Some of you have been interested in the essays I write for uni, and not just for fandom reasons, so here's 2,641 words for you:
(I did get a high distinction but remember it's student quality and not at all peer-reviewed so treat it as you would any random blog post that hasn't been professionally verified. It's also been put into a database-thing now so will show up as plagiarised work just in case a google search lead some desperate student here - don't even try it. All sources are at the bottom.)
Genteel Birth and Education vs Money: What Miss Bates in Jane Austen’s Emma (1816) and Magwitch in Charles Dickens’s Great Expectations (1860-61) Reveal About Class.
Charles Dickens’s Great Expectations (1860-61) and Jane Austen’s Emma (1816) are uniquely suited for comparison, taking place within fifty miles of each other (Austen 344; Dickens 3) and the action of the latter (Modert 57) occurring between volumes I and II of the former (Meckier 158). With Great Expectations exploring upwards social mobility, and Emma concerned with many characters hovering on the boundary of gentility, they offer a glimpse into the intricate financial and social rules governing class, especially the extremes along that class barrier. In this essay I argue that belonging to the genteel class requires more than money, and the examples of Miss Bates’s genteel poverty and Magwitch’s fortune without gentility reveal how the true markers of class are birth and education, whilst the power of money is limited.
Pip’s yearly income after coming of age is “five hundred pounds … until the donor of the whole appears” (Dickens 288). According to a contemporary economy book, £500/year supports a family, two maid-servants, and a man-servant (Colburn 429). As “a typical government fund paid 5% a year, or only 4% in the case of a small investment” (Toran) this income required capital of at least £10,000-£12,500. The increased rate after Magwitch returns is considered sufficient for Pip to move from Baynard’s Inn (Dickens 170) to “a ‘fashionable crib’ near Hyde Park” (345) and Magwitch expects it to support “horses, and carriages” (342) in the plural. Carriages weren’t recommended until incomes of £750/year (Colburn 431), two aren’t until £1,500/year (440-441) which makes Magwitch’s fortune a staggering minimum of £30,000, similar to Emma Woodhouse (Austen 128).
By comparison, “Mrs. and Miss Bates have only £100/year” (Toran) and are at the bottom limit of genteel poverty, reliant on neighbours for additional comforts (Austen 162; 221). Their fortune must be only about £2,000-£2,500 and since “between 1790 and 1814 [wholesale prices] roughly doubled” (Ashton 142) inflation has effectively made them consistently poorer. But money doesn’t inherently alter either’s class: “[Mr. Knightley] insists that due deference be paid to the gentility of the Bateses, regardless of their present poverty” (Delany 544), and Matthew Taft feels “Magwitch exposes the fallacy self-transcendence imbedded in the romance of upward mobility” (1980), so for both, class and wealth remain separate.
Magwitch’s fortune has limited ability to improve his standing, especially as the money has “‘low’ origins in a convict’s earnings” (McBratney 538) which is even worse than trade, which “gradually may be diluted by withdrawal from active business and the adoption of genteel manners” (Delany 540). Even Pip, the beneficent, “recoils from the way this wealth was accumulated,” (Taft 1980) and considers it “not likely ever to enrich me in reputation, station, fortune, anything” (Dickens 359), ultimately deciding to give up all advantages it brought him (342). Something money can do is provide the “neckcloth, waistcoat, trousers, boots, of a member of society” (174) and other genteel trappings which impress Magwitch (320). But being a gentleman was more than appearances: “the hospitality, the apparel, the travelling, the company, the recreations, the marriage of gentlemen” (Fuller 385) are distinct from the “low-lived bad way” (Dickens 65) of commoners. “Company-manners” (192) must be learnt from one already familiar with them, such as Miss Bates, who was taught from infancy by parents “whose counsels and example would have been your best guide to all that was amiable and praise worthy” (West 9). Magwitch’s money enables Pip to reside with Herbert, whom he asks to “give me a hint whenever her saw me at a loss or going wrong” (178), but Pip’s not yet an adult, and gets to come of age able to begin establishing his reputation as genteel, whereas fully-grown Magwitch is already set in his ways and has an established criminal history. Paul Delany notes “it is not enough to look right; one must be right. What counts most are breeding, ‘connection,’ and ‘consequence,’ which are not sold in shops” (541) and we see Magwitch create a facsimile of participating in genteel culture when he’s served a drink by Pip (317) and asks him to read books (339) but his impropriety and inability to understand the foreign language show how far he is from gentility.
