The Role Of Marriage In Moll Flanders

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Moll Flanders is a woman of great knowledge and drive, which she attempts to utilize to further herself in society and wealth. In the 18th century, there was a vast divide in the role that men and women have to play in society, both trying to gain advantages for themselves in their lives. Moll runs into the problem of marriage throughout her whole life, especially when it comes to her reflecting on society after her marriage to the linen draper who went bankrupt. In this scene, Moll depicts men as all-powerful to suggest that women are dependent to society's standards in order to have an opportunity to obtain wealth and status through marriage. Through Moll, Defoe examines marriage as an economic exchange between men and women, yet the unequal …show more content…

Men hold all the power in society in relationships and women because Moll is not able to raise her position in society without the status of a married woman. An issue that Moll runs into is the distribution of choice that men and women in society must adhere to. When looking for the next prospective husband, Moll has to yield to the fact that "The Men had such Choice every where" in accordance to women and future wives (112). Defoe utilizes this phrase to demonstrate that women are subject to men's wishes or choice of which female they choose to spend the rest of their life with. This emphasis is given to the readers to portray the limited distribution of choice women have in society because they are unable to marry a man they truly would want to marry. Women must find a match that suits them, but are limited because they have no control over which man chooses them. Because a woman gains all this wealth and status in a marriage, "Women had lost the Privilege of saying No" due to the fact that there was a shortage in proposals and a woman did not want to risk losing the possibly of security (112). Defoe sees the marriage market as a sort of supply and demand where men and women are vying for the best prospective partner, making it prominent focus in the book because the marriage market controls a woman's life. Because all women are trying to achieve the same goal of being married, society has made marriage a necessity for women in life and in turn, has made women dependent on

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