Friday, February 17, 2012

Betty by the Numbers: Marriages

Harlequin author Catherine Spencer has a story on the Harlequin website of a modern-day marriage of convenience – her widowed dental hygienist, with two young daughters, married the widower of her best friend, who had two young sons.  They thought it would be best for the kids, so they created a happy family for several years and divorced after the kids were grown.  Sounds better than Consuelo Vanderbilt’s experience in being threatened and emotionally blackmailed into marrying the Duke of Marlborough to satisfy her mother’s social ambitions – that marriage ended after two sons and eleven years, though the divorce didn’t happen for another 15 years, and then they managed an annulment five years after that, apparently on grounds that the bride married against her will and the groom did it for the money.  It makes a love match sound rather appealing, doesn’t it?

 

The Duke and Duchess of Marlborough, 1895 – the former Miss Vanderbilt needed the veil because, though famously beautiful, she is rumored to have cried throughout her wedding.




That said, any rich, Dutch doctor who needs a gracious hostess for his dinner parties and mousey Mama to his flighty late-wife’s children is welcome to call on me – assuming he doesn’t mind a little wear on the tires, if you will.  I am great at all that hostessing stuff, and Betty Beth has already volunteered to take the kiddies for a few hours a week, and I would be suitably appreciative – no gushing – of shopping sprees at Harrod’s and a devoted household staff.  (Drifts off into pleasant daydream....)

Actually, only one quarter of Betty’s marriages are convenient.  I tend to avoid the MOC stories, as the premise is so utterly and unbelievably unhappy to me.  “As I am now almost forty, and you are 26, we’re probably both willing to spend the rest of our lives without so much as speeding past the Brighton city limits.”  Oh, no, we are not, bucko.  We’ve never been there, and we understand that mutual affection, respect and a socking great allowance paid quarterly are important components of a successful union, but we’ve heard a few things about Brighton, and frankly it sounds worth exploring in the right company.  Anyway, it turns out I’ve been avoiding fewer books than I realized – and The Vicar’s Daughter (1996), which includes a MOC, was off the list anyway because I hate when the parents die in car crashes (sorry, Once for All Time).

My favorite marriage scenarios are the ones where he proposes near the end of the book, but not so near that we don’t get to see the wedding.  Cassandra by Chance (1973) is the first of seven – just 5% of the stories offer us an invitation to the wedding of two entirely happy, mutually loving people – but what a wedding: “on a cold blustery January day in the little village church on Mull... overflowing with flowers.”  The bride wears blue, to match her sapphire engagement ring.  (And seems to have her new mink coat on over the blue dress.  Am I misreading that?)  After a jolly reception at her sister’s, they change into sheepskin jackets and walk briskly up the hill to Ogre’s Relish, planning for a mixed half-dozen of baby ogres and ogresses.  Happily, there is no mention of awkward social moments with would-be suitor and minister Mr. Campbell conducting the service.

 

A sapphire-blue wedding dress – perhaps a skosh chilly for Mull in January.

 





This one will work well if he gives you an heirloom aquamarine.





If you haven’t read Philomena’s Miracle (1978) recently, do go back and tuck through those last few pages of wedding-prep and aisle-walk.  They really make a VHEA, although I do wish Betty didn’t harp so on our heroines’ looks, as if that were the primary and proper criterion for love.  If you’ve never read Philomena’s, you have a treat in store.  I’m less enamored of Eugenia and Gerard’s Heidelberg Wedding (1984).  Hands up who’d want to be proposed to, without warning, at the door of the chapel and swept in, handed a bouquet, and pointed toward the officiant.  We skip a lot of years after that, and then get four wedding scenes in ten books in 1997-2000.  Perhaps Harlequin/M&B was paying extra for satin and lace – and flowers.  Always flowers.


 The wedding chapel at Heidelberg Castle, pre-be-flowering.


With the usual caveats, I count 34 MOCs, or 25% of the 135 books.  Five of them take place early in the story, 23 happen about halfway through, and six occur toward the end – including that of the beautiful Sophie and her Rijk, who marry for convenience on page 137, and discover they really, truly do love each other on page 188, after rescuing a small child from drowning and freezing and straightening out all the confusion as to just what the curiously-likeable Irena means in Rijk’s life.

