The Marriage Book (46 page)

Anybody could make a case, and a hell of a good case, against your getting married. The arguments are so obvious that nobody has to make them. But you’re two wonderful people who happened to fall in love and happen to have a pigmentation problem, and I think that now, no matter what kind of a case some bastard could make against your getting married, there would be only one thing worse, and that would be if—knowing what you two are, knowing what you two have, and knowing what you two feel—you didn’t get married.

Well, Tillie, when the hell are we gonna get some dinner?

WOODY ALLEN

LOVE AND DEATH
, 1975

Many of the films of Woody Allen (see
Divorce
) are send-ups of genre pieces, and one of his earliest,
Love and Death
, offers a pastiche of great Russian fiction, with its tradition of complex emotional relationships and philosophical exploration. The following deadpan exchange is between cousins Natasha, played by Jessica Harper, and Sonja, played by Diane Keaton.

ALAIN DE BOTTON

“WHY BOOKS DO NOT PREPARE US FOR REAL LOVE,” 2011

Born in Switzerland and living in London, Alain de Botton (1969–) has written extensively and philosophically on love, art, literature, and travel. Lecturer, radio commentator, and founder of a London enterprise called the School of Life, he became popular for books including
How Proust Can Change Your Life
and for a weekly
BBC News Magazine
column, in which the following passage appeared.

We are taught to imagine that romantic love might be akin to Christian love, a universal emotion that would allow us to declare “I will love you for everything that you are.” A love without conditions or boundaries, a love that is the embodiment of acceptance.

But the arguments that even the closest couples experience are a reminder that Christian love does not well survive the transition into the bedroom. Its message seems more suited to the universal than the particular, to the love of all men for all women, to the love of two companions who will not hear each other clipping their toe-nails.

Married love teaches us that we bring all of ourselves into a marriage—anxiety, boredom, free-floating sadness and alarm. I continue sometimes to feel unhappy about my work, to worry about my future and to be disappointed with myself and with my friends. Except that now, rather than sharing my sorrows, I tend to blame the person who lives beside me for them. My wife isn’t just a witness to my problems; on a bad day, she can sadly end up being held responsible for them.

M

MATH

ARTHUR SCHOPENHAUER

“OF WOMEN,” 1851

German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860), a renowned pessimist who focused on the continual thwarting of the human will, believed fervently in the inherent weakness of women. This passage was a building block of Schopenhauer’s argument for polygamy, which he contended would spare women the fate to which monogamy condemned so many: to be left unmarried and unprotected, vulnerable to the lure of prostitution, and ultimately even less equal to men than they naturally were.

The laws of marriage prevailing in Europe consider the woman as the equivalent of the man—start, that is to say, from a wrong position. In our part of the world where monogamy is the rule, to marry means to halve one’s rights and double one’s duties. Now, when the laws gave women equal rights with man, they ought to have also endowed her with a masculine intellect. But the fact is, that just in proportion as the honors and priveleges which the laws accord to women exceed the amount which nature gives, is there a diminution in the number of women who really participate in these priveleges, and all the remainder are deprived of their natural rights by just so much is given over and above their share.

SAMUEL BUTLER

LETTER TO ELIZA MARY ANN SAVAGE, 1884

British author Samuel Butler (1835–1902) always gets credit for this quote about essayist Thomas Carlyle and his wife, Jane. The comment is alternately interpreted as a reference to the Carlyles’ well-known belligerence and to the often-rumored platonic nature of their marriage. Butler’s witticism was in fact the answer to the question in a letter from Eliza Savage, a set-up line if ever there was one: “Are you not glad that Mr. and Mrs. Carlyle were married to one another, and not to other people?”

Yes, it was very good of God to let Carlyle and Mrs. Carlyle marry one another and so make only two people miserable instead of four.

OSCAR WILDE

THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING EARNEST
, 1895

Married with two children, Irish writer Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) was arrested and imprisoned for “gross indecency” just seven weeks after the triumphant London opening of
The Importance of Being Earnest
. The charge concerned Wilde’s presumed affair with Alfred Douglas, son of the Marquess of Queensbury, whom the playwright had sued for libel. The arrest effectively ended the play’s run and destroyed Wilde’s playwriting career. But wife Constance Lloyd—while changing her own and their children’s names and denying Wilde parental rights—remained married to him.

In the play’s first act, Algernon and Jack reveal that each has created a useful fictional persona who allows for certain freedoms: Jack is “Earnest” in town and “Jack” in the country; Algernon has a sick friend named Bunbury whose constant brushes with death demand a lot of quick exits for bedside visits.

