Gender In Hannah W. Foster's The Coquette

19 November 2008

He’s a Keeper: the Men of The Coquette

The two main male characters in Hannah W. Foster’s The Coquette are Major Sanford and Reverend Boyer. Both of these men represent a stereotypical male you might find in 1700’s American society and today’s society. Major Sanford represents the flashy, womanizing type, Reverend Boyer the unimpressive reserved type. They are each a character foil for the other, and are at the extreme for their personality traits. Not to mention they are modeled after real men. The light in which the male characters are viewed in the story also enlightens the reader to a new side of the typical sentimental novel not previously explored. The effect of this characterization emphasizes the mind set in which men view marriage and women, and to reveal the bigger role men play in the downfall of some women.

Mr. Boyer is our first bachelor and modeled after Reverend Joseph Buckmininster (Mulford et al). The letter in which he is introduced begins to reveal his character. He describes himself as having a “studious and sedentary life” (11). “Boyer's discourse is formal, rational, argumentative, full of good intent and moral rectitude, but utterly boring” (Mulford et al). He is usually caught up in his studies of religious doctrine, but Eliza Wharton has caught his attention. And although he writes of her attributes, he is quick to point out that what is really appealing about her is that she would make a “cheerful wife.” He also writes about the usefulness of having a wife: “They dispel the gloom of retirement, and exhilarate the spirits depressed by intense application” (11). This is evidence that in Boyer’s mind, a wife has a purpose and is more then just someone you have affection for.

Throughout the novel Boyer’s letters show that he is preoccupied with how a wife will reflect on his own image. He is also pompous and self-satisfied. From Boyer’s letters, it is easy to gain a sense that he is very intent on a picturesque, humble, typical clergymen’s life. But Boyer isn’t all bad. He does have a romantic side. And when Boyer proposed to Eliza he “painted in the most alluring colours the pleasures resulting form domestic tranquility, mutual confidence, and conjugal affection” (76). Boyer’s is the type of man to try to take an independent, well-educated and vivacious woman and turn her into a domestic servant. Foster counted on her readers to sympathize with Eliza’s resistance so as to alleviate some of the typical blame placed on the women in the usual “fallen woman” stories. Although Boyer is not a cad, even the read knows he isn’t good enough for her.

When Boyer and his idea of “domestic tranquility” are rejected, he criticizes her for her preference of “every other pleasure to the rational interchange of affection, to the calm delights of domestic life” (78). This statement again reinforces Boyer’s character as one that focuses on rationality. It also shows frustration that Eliza does not have the same view of marriage he has. The Boyer-like man is of the opinion that a woman should want to be married. When Eliza tries to postpone any “solicitations” of marriage, he argues that her choice to not be married is “a false notion of happiness” (78). The view that a woman’s true happiness should come from having a home and children to look after is a stereotypical view.

The alternative (which is really no alternative at all) is Major Sanford; shallow and concerned with only his own happiness, he enters the novel clearly as a villain. His outward appearance is that of a respectable philistine, and he probably sees himself as God’s gift to women. Although his conduct toward women is well known in the community, “the rank and fortune of Major Sanford…procure him respect” (16). “Sanford's is glib, disrespectful of women and society, witty, yet entertaining” (Mulford et al). This was also true for Sanford’s real life counterpart. There are a few suspects as to who the true seducer was. They include Pierrepont Edwards, Aaron Burr, Joel Barlow, and Senator James Watson (Mulford et al). All of these men have some kind of powerful social standing, just as Mrs. Richman says of Sanford. The obligated respect men like these have allow them to stay in society with only minor criticism. If a poor man tried to take up the position of womanizer, he could be forced to marry the woman or be cast out of decent society. Men of money and a title are rarely told what to do.

Sanford may also be considered a prime example of the complete opposite of the Boyer type. Flashy and interesting with charm and wit, Sanford easily gets a women’s attention. Unfortunately for women, they don’t realize they are insects in a spider’s web until it is too late. Women are seen by Sanford to be weak and shallow because he has “found so many frail ones among them” (56). Sanford seems to easily “throw away” women once he gets what he wants from them. He is also very capable to provide excuses or reasons for his actions. In Eliza’s case, his plans of seducing her with no thought of marriage are quite “honorable.” “I fancy this young lady is a coquette; and if so, I shall avenge my sex, by retaliating the mischiefs she meditates against us” (18). Clearly the double standard was alive and well in the 1700’s. He goes further to say “if she will play with a lion, let her beware of his paw”, which suggest that his reputation is generally known and that it will be her own fault should her reputation suffer from any connection with him (56). While Sanford can get away with being a flirt, Eliza must be punished, and undoubtedly she is in the end. The fact that he is still allowed to be part of society clearly shows the unfairness of the times. A man like Sanford was allowed to continue to socialize; we see him through out the novel at parties, dinners, and so forth. If a woman was considered “fallen” she was not allowed to socialize anymore. She would be sent away to live in the country in shame.