Given that seven marriages take place in the final paragraphs, that leaves 94, or 70%, to occur after the curtain falls upon our satisfyingly-snogging hero and heroine.  As the milkman in Last April Fair (1980) says “to no one in particular” after squeezing and wriggling past a blissfully-unnoticing Phylly and Pieter, “it’s a very good morning for some of us, and that’s a fact.”

While we have limited glimpses into their Afters, about 27 couples (MOC and non-MOC) show up in subsequent books, and 100% of them are blissfully happy together.  If I know anything about social sciences (and I don’t), that’s a statistically-significant sample.

Finally, let me quote from Kate Fox’s anthropological work Watching the English, recommended on this site by Betty Andrea, and many thanks to the said Betty for the tip.  Here’s Ms. Fox on weddings in England:  “We know that a wedding is supposed to be a joyous event, but in our usual Eeyorish fashion, we really see it as an ordeal, an occasion fraught with difficulties and dangers (or, as the ever-cheery Debrett’s puts it ‘a minefield for the socially insecure and a logistical nightmare for the organisers’ and, for good measure, ‘a source of inter-family tension’).  Something is bound to go drastically wrong, and someone is bound to be mortally offended – and because of our belief in the magical disinhibiting powers of alcohol, we know that the veneer of polite conviviality may crack, and the inevitable family tensions may erupt into unseemly tears and quarrels.  Even if stiff upper lips are maintained on the day, there will be grumbles and recriminations in the aftermath, and in any case, even at best, we expect the whole ritual to be rather embarrassing.”

According to Fox, the English practice “negative politeness,” which involves taking great care not to threaten the privacy of others.  This and other factors make them chronically uneasy on social occasions, like wedding receptions.  (“Positive politeness,” as practiced in the US and most western European cultures, involves seeking to include others in community – or invading their privacy.)

31 comments:

  1. When I first read Heidleburg Wedding I didn't like the abrupt wedding because *I* always thought *I* should be the one in charge of how to create *my* wedding style!!! Huh!

    But now, I don't mind the very short distance between bethrotal and altar at all. But. And a very bit but, I want all my family and close friends there as well to enjoy it and remember it for me.

    Betty Francesca

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    1. Sorry, it should read, "very BIG but,..."

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    2. I also sometimes fantasize about MOC's. But realistically, how could BN or anyone think that ANY guy would want NO urm (you know what) um when he has the um desire and wherewhital.

      IRL I don't think that would EVER happen!!!!

      Betty Francesca

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    3. Betty Francesca - I'm with you there about the Brighton part of the convenience.

      Another separate point:I can understand the MOC's where the Prof thinks he will softly woo the Betty while she's living with him in his incredible heirloom honkin' estate but what about the other issue of those guys who marry for 'companion' or to fend of other candidates. I do get worried about those professors who want to live in long term celibacy and possibly remain a virgin for the rest of their life (though happy in platonic company with their pets and er, their 'wife'). Does that mean when they do realise they are madly in love they have a sudden libido for their babes, when before it was all happily suppressed? I know, I know, Betty is never about TMI, but that's hard for me to get my head around ;-)
      Betty AnHK

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    4. I wrote a pro-Betty Neels post for a friend. (You can read it here.) In it, I make the point that any hero who can order for you at a five-star restaurant and get it right (i.e., demonstrate mind-reading, empathy, and a tendency to take control) can get it right when the car finally takes the slip road ("on ramp" in American parlance) to Brighton.

      More to the point, The Great Betty's heroes struck me as men with awesome powers of compartmentalization. There's work, there's home (which means hiring the Jollys, but still the hero is aware the Jollys will need his counsel from time to time), there's family (visits to his mother, visits from his impetuous younger sister, long car trips to rescue/deal with ill nieces or nephews), and then there's romance. Most of them have decided to forgo romance, until Miss Charity Patience Virtue shows up.

      So, while it's never stated expressly, I figure the heroes have a compartment, currently boarded up, for S*E*X. Just because he's not the kind of guy to lust after someone doesn't mean he doesn't have an extremely detailed government survey map for Brighton tucked away in his glove box (glove compartment in American parlance).

