Lovelace’s demands upon Clarissa’s death (L497)

I think it absolutely right that my ever-dear and beloved lady should be opened and embalmed. It must be done out of hand this very afternoon. Your acquaintance, Tomkins, and old Anderson of this place, I will bring with me, shall be the surgeons. I have talked to the latter about it.
I will see everything done with that decorum which the case, and the sacred person of my beloved require.
Everything that can be done to preserve the charmer from decay shall also be done. And when she will descend to her original dust, or cannot be kept longer, I will then have her laid in my family-vault, between my own father and mother. Myself, as I am in my soul, so in person, chief mourner. But her heart, to which I have such unquestionable pretensions, in which once I had so large a share, and which I will prize above my own, I will have. I will keep it in spirits. It shall never be out of my sight. And all the charges of sepulture too shall be mine.
Surely nobody will dispute my right to her. Whose was she living?—Whose is she dead but mine?—Her cursed parents, whose barbarity to her, no doubt, was the true cause of her death, have long since renounced her. She left them for me. She chose me therefore; and I was her husband. What though I treated her like a villain? Do I not pay for it now? Would she not have been mine had I not? Nobody will dispute but she would. And has she not forgiven me?—I am then in statu quo prius with her, am I not? as if I had never offended?—Whose then can she be but mine?
I will free you from your executorship, and all your cares.…
I send in the mean time for a lock of her hair.
I charge you stir not in any part of her will but by my express direction. I will order everything myself. For am I not her husband? and, being forgiven by her, am I not the chosen of her heart? What else signifies her forgiveness?
What I write to you for is,
1. To forbid you intermeddling with anything relating to her. To forbid Morden intermeddling also. If I remember right, he has threatened me, and cursed me, and used me ill—and let him be gone from her, if he would avoid my resentment.
2. To send me a lock of her hair instantly by the bearer.
3. To engage Tomkins to have everything ready for the opening and embalming. I shall bring Anderson with me.
4. To get her will and everything ready for my perusal and consideration.
I will have possession of her dear heart this very night; and let Tomkins provide a proper receptacle and spirits, till I can get a golden one made for it.
I will take her papers. And, as no one can do her memory justice equal to myself, and I will not spare myself, who can better show the world what she was, and what a villain he that could use her ill? And the world shall also see what implacable and unworthy parents she had.
All shall be set forth in words at length. No mincing of the matter. Names undisguised as well as facts. For, as I shall make the worst figure in it myself, and have a right to treat myself as nobody else shall, who shall control me? who dare call me to account?
Although her will may in some respects cross mine, yet I expect to be observed. I will be the interpreter of hers.
Next to mine, hers shall be observed: for she is my wife, and shall be to all eternity.—I will never have another.
Adieu, Jack, I am preparing to be with you. I charge you, as you value my life or your own, do not oppose me in anything relating to my Clarissa Lovelace.
My temper is entirely altered. I know not what it is to laugh, or smile, or be pleasant. I am grown choleric and impatient, and will not be controlled.
I write this in characters as I used to do, that nobody but you should know what I write. For never was any man plagued with impertinents as I am.

10 thoughts on “Lovelace’s demands upon Clarissa’s death (L497)

  1. Rachel Gramer

    Although Lovelace's command for Clarissa's heart is most terrifying, I was also struck here by how his letter serves to function as a list of demands to Belford. How much he wants! What do you make of Lovelace's attempts to overwrite Clarissa's will with his own desires?

    I'm also wondering: Is this the same domineering Lovelace we've grown accustomed to despising? Is the Lovelace (we think) we know asserting himself here–or further unraveling after Clarissa's death?

