The Coquette Compare And Contrast

The Most Complicated of Misfortunes In two of our readings during this semester of American literature there was some striking similarities and some differences between the main characters from The Contrast and The Coquette. Eliza Warton and Maria Van Rough both get diminished for not following gender roles during their era, both women interact with financially stable men and both women have different end results with the men they interact with. Women in early America were bound by standards which Eliza and Maria deemed to be pointless to them by preferring to follow their own rules. There are examples being demonstrated throughout both stories when both female characters are breaking the gender roles. In Act 1 Scene 2 Maria’s father states that “Now, what good have those books done you? Have they not made you melancholy?” (Norton 807) Maria’s father is making fun of her passion of reading and is saying that the reason that she’s been depressed is thanks to her books. Tyler inserts this too prove that if you were a woman during that period doing anything that is a “man’s task” you would be mocked. The same can be said about Eliza impart due to her flirtatious nature throughout the story of The Coquette. …show more content…
Both stories end with lessons that the authors intended to include to help better people’s lives. In the ending of The Coquette Eliza dies alone after the major gets his way rather than being with someone she could’ve been happy with. Foster made this happen because she tried to implement a moral lesson of choosing what’s right rather than choosing greed. Now towards the other story Maria decides to follow her heart instead of listening to what her father would’ve preferred. Tyler added this ended to create a lesson of if you believe something to be right fight to accomplish that rather than following