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    5. Betty Magdalen, I could not have explained it any better (read: as well as you).
      That's exactly my viewpoint.
      Betty Anonymous

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    6. Betty Barbara here--
      Good explanation on our RDD's mind set. Well said.

      ps--I couldn't get your link to work. It took me to a 'page not found'. Am I missing something?

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    7. That seems to have worked! (Sorry about the glitch before.)

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    8. Betty Magdalen,
      The Spirit of Betty in a Nutshell! Lovely pictures too.
      Betty Anonymous

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    9. Betty Barbara here--
      Thanks Betty Magdalen--You nailed it. Finest mac & cheese, indeed (and I do love the mac & cheese!)
      Re: Betty's ability to write good, clear sentences-see my remarks about another author's inability to do so HERE .

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    10. Betty Madgalen - a double barrel of thanks. Now its clearer - its good comparmentalisation skills and the Professor has some fine files right? And the one marked Brighton is about to be fully opened by the heroine with exploded pages thrown out everywhere in fine flurry, well, in between the compartments for a myriad of other good things like fastidious driving, operating and relatives/retainers...I geddit now.

      Very good metaphor to relate sophisticated, suave fine dining orders with the RDD's prowess in Sussex. Am sure he'd be awesome in a long, detailed, layered degustation menu selection. And he's have all the wines perfectly matched with a impeccable taste righteo! dirty giggles ;-)

      p.s. your guest post was lovely paen to the wisdom of Betty Neels
      Betty AnHK

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    11. All of Betty's tiptoeing around the RDD's BFL (Brighton Familiarity Level)reminds me of the "fiddle dee dee" scene in Sleepless in Seattle, between Annie and her mother. Let's ignore the Brighton-shaped elephant in the room, shall we? We shall!

      Betty von Susie

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  2. Haha love that line from the milkman! Always finished that book with a stupid grin on my face thanks to him. :)

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    1. I also like the one where he says (loosely paraphrasing), "They say it's love that makes the world go round, and, by golly, it's fairly whizzing."

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  3. I don't know, I like the Marriage of Convenience ones... It just seems very sweet and old-fashioned to me, just the right flavor of wistful hoping for happiness and gentle friends-that-fall-in-love for my taste. But then again I like the other ones, too - I guess I just love seeing how Mrs. Neels wrote the weddings!

    Before this year I'd only attended five weddings (and two of them I was too young to remember), all for my uncles... and I loved getting a glimpse of other weddings and how British ceremonies worked compared to the Catholic ones in my family: special licenses and the vicar down the lane and the flowers done by the church ladies and the need for a new and becoming hat.

    (Of course, this year all my friends seemed to get married at once... five weddings this year alone!! I guess I'm at that age where all my friends are turning into wives. Wonder if my boyfriend is getting any ideas!)

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  4. Love the pic of that Heidlburg Church wedding altar. It is very beautiful. Betty Francesca

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    1. Betty Barbara here--
      *snork* Sorry it took me so long to post, but it has taken me a while to stop laughing at the blue dress! So obviously NOT a wedding dress, I'm not sure I would even wear it to a costume masquerade.
      Now the aquamarine one--not for a wedding, of course, but it is a very pretty dress, IMHO. If I were tall and willowy, I could see myself wearing it for a fancy ball, with the RDD as escort, of course.

      In all seriousness, I always pictured Cassandra's dress as something very like THIS . Would look good with a mink coat topper, wouldn't it?

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    2. For the sapphire one, without the sleeves, and in white, it's identical to a lot of wedding dresses I've seen, right down to the beading/crystals.

      But my question is, how on EARTH do those sleeve things stay on? Elastic? Duct tape? Staples? I am so confused.

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    3. Betty Barbara, I love your candidate. I always like the idea of velvet in winter, and so propose this for Cassandra - with a longer sleeve, maybe slightly belled.

      Betty Beth, the magic wand is what keeps those sleeves up, silly goose.

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    4. Hilarious, Betty van der Betsy about the 'magic wand', silly us!!!!
      I think my sister wore a dress like that to her prom, hideous but exciting too, it says magical party when there there's no where to go. Tee hee.

