Didacticism in Eliza Haywood's Love in Excess

Love in Excess seemed to me as an early experiment in novel writing, which served as a basis for later novels to draw themes from. Haywood utilizes extremely long sentences; this style, paired with the very dramatic events that occurred, created a more intense read for me.  I often felt like I did not have time to reflect on what I had just read because the narrator would introduce yet another surprising or dramatic incident. The characters, for example, are so dramatic that they seem unrealistic to me. The Count was happy in marrying Alovisa because of her rank and fortune, and yet, he falls in love with Melliora instantly after he meets her! And then, of course, he sympathizes with Amena because he mistreated her and did not love her back. He fell in love with another woman and had this moralistic epiphany in just a few pages! I couldn’t help but compare this with Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice and how we learn the truth about Mr. Darcy’s behavior only towards the end of the novel. Even Elizabeth herself comes to realizations only as time passes. We as readers learn of our own biases as well.  In Love in Excess, however, we have no time to reflect because we are thrown right into everything all at once. Of course, I am not saying this is a flaw on Haywood’s part, I simply see it as an experiment in novel writing and Haywood possibly setting an example for later authors.

The interesting thing to me was that as readers, we did not have to guess what the characters were thinking. The third person omniscient narrator made that clear for us. Because the narrator is all knowing, events seemed more theatrical and dramatic than they could have been portrayed. This is because we are experiencing a scene from all the characters’ perspectives. For example, when Amena arrives at Alovisa’s home, we know that Amena sees Alovisa as a “dearest friend,” that the Count is “overjoyed to be eased of his fair burthen,” and that Alovisa is filled “with so exquisite a joy” because of Amena’s misfortunes (60, 61).  The characters’ dispositions are clear to us; they are not much of a mystery. I found this interesting because I am used to reading novels where the truth about characters is revealed only as the story goes on.

The narrator in Haywood’s novel, however, offers a clear portrayal of the inner workings of these characters and also adds her own personal input. For example, she refers to Alovisa as a “cruel woman,” (61), and even Anaret as a “cunning wench” (57).  This may be a conscious effort on the narrator’s part to teach readers who to like and dislike, thus creating a moralistic reading. There is a didactic aspect to novels at this time period and how they were meant to teach readers how to behave.  What I noticed was different with Haywood’s novel than with later novels of the century, is that we are not left to guess which character is moral and good. The narrator makes it clear to us and in giving us her opinion, shapes our opinions as well. As opposed to the narrator in Aphra Behn’s Oronooko who likes to leave room for the reader to judge, the narrator in Love in Excess leads us to a certain judgment.

As in Behn’s Oronooko, the narrator’s awareness of her presence within Love in Excess is an interesting factor. The narrator in Oronooko admits to omitting certain details from the story. The narrator in Haywood’s novel also claims that the feelings of the characters are sometimes so overwhelming that she cannot even describe them. For example, in regards to Amena, “the violence of her sorrow is more easily imagined than expressed” (63). Moreover, in regards to Alovisa, the narrator claims, “the most lively description would come far short of what she felt” (43).  Then interestingly enough, the narrator relates to us that Alovisa “tore her hair” and “was ready to lay violent hands on her own life” (43). I found this to be strange because I expected the narrator to leave out the details of Alovisa’s reaction and have us readers imagine the extremity of her feelings.

            Although the narrator is quick to give us her opinion on events or characters, at times I felt confused as to who was telling the story. The narrator draws our sympathies towards Amena as we witness how unfortunate her circumstance is, and yet towards the end of part 1, as things were going in Alovisa and the Count’s favor, the narrator has a change of voice and says “There was no gloom now left to cloud the gaity of the happy day” (79). I think this is the start of free indirect discourse.