet was the only daughter who had the right to inherit Grandet's property. Grandet did not allow Eugenie to marry her cousin Charles, not because she was reluctant to give up the dowry, but because of the love of Charles. Father is bankrupt. He wouldn't allow his only daughter, the heir, to get mired in debt and get himself into it.
Of course, after Grandet's death in Paris, Grandet was still involved in his brother's debt problems, but that was to operate in a profitable way, not a rescue. Plyushkin's daughter Alexandra Stepanovna eloped with an officer and this is the case. In Plyushkin's eyes, an officer is a gambler, a prodigal, and is naturally similar to a person without property. . To sum up, it can be found that the four stingy fathers actually have common expectations for their daughters' marriage - the man is rich, and the marriage of the daughter will not detract from the fathers' property. But this kind of expectation is obviously a heavy shackle that deprives the daughters of love.
Since the fathers' expectations for their daughters' marriage are in conflict with their daughters' longing for love and marriage, private life seems to be the only choice for daughters to achieve their goals. So why Jessica and the others can resolutely choose love and give up family love between love and father-daughter family relationship? The French philosopher Michel Foucault wrote in The History of Sexual Experience: "Musonius considered the marital community to be the most noble, the most important and the most venerable. Its strength shows that it is superior to being able to The community that unites friend to friend, brother to brother, son to his parents. It is even superior to the community that unites parents to their offspring (this is the point) … Thus the spousal relationship becomes fundamental It is based on this concept that Jessica and the others have the legitimacy of betraying their father for the sake of their lover. When Jessica, Alexandra Stepanovna and other four people chose their spouses, they resisted their father's will. It is more important than the relationship between father and daughter. When there is conflict between the two, the relationship between father and daughter can be sacrificed, not to mention that the relationship between them and their father is not close.
Different from the daughters who elope in Shakespeare and Gogol's writings, the daughters of miser in the works of two French writers did not choose to elope even though they also had an elopement with others for life. In addition to the writer's consideration of the development of the plot and the differences caused by the differences in the characters' personalities, this is also related to the unique marriage tradition in France to a certain extent. At that time, France did not recognize the legality of secret marriages, that is to say, even if Alice and Eugenie Grandet eloped with their lovers, they could not conclude a marriage, be recognized by the regime, and then obtain the understanding of both parents. In this regard, Canadian scholar Elizabeth Abbott described it this way in her book "Marriage History": "The marriage tradition in France is different from that in other parts of Europe. The church and the government in this country compete for civil marriage between the church and the government. There was a fierce battle for control of the Provocation by the authority of the French government.
“The French government issued a series of decrees against the influence of the Church. In 1557, the introduction of France’s first marriage decree set the tone for the matter… The decree allows parents to legally deprive children of secret marriages of the inheritance, which can therefore be withdrawn. Daughter's dowry or son's inheritance.
"The Blois Ordinance of 1579 reinforced the 1557 decree, which made the crime of secret marriage a first-degree felony". Most European countries other than France recognize the legality of secret marriages, which is why Jessica and Alexandra Stepanovna eloped with their lovers and could successfully establish a relationship between husband and wife, and eventually with their father for the sake of understanding. Since elopement is not only a failure to marry a lover, but also makes both of them fall into a situation of breaking the law, then Alice and Eugenie Grandet naturally cannot choose to take this dead end. But the two of them have no less desire for free love than Jessica and Alexandra Stepanovna, whether it's Alice and Pharrell's vow of love, or Eugenie Grandet's love The fidelity of the first love proves this.
From the text, we can't see what kind of inner struggles Jessicas experienced when they faced the conflict between love and father-daughter relationship, and whether they hesitated before making up their minds, but it must be the case After all, although the Sherlocks are not loving fathers, there is always a sense of parenting. In particular, Plyushkin before his widow was not necessarily a good husband and father. But the one who wants to accompany you on a longer journey is still a lover. After all, the spousal relationship is the most fundamental and most intimate kind of relationship. Therefore, they can only resolutely and resolutely make a private lifelong relationship with their lover, and resist the opposition, restraint and oppression of love by family. When describing Jessica, Alice and their emotional choices, one of the "Portuguese Lyrical Sonnets" by Mrs. Browning, an English poet who also eloped with her lover, may best express their feelings: " . . . Worldly slander will not divide us, let the storm fly, nor shake our steadfastness; our hands will reach across the mountains and touch each other; one day, the sky will roll between us, and we will swear to the stars, and more. Hold tight." Yes, slander and alienation, storms, mountains, sky, even worldly eyes, laws and regulations, and even the fetters of family love can't stop two loving hearts from being together.
.jpeg)