      That other chiffony tiered blue dress is gorgeous, just the perfect deliciously romantic fall of evening gown for Julia to swan languidly around in Brideshead Revisited.
      Betty AnHK

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  6. I can see the case for the British practicing negative politeness. But if our venerable Betty is to believed, that is a behavior mostly ascribed to Londoners or the upper class. How many times do we see rural English families being a "community" around our unfortunate heroines?

    Nevertheless, I'm glad the British royals broadcasted their last two big weddings. To get live, front-row view of an event that people in centuries past only craned their necks at is (to me) still mind-boggling.

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  7. You guys are hilarious!

    I noticed that there is a lot of negative politeness for most MOC BN weddings. If I practiced negative politeness for my wedding, MOC or not, my family and friends would kill me. Hah! In my mind, there is always a guest list of about 200!

    It always irked me that hero wanted no one to show up for his wedding. And that the heroine gladly agreed to it. ??? Is there some invisible British law, Betty Magdalen, that says one should always agree to a negative politeness for ones wedding and it def would not offend your husband's numerous cousins????

    Betty Francesca

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  8. our heros always remark when asked, "oh, my family won't mind not coming to my wedding!" ???
    Since when do family members of the female origin not mind going to a close beloved's wedding?????

    huh

    Betty Francesca

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  9. I say! The Former Miss Vonderbilt should have known better. It was taken for granted "in the olden days" that royalty and aristocrats married by order of the king! Check your Henry VIII history books. If you didn't marry with his permission, you got your head cut off. She should have submitted with grace to a loveless marriage for the sake of prestige and money! Love never came into it. It was icing. Then she should have read more BN novels (or their equivalent) where one learns that MOC couples fall in love in the weeks subsequent to ceremony. Read any historical novels for proof!
    Betty Francesca

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  10. I have not yet encountered a MoC Neels. !!! I love MoC novels.

    Dare I ask if there is a list of these?

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    1. Betty Victoria, a very partial list, with one novel from each of three Betty phases (the all-nurse, the partial-nurse, and the pretty-much-no-nurses phases): The Moon for Lavinia, Never Too Late, and Dearest Eulalia. Each of these earned the coveted Queen of Puddings rating from The Founding Bettys. There are 31 others as well; let me know when you're ready for more.

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  11. I love MoC Neels, also! There is something lovely about the books in which the heroine is finding her feet in her new household. I love the scenes in Harrods buying a new wardrobe, or mooching around town with a handbag full of cash and all day to spend it. For me, it almost seems to be a time where the downtrodden Araminta becomes independent and free of her cares ALONE before the HEA. I also love any scene in which the MoC couple is together at night... washing dishes, eating sandwiches together at the table, etc. More of a frisson because they are married!

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  12. All Else Confusion - MOC couple Annis and Jake
    'It's all perfect,' she told him seriously. 'Did you plan it all yourself?' The little mocking smile she hated curled his mouth. 'Fishing, darling? Am I to feel flattered, though I can hardly expect jealousy—that's for those in love,isn't it? Just female curiosity? I did most of it myself, but the odd feminine touch was added by whichever girl-friend happened to be here taking an interest.' He added in quite a different voice: 'You needn't mind, Annis, none of them mattered.'

    What exactly did the Great Betty expect us to read into those lines?

    Years Happy Ending MOC couple Gideon and Deborah (after she declined his first proposal)
    'I think I've forgotten how to love, and I'm not sure that I want to fall in love again — there are plenty of girls around who come easily and go just as easily — perhaps I'm getting too old.' 'You're not even middle aged. ...'
    Betty Anonymous

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    1. If we can explain Betty with Betty, she meant that the men dated these past girlfriends because they were either (a.) lonely, (b.) wanted to be amused, (c.) gave up on finding the girl described as "I didn't know there were girls like you left in the world," or (d.) was chased by the woman. But these past girlfriends were Veronica types who didn't have hearts to break. He wouldn't ever trifle with the Aramintas. I think the only Veronica who felt truly hurt (i.e., didn't have someone already in the wings) by being spurned was Elisabeth in End of the Rainbow.

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