Major Sanford is also a prime example of the fortune hunting cad any debutant must watch out for. His greed is shown in Letter XI when reflecting on a rendezvous with Eliza. “Were I disposed to marry, I am persuaded she would make an excellent wife; but that you know is no part of my plan…whenever I do submit to be shackled, it must be from a necessity of mending my fortune”(23). Sanford does have genuine feelings for her, but he is quick to point out her most repulsive shortcoming- she is not wealthy. Later in the story he reiterates that if he where to fallow his heart and marry Eliza, “poverty and want must be the consequence” (72). It was common for men of that time (and is still today) to choose a wife that could provide a life style they have been accustom to. And when Sanford does find a lady with the qualities he wants in a wife, he makes it very clear he has no affection for her. “She has no soul though, that I can discover. She is heiress, nevertheless, to a great fortune; and that is all the soul I wish for in a wife” (34). It is statements like these that make a reader think of Sanford as disagreeable, but when in comparison to Boyer the reader secretly might wish Sanford to marry Eliza because he is considered the better match in some ways.

Both of the men in The Coquette are devices used to criticize the views held by men in the 1700’s. “One of the most fascinating aspects of Foster's novel …is that while bourgeois morality and ideology certainly inform the surface discourse, there is some covert resistance as well” (Mulford). By making each a stereotype, Foster shows that women are either forced into unhappy marriages with men like Boyer, or can fall victims of men like Sanford. Foster takes advantage of this “to further complicate the moral issues involved here, [by portraying] each male character as less than perfect. Eliza's choices are realistic, and she essentially wants neither” (Davidson). Buy marrying Boyer, Eliza would live a life of “domestic happiness” she doesn’t want to live.

Sanford, despite his multiple shortcomings, seems much better suited for Eliza. “Foster makes the seducer seem more appealing by contrasting him to a second male character, the Reverend Boyer, who also falls short of Eliza's ideals. Pompous and pedantic, Boyer represents a life of stultifying convention” (Davidson). From what we know of Eliza and from her own voice in the letters to Lucy we know that a life style like this would not have suited this flirty and intelligent woman. In personality, Sanford may have suited her better. She tried hard to justify her liking him. In a letter to Lucy, she says “a reformed rake makes the best husband” (53). This is a key statement because it tells the reader that not only does Eliza know the true colors of Major Sanford, but she wants to marry him despite it. “Many a young heroine in eighteenth-century novels found herself faced by the choice between society's candidate--in this case, Boyer--and the candidate of her heart--Sanford. This choice is much more intriguing…than in other novels of the period not because Eliza's suitors are less predictable than their counterparts in the majority of sentimental novels, but because Eliza is a totally different sort of heroine” (Mulford).

The main theme of The Coquette focuses on the choice between Sanford and Boyer by an older well-educated woman, while other sentimental novels of the time focused on teaching young, vulnerable women to be aware of the evils of sin. “Foster turned the choice itself into the real topic of her novel, suggesting that the challenge a talented and independent young woman such as Eliza faces is not so much the choice between virtue and sin… within the strict moral and ideological confines of the day, she has no real choice” (Mulford et al). Stay away from Sanford and marry Boyer, this is what she should do according to the ideology of the time. Unfortunately for Eliza, a woman’s place was with her family or with her husband. It is this pressure of the common ideology that forces Eliza to choose between these two men. “When the female character must choose between men, the reader is forced to weigh carefully the relative merits of representative male characters” (Davidson).

It could be considered simple math that an unmarried women should be pared with one of the two single men in the area. Everyone seems to lean toward Boyer due to his rank and respectability (and perhaps by process of elimination). Indeed, Lucy advises her friend, “his situation in life is, perhaps, as elevated as you have a right to claim” (27). So Boyer is good enough, Sanford is trouble, and Eliza is caught in the middle. This is the point that Foster was trying to achieve. Life for women is hard when she is forced to choose between two unsatisfactory alternatives and can easily end in tragedy. The question rose by The Coquette however is why a woman would end up in this position. A large part of this answer is the man behind the debauchery. It also enlightens readers to different elements of seduction they might not have considered before. “The resistance to this institutionalized view of seduction…is apparent in the discrepancy that exists between the conventional rhetoric condemning the seducer as a degenerate rake and the way he is actually presented to the reader in all but the concluding stages of the novel: as the flamboyant ne'er-do-well from a picaresque novel” (Mulford et al).

Clearly not all the blame can be placed on Eliza for her actions. Major Sanford was a bad yet consistent influence in her life. Reverend Boyer was a pompous and boring man who she resisted marring for lack of romantic affection. These two men in a typical social equation of any time period could have led to any one woman’s downfall. Without these stereotypical men, however, Foster would not have been able to place the seed of doubt in her reader’s mind that succumbing to seduction is the women’s fault entirely.

Works Cited

Davidson, Cathy N. "Hannah Webster Foster." American Writers of the Early Republic.

Ed. Emory Elliott. Dictionary of Literary Biography Vol. 37. Detroit: Gale Research, 1985. Literature Resource Center. Gale. UNIV OF MONTANA. 7 Nov. 2008<http://go.galegroup.com/ps/start.do?p=LitRC&u=mtlib_1_1195>.

Foster, Hannah W. The Coquette. 1797. New York: Oxford University Press, 1986.

"Hannah Webster Foster." American Women Prose Writers to 1820. Ed. Carla Mulford, Angela Vietto, and Amy E. Winans. Dictionary of Literary Biography Vol. 200. Detroit: Gale Research, 1999. Literature Resource Center. Gale. UNIV OF MONTANA. 7 Nov. 2008<http://go.galegroup.com/ps/start.do?p=LitRC&u=mtlib_1_1195>