Language In Clarissa, Evelina And Pride And Prejudice

necessity to alter her whole Character from
what I had drawn it . . . .(Correspondence 79)
Mrs. Harlowe is Clarissa's model. She is what good
women become when they obey their patriarchal masters,
suffering under an obedience often not coming easily or
unencumbered. Highlighting her uneasiness, Richardson
casts Mrs. Harlowe as ill during the beginning of the
family upheaval. Charlotte Harlowe is often in tears as
she tries to persuade her daughter to comply with family
wishes that she marry Solmes. Clarissa relates that her
mother opposes sending Clarissa to Scotland to care for
her brother's newly-acquired estate, "because, having
relieved [Mrs. Harlowe], as she is pleased to say, of the
household cares (for which my sister, you know, has no
turn) they must again devolve upon her if I go" (L6 56).
Mrs. Harlowe is a woman of exceptional birth whose
marriage into the Harlowe family has tempered her
resolve. Clarissa sums up her mother's place in the
family in a postscript to Anna, saying, "Sir Oliver's
observation, who knew the world perfectly well, [was]
that fear was a better security than love for a woman's
good behaviour to her husband" (L41 187).
Further, Dr. Gregory and other conduct writers are
adamant that a woman must always retain herself as keeper