AMBROSE BIERCE

THE DEVIL’S DICTIONARY
, 1911

A journalist, short-story writer, and dark satirist, Ambrose Gwinnett Bierce (1842–circa 1913) was a longtime columnist for San Francisco–area newspapers, including William Randolph Hearst’s
Examiner
. His marriage was a messy one that ended in divorce and was followed by his ex-wife’s suicide. His own life ended mysteriously sometime after December 26, 1913, when he was covering the Mexican Revolution. All things considered, the definition of marriage in the satirical lexicon for which he is best known was relatively benign.

Marriage, n. The state or condition of a community consisting of a master, a mistress and two slaves, making in all, two.

IAN FLEMING

DIAMONDS ARE FOREVER
, 1956

Author of the hugely popular James Bond novels, Ian Fleming (1908–1964) brought his World War II experience in Britain’s naval intelligence service to the creation of the irresistible Agent 007. The books—as well as the two dozen movies they spawned—could be counted on for intricate plots, outlandish contraptions, and outrageously named “Bond girls,” including Pussy Galore, Holly Goodhead, and, in the scene below, the stunning diamond smuggler Tiffany Case.

In 1952, Fleming married Ann Charteris after their affair was discovered by her then-husband, the second Viscount Rothermere. They remained married until his death twelve years later.

“Are you married?” She paused. “Or anything?”

“No. I occasionally have affairs.”

“So you’re one of those old-fashioned men who like sleeping with women. Why haven’t you ever married?”

“I expect because I think I can handle life better on my own. Most marriages don’t add two people together. They subtract one from the other.”

MONEY

HÉLOÏSE

LETTER TO ABELARD, 12TH CENTURY

Peter Abelard was a renowned French philosopher, Héloïse d’Argenteuil (circa 1098–1164) the niece of Notre Dame’s Canon Fulbert. Smitten with the much younger Héloïse, Abelard arranged to be hired as her live-in teacher. They became lovers, conceived a child, then married secretly—but were forced apart after Fulbert had Abelard castrated. Héloïse ended up in a nunnery. Their story has stood for centuries as an emblem of enduring, unrepentant love in the face of family and societal disapproval, brutal retribution, and ultimate separation. Though apart, they remained married and began a long, passionate correspondence.

’Tis not Love, but the Desire of Riches and Honour, which makes Women run into the Embraces of an indolent Husband. Ambition, not Affection, forms such Marriages. I believe indeed they may be followed with some Honours and Advantages, but I can never think that this is the Way to enjoy the Pleasures of an affectionate Union, nor to feel those secret and charming Emotions of Hearts that have long strove to be united. These Martyrs of Marriage pine always for larger Fortunes, which they think they have lost. The Wife sees Husbands richer than her own, and the Husband Wives better portioned than his. Their interested Vows occasion Regret, and Regret produces Hatred. They soon part, or always desire it. This restless and tormenting Passion punishes them for aiming at other Advantages by Love than Love itself.

EDITORIAL

THE NATIONAL ADVOCATE
, 1817

Universal concepts: the search for a wife, the search for a fortune, the use of advertising in pursuit of both. Personal ads date as far back as the 1700s.

We perceive in a Boston paper, that a young gentleman, in easy circumstances, advertises for a wife; his description of her qualities is interesting enough, and combine almost every advantage calculated to make the marriage state agreeable: doubtless conceiving, that which his descriptive
powers were awakened, it would be well enough to give the picture a high and fanciful coloring; but he spoils all by saying, that she must possess a fortune of from ten to twenty thousand dollars. Now, under favour, a wife such as he describes would be a fortune in herself. He also has omitted to describe
his
qualities and attainments, doubtless considering that his, having “a fine house furnished,” is a sufficient inducement, and having the cage he can easily get the bird. There is something new in this mode of advertising for a wife in the same manner as we would for a farm or a valet; and, on the score of sentiment, there is not much to be admired. The success of the “young gentleman” may be considered very problematical.

SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE

TABLE TALK
, 1824

Perhaps best known for his poems “Kubla Khan” and “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner,” Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834) was well enough established as a literary critic, poet, and biographer, even during his life, to have fragments of his sayings collected and published in the book
Table Talk
. His statement below notwithstanding, Coleridge was unhappily married for many years, with part of the strain due to the tension between financial income and literary output.

Show me one couple unhappy merely on account of their limited circumstances, and I will show you ten who are wretched from other causes.

“A FATHER’S ADVICE TO HIS DAUGHTER,”

PENNSYLVANIA INQUIRER AND NATIONAL GAZETTE
, 1843

These words of advice, often reprinted in newspapers, were, as was typical of the genre, written anonymously.

Your mother was a woman of family: I had a large fortune; these were the sole considerations that influenced our parents to join us together. I have lost my fortune, she has lost her rank; forgot by her family: what doth it signify to her that she was born a lady? In the midst of our distress, the union of our hearts made up for every thing; the conformity of our tastes made us choose this retirement. We live happy in our poverty; each is to the other a friend and
companion. [You are] our common treasure; we thank the Almighty for giving [you], and taking away every thing else.