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Hierogamy versus Wedlock: Types of Marriage Plots and Their Relationship to Genres of Prose Fiction

1976; Cambridge University Press; Volume: 91; Issue: 5 Linguagem: Inglês

10.2307/461564

1938-1530

Evelyn J. Hinz,

Contemporary Literature and Criticism

Because we conventionally think of marriage in social and moral terms, we tend to regard it as a subject practically indigenous to the novel. Hence a work like Wuthering Heights poses problems for the traditional genre critic, since while this work is concerned with marriage its conventions are not those of the novel. The usual tactic is to call Brontë's work a “romance,” but marriage is not compatible with the “romance” as the term is usually defined. It is thus important to recognize that there are two types of marriage plots in prose fiction: one indigenous to the novel, that might be called “wedlock”; another, indigenous to works like Wuthering Heights , that may be called “hierogamy.” Thus, works like Wuthering Heights should not be classified as “displaced novels” but as examples of an autonomous genre which for the present might be designated “mythic narrative.”