Language In Clarissa, Evelina And Pride And Prejudice

Zomchick connects the importance of law and its
language to literature, claiming eighteenth-century
novelists could "no more imagine character without law
than they can imagine a society without conflicts" (2).
Accordingly, James Thompson points out that novels
function with their own "thematization of value, not
dissimilar to the questions of value that occupy
political economists" (21) . One can go further, however,
and claim that inheritance law and its language combine
with literature in the eighteenth century, allowing
novels to adopt the language of inheritance law and use
its power to fuel plots of several novels. This study
provides a new instrument through which to view
literature in the eighteenth century and beyond, one
opened by Zomchick and Thompson and brought clearly into
the light through this study.
Within the three novels discussed in this study,
strict settlement on the surface, does not adversely
affect males. Mr. Bennet of Pride and Prejudice is our
exception. Once a deviation from the norm occurs,
however, the results overtly settle on females, providing
a context for action in the story. This is even true in
the case of Mr. Bennet, for he followed standard