Even removing the convict elements, Magwitch’s behaviours are established as the opposite of gentlemen: on fighting, Ed Krzemienski says “a gentleman engages in combat only for sport and only when no just emotional cause exists. A non-gentleman, on the other hand, engages in combat only when an emotional cause exists” (91-92) and so his brawls with Compeyson (Dickens 36; 444) are “decidedly visceral in nature” (Krzemienski 92) and not those of a gentleman. Even his death sets him up an antonym of a gentleman; a popular author wrote in warning of men who make bad (and often, criminal) choices “his death is as miserable as his life hath been vicious. – A hospital is the height he hopes to be advanced to: but commonly he dies not in so charitable a prison, but sings his last note in a cage” (Fuller 390). Every element of Magwitch’s past and future seems destined to keep him distinct from the gentry in every way but wealth, and clearly that alone isn’t enough to alter his status.
Thomas Fuller, whose work The Holy State, and the Profane State was published in 1642 but reprinted during the Victorian era, proving its enduring relevance, said a gentleman “is extracted from ancient and worshipful parentage … his blood needs be well-purified who is genteelly born on both sides” (137) but makes allowances for social mobility based on merit: “if his birth be not – at least his qualities are – generous … he hath endeavoured, by his own deserts, to ennoble himself” (137). Few, except the landed gentry such as Miss Havisham and Mr. Knightley, could afford to live genteelly without earning an income, so “though to have land be a good First, yet to have learning is the surest Second” (Fuller 138) and certain occupations were compatible with gentility. But achieving genteel work was impossible for both Magwitch and Miss Bates, immediately putting them at a disadvantage of, respectively, gaining or maintaining a position in the gentry. Though “at no other time in English history was the restructuring and shuffling of society so dramatic and of such long-standing significance” (Krzemienski 88) as a homeless and unwanted child (Dickens 346), Magwitch had even less prospects and chance of upward mobility than “common labouring-boy” (60) Pip. Whom, though learning all he could from Biddy (73), when Miss Havisham didn’t offer assistance after he talked of “knowing nothing and wanting to know everything” (95) had no choice but to “go into the forge, Joe’s ‘prentice” (107) – his dreams of improving his situation crushed as he realises “to become [a gentleman] … requires the transformational magic of money” (Taft 1975).
Without a wealthy patron or connections, lowborn boys like Magwitch and Pip are excluded from the genteel occupations we see in both novels, and Pip’s later lament “I have been bred to no calling, and I am fit for nothing” (Dickens 342) shows even a gentlemanly education unequal to the specific learning individual occupations require. Magwitch faced an additional disadvantage: “if work as a trader in Egypt is worthy employment for a middle-class English gentleman, imprisonment as a convict in Australia represents the antithesis of "normal" bourgeois respectability” (McBratney 537) and he cannot escape his criminal history.
A 1794 masculine instructional book wrote “it is the duty of every British subject to obey with punctuality, promptitude, and cheerfulness, the laws of the land” (Gisborne 59) and we see through Magwitch how insurmountable failure to adhere to that is in regards to occupational prospects. Though he “was a ragged little creetur … much to be pitied” (Dickens 346) merely trying to stay alive, since it was asserted there were no unjust British laws (Gisborne 13) Magwitch received no sympathy for his crimes of childhood desperation and “got the name of being hardened” (Dickens 346). As “a scourge to society” (457) he struggled to get work even as a labourer (347), let alone improve his social credit or situation enough to secure a place in a genteel profession through merit, connections, or wealth.
It's equally impossible for Miss Bates to have an occupation to maintain her gentility, as “for women, working to support themselves was incompatible with genteel social position: they could inherit money or marry it; there were no other options” (Hume 293). In dire financial situations, such as her niece, Jane Fairfax’s, a woman might “be brought up for educating others [as a governess] … supplying the means of respectable subsistence” but it earnt a pittance and required an “excellent education … [with] first rate masters” to make one “fully competent to the office of instruction” (Austen 154). Miss Bates doesn’t possess this proficiency in diverse skills and accomplishments, as she could teach her niece “only what very limited means could command … with no advantages of connexion or improvement” (153) and thus represents “the vulnerability of women who could not support themselves in any reliably lucrative profession and could only pray that they would strike it lucky on the marriage market” (Hume 310). Of course, Miss Bates is likely to be a lifelong spinster, but it’s oversimplification to say her only options in youth were marriage or to live “devoted to the care of a failing mother, and the endeavour to make a small income go as far as possible” (Austen 22) as marriage itself should be two categories: respectable, and socially inferior.
