Language In Clarissa, Evelina And Pride And Prejudice

Clarissa. Richardson's masterpiece recounts a litany of
realistic implications and consequences gleaned from the
proliferation of land-based estate settlements. Clarissa
also realistically characterized English belief that
primogeniture, the rule of assigning land to the eldest
male child in a family in some form was more judicious
for estate planning than wills. The effect of the law on
society and literature came late to critical attention.
The late twentieth century has seen only a very few
studies whose foci are on law and literature.
Of these few, John Zomchick has written extensively
regarding civil law and its prominence in eighteenth-
century society. Zomchick uses portions of Clarissa to
exemplify eighteenth-century society's ability to
interpret and apply legal codes and laws, while also
understanding their social implications. He cites
specifically Clarissa's arrest and night in custody,
using that incident to note how Mrs. Sinclair and her
girls use the law against Clarissa in order to malign her
further. Zomchick also clarifies the psychological
effect of this language on Clarissa and its effect on the
reader. He does not venture, however, into her
inheritance problems, as those laws are different from
civil codes. Family and the law in eighteenth-century