Marriage, choice, novels and age

[RitaLynn]

I've been reading a lot of novels recently, and a thought occurred to me. A lot of novels and films are about a character having the choice of two people to marry (e.g. the steady, reliable guy, or the sexy, fun, but unstable guy). What's important in these novels is that the character has a choice in who to marry.

From my personal experience, I've noticed something very different happening. People tend to marry the boyfriend they have when they get to the socially acceptable age (among my friends, it seems to be 30, I think a generation ago, it was 25), and it often doesn't seem to matter how long they've been together. If they've been together since 22, they marry at 30, if they've been together since they were 28, they marry at 30.

I don't really have any particularly profound thoughts on this, but this difference between the world of novels and real life seemed interesting to me.

Anyone else experienced something similar?

More succinctly, what I'm saying is that in novels and films there is a great emphasis on the choice of who you marry, their character, and how it will affect your life, whereas in real life, a lot of people seem almost to be resigned to marrying their boyfriend when they're a certain age and want children, and I wonder if this leads to a lot of the problems we read about on this forum.

I think it has to be remembered that novels and films reflect elements of reality, not the whole thing. For example, dialogue in novels doesn't contain all the 'umm-ing' / err-ing' / coughing / burping that real life conversations do.

In the same way, the situations the characters find themselves in are likely to be more clear-cut than in real-life.

But actually the choice is still there somewhere. The choice to be with a boyfriend who is sexy/reliable/artistic/demanding.

You say you have seen this happening a lot in your circle of friends - I would say it isn't true in mine. I think among my friends, I would put it more down to age. When we were in our early twenties, there was a lot more 'dating' and trying out different people for size so to speak.

As we get older, I see my friends knowing themselves and their likes and dislikes more, and choosing to be with a certain person because that person fits in with their ideas for the future. I don't see them having a choice between 'man a' and 'man b', but I do see them becoming more focused about what they do and don't want in a partner, so basically 'man b' doesn't even feature on the radar any more.

It's interesting that you mention 30 as the age people are getting married - among my friends there are probably equal numbers of married and unmarried (some in relationships some not). But age-wise the married ones were not clumped together around 30 - they vary fairly evenly between 20 and 35. It was about having found the right person for them rather than being the right age, I would have said.

(For the record, my conversation doesn't usually include that much burping.)

I think the fact that now you can date people, shag people, even move in with them without having to make the big decision to marry, makes our lives less novelly. Whereas when novels were invented and for most of their existence, people did have to take more of a gamble on their marriage.
the fact that novels are still being written, set in the present day, in which people make those choices, will partly be a result of the fact that that is the genealogy of the novel and people write on the model of earlier ones to some extent.

Yes, I'd say there's very little choice in life - usually only 'shall I stay with this partner or not'. There was one six-week period in my life when I had one boyfriend I was constantly breaking up with, snogged someone else and was then obsessed with him, but he was only out for a shag so wasn't an option for more than that anyway. I've never to my knowledge been pursued by more than one person, in fact I've usually been the pursuer. The idea of having two people you are close enough to so that you even feel sexual attraction to them is quite foreign to me.

Wordweaver,

I definitely agree with you that the choice is there, but I think the modern way of life (i.e. moving in together relatively quickly) rather hides the emphasis on choice that should be there.

In the past, say, you'd have been less likely to live together unless you were married, and so you'd have to decide you want to stay with that person for life, and weigh up their pros and cons more clearly.

Yes, Ritalynn, I see your point and I do agree. But then, on the other hand, how much were our grandparents really able to know about their future spouses? It's when we live with a person that we discover their true self, isn't it? Warts and all. So perhaps actually our choice is just more informed than it would have been years ago.

I can really imagine being in a situation where two potential husbands are around, are happy to be perhaps dumped for a while, while I make up my mind, etc.

I don't know many women who've had more than one bloke on the go, though - certainly not two who they'd consider marrying. Maybe one and a sometime-shag?