Miss Bates’s “status cannot be diminished by economic misfortune” (Delany 536) nor personal disadvantages like having “never boasted either beauty or cleverness” (Austen 22) or being “tiresome” (158), so as the genteelly born daughter “of a former vicar of Highbury” (22), she clings to her class… unless she marries beneath it. Jane West warns that “many a wife will have reason to envy the respectability and happiness of the old maid, and to regret that the silly ridicule attached to that name precipitated her into a ruinous and miserable connexion” (376). These unsuitable marriages are ones where dispositions clash, the groom has poor character, there’s little to live on (376-379) but also where the disparity in class (but explicitly not wealth) is too great, as “everyone is happiest in the state of life to which they have been accustomed” (380). A woman assumed her husband’s class, so Miss Hawkins, daughter of a moderately successful Bristol merchant, “brought no name, no blood, no alliance” (Austen 172) when she became Mrs. Elton. Yet, thanks to the “advantage of the status [she] gained through marriage” (Delany 546) she can condescend to Jane Fairfax, and call her “inferior” (Austen 263), despite Jane being “more genteel than [Mrs. Elton] is” (Delany 545), and Emma is obliged to pay her respects by calling on her (Austen 251) and maintain an acquaintance despite determining her to be “a little upstart, vulgar being, with … all her airs of pert pretension and underbred finery” (259).
But crucially, this social mobility also happens in reverse, a minor example being Mrs. Herbert, of “so aristocratic a disposition” (Dickens 191) as the daughter of a knight with delusions of baronetcy (only one rung below the peerage) marrying a working gentleman without title, land, nor fortune (189) and becoming “the object of a queer sort of respectful pity” (190). It’s this fear which prompts Emma encouraging Harriet, whom she falsely believes to be “a gentleman’s daughter,” to reject “gentleman-farmer” Robert Martin (Austen 61), as she considers him “the richest of the two, but he is undoubtedly her inferior as to rank in society … It would be a degradation (60). The uncertainties around Harriet’s belonging to the genteel class (Delany 540) mean her “only way of achieving such ‘permanence’ is by a marriage into the gentry” (543) and gaining the status of her husband – and when she does marry Robert we see “the intimacy between her and Emma must sink” (Austen 451) as Harriet has assumed her husband’s working-class status. But that a prosperous and “very respectable young man” (59) would marry a penniless girl undisputably inferior in every way (except beauty) to Jane Fairfax, “one of the most lovely and accomplished young women in England” (376), implies that men in similar circumstances would view marrying Jane far more beneficially than most men of the gentry – but that’s never even mentioned as a possibility.
It’s possible “when tenant farmers (Robert Martin) or tradespeople (the Coles) become sufficiently prosperous and mannered, they can win social acceptance from the gentry” (Delany, 540) but until that happens the hard life of a governess is preferred to comparative luxury and freedom gained from marrying them when the price is dropping down a class. Thus, though Hume states “the foundational reality underlying all of Austen's novels is painfully simple: a genteel woman must either have money or marry money,” (293) I argue there are limits – just as Emma had “objection to Harriet Smith’s marrying a man [Robert Martin] who is much better off than she is” (Delany 534) on the basis of class, so too would Miss Bates object on her own account if offered the chance, as retaining gentility is more valuable than fiscal comfort or creating a family of her own.
The theme of marriage being an important class indicator and chance for advancement repeats in Great Expectations. Herbert and Estella are introduced to see if they get along and may’ve been betrothed if the visit was successful (Dickens 176), but he eventually marries Clara, who’s noted to be “rather below [his] mother’s nonsensical family notions” (252) as she’s without family name or history. With the advancement of his prospects, Pip comes to believe he’s destined for Estella, and “to restore the desolate house … do all the shining deeds of the young Knight of romance, and marry the Princess” (231). He loves Estella (243) but his thoughts adopt a feudal tone as he considers that the marriage will rise his status from gentleman of education and wealth to landed gentry. But so far Magwitch is from having made an advantageous match, that he married “over the broomstick” (393), and thus invalidly and not in accordance with the Clandestine Marriages Act 1753.
