Ch. 50 shows us more of Mrs. Bennet's character. We read: The marriage of a daughter, which had been the first object of her wishes since Jane was sixteen, was now on the point of accomplishment. It's now all too clear that Mrs. Bennet literally doesn't care what kind of man her daughters marry, as long as they can put "Mrs." in front of their names. Earlier, I could give her a kind of negative benefit of the doubt, because Elizabeth is her least favourite daughter, but Lydia is her favourite, and she still doesn't waste a minute wondering about this daughter's happiness. (I'm beginning to wonder what Mrs. Gardiner Sr.'s own attitude towards marriage was!) Is it the hardening effect of 23 years with Mr. Bennet, is Mrs. Bennet really as stupid and insensitive as she appears to be here, or is it a combination of the above?).
Later, we read that what most upsets her is that her husband won't give Lydia any money to buy wedding clothes, "a privilege without which her marriage would scarcely seem valid". I've come across some women who also seemed to feel that a marriage was not quite real without all the (expensive) trappings of a full-scale wedding, but they were a lot younger than Mrs. Bennet!
Board Index
