Shirley Keeldar Finding the Words For Me

I've been poking the idea of love for...ever, and without much, if any, success. Love sounds like it sucks. I've seen people torn up, given up, even thrown up for the sake of love. Igh.

So I thought I shouldn't and couldn't have it. It would be horrible, I would be wretched, and it would end badly. Why would I want that? Aren't I rational enough to avoid it at all costs? Well, I do; except within my thoughts, the most important place of all. Greeeaaat.

The following excerpt is a conversation between Shirley Keeldar and her uncle, who wants her to reconsider marrying the already rejected Sir Philip Nunnely. I've found something of a solution, and much reassurance, in her words.

"...what are your intentions, Miss Keeldar?"
"In what respect?"
"In respect of matrimony."
"To be quiet--and to do just as I please."
"Just as you please! The words are to the last degree indecorous."
"Mr. Sympson, I advise you not to become insulting: you know I will not bear that."
"You read French. Your mind is is poisoned with French novels. You have imbibed French principles."
"The ground you are treading now returns a mighty hollow sound under your feet. Beware!"
"It will end in infamy, sooner or later. I have forseen it all along."
"Do you assert, sir, that something in which I am concerned will end in infamy?"
"That it will--that it will. You said just now you would act as you please. You acknowledge no rules--no limitations."
"Silly stuff! and vulgar as silly!"
"Regardless of decorum, you are prepared to fly in the face of propriety."
"You tire me, uncle."
"What, madam--what could be your reasons for refusing Sir Philip?"
"At last, there is another sensible question: I shall be glad to reply to it. Sir Philip is too young for me: I regard him as a boy: all his relations--his mother especially--would be annoyed if he married me: such a step would embroil him with them: I am not his equal in the world's estimation."
"Is that all?"
"Our dispositions are not compatible."
"Why, a more amiable gentleman never breathed."
"He is very amiable--very excellent--truly estimable, but not my master: not in one point. I could not trust myself with his happiness: I would not undertake the keeping of it for thousands: I will accept no hand which cannot hold me in check."
"I thought you liked to do as you please: you are vastly inconsistent."
"When I promise to obey, it will be under the conviction that I can keep that promise: I could not obey a youth like Sir Philip. Besides. he would never command me: he would expect me always to rule--to guide, and I have no taste whatever for that office."
"You have no taste for swaggering, and subduing, and ruling?"
"Not my husband: only my uncle."
"What is the difference?"
"There is a slight difference: that is certain. And I know full well, any man who wishes to live in decent comfort with me as a husband must be able to control me."
"I wish you had a real tyrant."
"A tyrant would not hold me for a day--not for an hour. I would rebel--break from him--defy him."
"Are you not enough to bewilder one's brain with your self-contradiction?"
"It is evident I belwilder your brain."
"You talk of Sir Philip being young: he is two and twenty."
"My husband must be thirty, with a sense of forty."
"You had better pick out some old man--some white-headed or bald-headed swain."
"No, thank you."
"You could lead some doting fool: you might pin him to your apron."
"I might do that with a boy: but it is not my vocation. Did I not say I prefer a master? One in whose presence I shall feel obligated and disposed to be good. One whose control my impatient temper must acknowledge. A man whose approbation can reward--whose displeasure punish me. A man I shall feel it impossible not to love, and very possible to fear."
"What is there to hinder you from doing al this with Sir Philip? He is a baronet a man of rank, property, connexions, far above yours. If you talk of intellect, he is a poet: he writes verses: which you, I take it, cannot do, with all your cleverness."
"Neither his title, wealth, pedigree, nor poetry, avail to invest him with the power I describe. These are feather-weights: they want ballast: a measure of sound, solid practical sense would have stood him in better stand with me."
"You an Henry rave about poetry: you used to catch fire like tinder on the subject when you were a girl."
"Oh! uncle, there is nothing really valuable in this world, there is nothing glorious in this world to come, that is not poetry!"
"Marry a poet, then, in God's name!"
"Show him me, and I will."
"Sir Philip."
"Not at all. You are almost as good a poet as he."

These are the only circumstances under which I will consider love or matrimony.

It's rather eye-openning: Shirley's sentiments concerning love are the basis of my own, and I feal beneath her levity the soul of the women I very may well become, should I live so long. Oh, Caroline Helstone shares my frame of mind, to be sure, as well as the determined and pointed actions felt towards those we hold close and those we dislike; however, my innermost workings, those impulsive and irrepressible emotions which truly define a person, as well as the unshakable ideals which were self-engraved from the beginning of our existence--those I share with Shirley.

I feel I have most in common with these two characters out of all the Bronte heroines, which is revealing of my character, since Shirley is concideed Charlotte Bronte's worst and most disgracefully boring novels (perhaps rivaled by The Professor, but no matter). Still, I am attached tremendously to these two young women, and I feel I would jump at the chance to befriend either.

Now let me be clear, Jane Eyre is still my favorite novel and character of Charlotte's, but she is not nearly as similar to me. Oh, we have some things in common, and she is most endearing, but I'd be more envious of her incredible nature, and be better to admire her strength of character and faerieness from some sort of distance--to acquaint myself with some natural reserve. Jane reminds me of a truly remarkable person I've known for a couple years now, and I do feel a sort of tenderness towards her, as well as a conscious pull away from her, for I am not the sort who befriends quickly or outwardly admires naturally: but I am working on it, and we shall see how I progress.