Even after growing richer than anyone else in the colony (317) as the colonialists’ opinions remained “he was a convict, a few year ago, and is a ignorant common fellow now, for all he’s lucky” (321) and Pip’s initial motivation of removing Magwitch from London was “to rid himself of the stain of criminal association” (Taft 1980) we see the impossibility for Magwitch to start fresh, which prevents his ability to ever make a good marriage. As gentlewomen must be “careful and most tender of [their] credit and reputation … a small touch may wound and kill it; which makes her very cautious what company she keeps” they are advised to “avoid all privacy with suspicious company” (Fuller 284), and thus Magwitch would never even have the chance to court a lady at the bottom of gentility such as Miss Bates, because, as established, his money is not as important a consideration as her birth and status.
To conclude, whilst money is needed to supply the means of learning the traits of the gentility and assume its appearance, Magwitch proves money alone isn’t enough, and so he uses Pip as “an objectification of the gentlemen he can never become” (Taft 1979). In fact, in looking to Miss Bates, we see evidence that “the influence of birth and rank was more beneficial to the community at large, than that of wealth” (West 107) and fortune was unnecessary to maintain genteel respectability once firmly established. Other factors, such as education, birth, connections, and behaviour, are a more powerful indicator of gentility and are impossible to gain with fortune alone.
--------------
Works Cited
“An Act for the Better Preventing of Clandestine Marriages.” Eighteenth Century Collections Online, printed by Thomas Baskett; and by the assigns of Robert Baskett, 1753.
Ashton, T. S. The Industrial Revolution 1760-1830. Oxford University Press, London. 1964.
Austen, Jane. Emma. 1816. Penguin Books Australia Ltd, 2003.
Colburn, Henry. A New System of Practical Domestic Economy. 1823. Shackell and Baylis, London, 1828.
Delany, Paul. “‘A Sort of Notch in the Donwell Estate’: Intersections of Status and Class in Emma.” Eighteenth-Century Fiction, vol. 12, no. 4, 2000, pp. 533–48.
Dickens, Charles. Great Expectations. 1860-61. Penguin Books Australia Ltd, 2003.
Fuller, Thomas. The Holy State, and the Profane State. 1642. Thomas Tegg, London, 1841.
Gisborne, Thomas, 1758-1846. An Enquiry Into the Duties of Men In the Higher And Middle Classes of Society In Great Britain: Resulting From Their Respective Stations, Professions, And Employments. Printed by J. Davis, for B. and J. White, London. 1794.
Hume, Robert D. “Money in Jane Austen.” The Review of English Studies, vol. 64, no. 264, 2013, pp. 289–31.
Krzemienski, Ed. “For Fun or Function? Recreation and Class in Great Expectations.” Aethlon (San Diego, Calif.), vol. 16, no. 2, 1999, pp. 85-96.
McBratney, John. “Reluctant Cosmopolitanism in Dickens’s ‘Great Expectations’.” Victorian Literature and Culture, vol. 38, no. 2, 2010, pp. 529–46,
Meckier, Jerome. “Dating the Action in ‘Great Expectations’: A New Chronology.” Dickens Studies Annual, vol. 21, 1992, pp. 157-94.
Modert, Jo. “Chronology within the Novels.” The Jane Austen Companion, ed. J. David Grey et al, Scribner, New York, 1986, pp. 53-9.
Taft, Matthew. “The Work of Love: Great Expectations and the English Bildungsroman.” Textual Practice, vol. 34, no. 12, 2020, pp. 1969–88.
Toran, Katherine. “The Economics of Jane Austen’s World.” Persuasions: The Jane Austen Journal Online, vol. 36, no. 1, 2015.
West, Jane. Letters to a Young Lady, in Which the Duties and Character of Women Are Considered, Chiefly with a Reference to Prevailing Opinions. Longman, Hurst, Rees and Orme, London. 1806.
___________________
Read more (casual) research | My Ao3
(and sorry to be self-promoting but if you did enjoy this and would like to see more essays and fanfic donating to my ko-fi really helps as it can allow me a night off cooking etc and give me more time and energy for the research and creativity I love to do)
