Marriages of Convenience and Excellent Boiled Potatoes

Mr. Collins (and Charlotte Lucas' Dilemma)

My apologies for some radio silence, friends. Globetrotting to New Orleans and Chicago last week really cut into my already limited writing time!

(If you’re new to this Substack, one of the things I’m offering this year is A Year with Jane. We’re reading through Austen’s six novels in 2023 and you can find all the details here.)

Let’s Talk About Mr. and Mrs. Collins

I once found myself in the very strange position of being a 21-year-old undergraduate presenting a paper at a conference at Notre Dame—with Alasdair MacIntyre in the audience. It was a little panel of my classmates from a reading course on Austen and philosophy and to our surprise both David Solomon, the director of the de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture and Alasdair MacIntyre, brilliant philosopher and author of After Virtue showed up. We were terrified.

I tell the story of the panel which is now morphed into ND legend (involving one of my classmates fainting under MacIntyre’s imposing gaze) in my book Jane Austen’s Genius Guide to Life . And I’ll share more of my thoughts on Austen’s clergymen (my paper’s topic) when we discuss Mansfield Park. But during the Q&A we discussed Mr. Collins: Is he really odious as I claimed in my paper? Or is he merely misunderstood? My answer was that while spending a little bit of time with Mr. Collins while reading a novel or watching a miniseries makes us laugh at his ridiculousness—Charlotte Lucas’ experience living with him day after day is to be pitied. He is indeed an odious man.

Maybe you think I’m being too hard on him. Because surely, he is misunderstood. I’ve seen the theory become more popular that Mr. Collins is autistic. His awkwardness and difficulty navigating social situations might indeed point to that possibility. I have (at least) one child on the spectrum and Mr. Collins attempts to live in a world made for the neurotypical (practicing compliments ahead of time!) tug at my heartstrings. But I also bristle a little bit at this theory because Mr. Collins is conceited, vengeful, lacking in empathy, and sometimes cruel. This is due to his character (or lack thereof) not because of neurodiversity. Those flaws are not characteristics of autism but of his own failure to be virtuous.

Mr. Collins is not, of course, all bad! His attempt to find a wife among the Bennet sisters is compassionate. He recognizes what a difficult position they are in due to not having a male heir and would like to set that right. But he is also so arrogant that he cannot conceive that Elizabeth Bennet would refuse his offer of marriage. His letter to Mr. Bennet upon Lydia’s scandal is disgustingly cruel. He is, like most of us, a mixed bag of virtue and vice. He is also full of nonsense. While that’s hardly his fault (and seems partly due to a poor education), it makes Charlotte Lucas’ choice to marry him more pitiable.

Poor Charlotte. She is in a terrible position. Because she’s 27 and therefore ancient according to Regency standards, Mr. Collins is likely her last chance at marriage. A woman of the gentry whose family isn’t rich would be a burden on her family for the rest of her days. She cannot start a career. She cannot make money. Marriage is her only way out.

While marrying someone like Mr. Collins is not appealing, neither is the alternative. Charlotte’s choice is understandable. She will have the prestige of her own home and perhaps the joys of children. She is protected by her connection to a wealthy family (the de Bourghs) and she is clever at convincing Mr. Collins to spend much of his time gardening so she doesn’t have to endure his company. He gets an excellent, sensible wife and Charlotte gets a secure, comfortable life. In some ways, everyone wins.

Lizzy seems to judge Charlotte for her decision. What I’m not sure of is whether Austen does. Jane Austen once accepted a marriage proposal from the brother of some of her close friends while she was staying with them. But the next morning she recanted and left. The details of her thought process are unknown, but I wonder if she was tempted by the financial security and then simply could not follow through marrying someone she didn’t love. Her integrity would not allow it.

Perhaps Austen understood Charlotte’s dilemma very deeply and still made a different decision to avoid an unhappy marriage.

Here’s this week’s question: This novel presents examples of both good marriages and bad marriages. Which are which? And what can we learn from them?

And this week we’re reading: Chapters 49-61 of Pride & Prejudice. Click here for the full reading schedule and details.

And that’s all folks! Wishing you all a happy Mardi Gras and beautiful start to Lent. I’ll be in your inbox again soon with a This Week’s Miscellany (so many good links to share!) and next week with more Austen content.

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Looking forward to hearing your thoughts on Austen’s married couples in the comments (and, if you’ve downloaded the Substack app, in the chat).