I don't get out much these days, though.

I CAN'T imagine, that should read!

I've noticed this too. I think I may even have started a thread on it before.

Amongst people I know there is a definate trend to marry/have kids with whoever you happen to be with at 30.

That's how old I am now and soo many people from primary, high school and uni are getting hitched/dropping sprogs it's like it's contagious. Peer pressure has a lot to answer for!

In a real life you generally date a string of men sequentially but that wouldn't be nearly as dramatic as having them both on the go at once

Do modern novels/films really have a couple of men around ready to marry the heroine at the drop of a hat. Thought it was more in the pattern of, two blokes that love/really fucking fancy the heroine and she chooses, and it goes from there.

Can only think of Green Wing (TV series) but that wasn't exactly gritty realism. And Bollywood, which is founded in a society more akin to 19th century marriage ideals.

As a teenager I always really liked the films that didn't end in marriage, just in a nice relationship, e.g. Clueless (where the last scene is of a wedding, but it turns out to be someone else's) and Four Weddings where they decide to just get together without fretting about weddings.

I don't novels and films are necessarily meant to reflect reality, but the best films and novels should try and tell us something universal about the human condition.

I think novels often use the device of two concurrent men to highlight the point that we do have a choice, and people's characters are important.

I'm not suggesting we should be all Jane Austeny about weighing our mind up between two men, but rather that choice is so important.

Some others have picked up on it, but it seems to me that of people almost sleepwalk (that's too harsh), into marrying the person they're with at the right age (which just happens to be 30 for my peer group), and I think peer pressure is a factor.

I expect most/many people have had more than one person wanting to be in a relationship with them at a time. But then of course most guys wouldn't make their feelings known to someone already in a relationship.

Elephant, I'm not necessarily thinking of modern novels per se, but Bridget Jones is about not necessarily the choice, but being attracted to two different men. I'm reading Franzen's Freedom right now which uses a similar device. In Any Human Heart, there is a very quick marriage early in the novel following a relationship with someone else, and all the Jane Austen, Middlemarch, etc have similar themes, on the choice of who we marry.

Well I suppose some of it is wish-fulfilment for the female writers/audience (cept Franzen obviously), and highlights the realistic fact that if you are going to be monogamous, you can't have everything good in one man. So for instance it's hard to find someone who's generous, ethical, works for good causes AND has his own penthouse suite and can take you out for dinner every night.

Also it's about taking risks isn't it - marrying/choosing one person is putting all your eggs in one basket, and no-one knows for sure whether it'll turn out well or not.

No disagreement with you there, EAM

I was thinking about this sort of thing this very morning: that some women's romantic expectations are still influenced by reading novels, like Jane Austen (and Bridget Jones is a pastiche of Pride and Prejudice). However the structure and ideals of those novels is so out of date that they will almost always be disappointed.

In Austen's time if a man wanted regular sex and to keep his Christian conscience clear then he had to get married. Nowadays men (and women) can have all the casual sex they like without commitment or judging, or having to be able to "set up home" or "earn enough to support a wife and family."

Yet the romantic notions of courtship and marriage seem to be ingrained in the psyche for a lot of women.

I read a few years ago that people decide (possibly subconsciously) that they want to settle down, and then "fall in love" with the first vaguely suitable person they meet. If that is true - and I can see plenty of couples for whom it may be - then it could explain the sudden "outbreaks" of weddings you get in groups of friends.

With apologies for thread-skimming ... Most novels depict a fairly stereotyped woman looking for "Mr Right". In most previous times, this was crucial to a woman's future. Things are different now, but the archetypes have stuck around.

Nearly every man I dated wanted to marry me! So, in that respect, I was usually in a position like the one you describe, OP. Importantly, I was also like the female character in a romance novel - in that I was a man-pleasing wimp when it came to relationships. Thus, all these suitors were self-absorbed users who saw me as the biddable little woman to suit their needs.

What I'm trying to say is: the novels do reflect real life, but not the healthy version.