Language In Clarissa, Evelina And Pride And Prejudice

The importance of a will in terms of inheritance and
the importance of claiming individual will confused the
connotations of both terms. The confusion caused tension
within families, and that tension reflects itself in
several early novels. Clarissa Harlowe, Evelina Anville
and Elizabeth Bennet exemplify the connotative tension
between inheritance and individual will. Clarissa
achieves economic independence through property willed
her by her grandfather and, in doing so, threatens the
male political establishment of her family. Evelina
Anville is "inherited" by Mr. Villars, who, through his
individual will, denies the existence of her true social
position and inheritance. Elizabeth Bennet is the victim
of an entail that saddles her family with the unenviable
task of marrying five daughters into the best possible
positions, knowing all the while that the Bennet name
will disappear. She, however, refuses to make a
convenient match, choosing to make her own marriage,
which, in the long run, is far beyond what she could have
hoped would be arranged by her father and family.
The reasonable expectations of young women were that
they would marry as their parents wished. Christopher
Hill, describing the times of Clarissa Harlowe, points
out that, "So long as parents' main criterion for a