Language In Clarissa, Evelina And Pride And Prejudice

others profited from being male, rising in a world
meant for men, knowing that she and her mother and
sisters depended on them for regular assistance, helpless
and controlled existence, to say the least.
Authors of inheritance novels use their own
knowledge of inheritance and marriage practices to
empower their characters' actions and experiences,
allowing inheritance language and practice to fuel the
plots of their novels. Allowing Clarissa Harlowe to
remain single and rich, Richardson underscores the power
of individuality. Clarissa was able to gather wealth
until her death and delegate it as she wished-a clear
usurpation of power reserved for the males in her family
and the larger patriarchal family of the eighteenth
century. Although Richardson gives Clarissa the moral
authority to triumph ultimately, he also gives his male
characters the force of eighteenth-century law and duty
to ruin her earthly life and precipitate her death,
revealing a side of Richardson that favors male authority
(Beasley 37-42).
The males in Clarissars life shut her away from the
real world, positioning themselves against her
inheritance of the dairy house and against Robert
Lovelace. Once her power to resist is gone, her only