  2. Kendra

    I'm sure by now I sound like a broken record, but Lovelace has made Clarissa's suffering and her death all about himself. He claims to be the “chief mourner” for Clarissa and tries to make her will into his own device. Lovelace wants an autopsy and embalming done by his own men, he wants to entomb her between his parents, and he is desiring parts of her physical body to keep for himself. The man is trying to control her even after death, or at least control her physical body since he could not control her spirit. He so boldly tells Belford that he “will have possession of her dear heart this very night.” He wants to keep her heart with him, something that she did not give him while alive. I think that he is both asserting himself as the Lovelace we assume him to be as well as unraveling after her death. I think he knows he is unraveling as well because he notes that his “temper is entirely altered.” Then again we also see the old Lovelace when he mentions Morden and how “he has threatened me, and cursed me, and used me ill—and let him be gone from her, if he would avoid my resentment.” We see that his old desire to revenge slights and to be in power over others. It will always be about Lovelace and his pain.

  3. Megan

    You're right, Kendra. Even in Clarissa's death, everything has to be about Lovelace. He is the chief mourner. He is hurting the most. He must have his wishes met over her family's or HER OWN.

    I don't know what to think of him at the moment. He is definitely acting super crazy in this letter. HE WANTS TO KEEP HER HEART IN A JAR. It's weird, guys. It's weird. Aside from the creepy/weird/awful requests, you can see how Lovelace has foregone the way he usually writes. He is NOT showing a command of language. He is NOT showing an ability to persuade and convince. He IS showing that he is completely out of it and has no read on the situation.

    Think about the itemized section. He does not try to work his way into his requests or flatter Belford to get it done. He just starts making demands. Has there been another time where he has itemized his wishes in such a way? It seems like a very different style of writing. He “forbids” Belford from acting as Clarissa has asked and then continues on with a ridiculous set of demands that he writes as if they were normal and completely in line with how he should be acting. This complete departure from the smooth, suave writer we came to know shows that something is definitely going on here.

  4. Keri Mathis

    These comments are so insightful. I really like Kendra and Megan’s focus on Lovelace’s self-centeredness here because I, too, think that it so telling of his character. He must have the final word on Clarissa, and you know, her **actual** heart.

    Furthermore, on a related note, I was really drawn to his request for the letters. He writes, “I will take her papers. And, as no one can do her memory justice equal to myself, and I will not spare myself, who can better show the world what she was, and what a villain he that could use her ill? And the world shall also see what implacable and unworthy parents she had.” By taking the letters, Lovelace seeks to also acquire and preserve Clarissa’s mind. He was always so drawn to her writing skill, and attaining the letters would be a way for him to hold on to this part of Clarissa, as well. Here, too, Lovelace notes that if he gains control of the letters and thus Clarissa’s story, he will show the world that Clarissa’s demise was not his fault, but her parents’ fault. While I certainly agree with Megan that he has taken a turn here at the end and has lost his ability to compose really eloquent letters, we do see a bit of the old Lovelace here in that he wants to create (or at least finish) Clarissa’s story and put his own spin on the narrative so that he can once again appear blameless.

  5. Meghan Hancock

    Megan, I totally agree that it sounds like Lovelace is really starting to lose it here. Demanding her heart in a jar is, while super gross and creepy, kind of classic Lovelace (as well as his desire to tell Clarissa's story for her through possession of her letters, like Keri suggested). It doesn't surprise me at all that he would want to do this, or that he would demand her body be placed in HIS family's vault (ugh).

    His style of writing was actually more shocking to me because it did seem different from his previous style, as you suggested. I think the line “I am grown choleric and impatient, and will not be controlled” is especially telling. Lovelace insists that he “will not be controlled.” It's ironic that he's saying this while he's been the one obsessed with controlling others through out the novel. There is also something very desperate about this. I don't remember ever hearing Lovelace being so straight forward, and I think it's because he's slowly realizing that HE can't be the one in control anymore. Even once he has Clarissa's heart in a jar (or so he's thinking will happen), that's the end of it–no more control. Clarissa is free in death, and he's lost.

  6. Debra

    I just want to add that he is is (literally) out of his mind at this point. He later only vaguely remembers writing it, and he doesn't pursue any of this. If we see this as a spontaneous outpouring of grief, does the letter read any differently?

  7. Steve

    It doesn't to me. Perhaps this is a little ungenerous of me, but even in a spontaneous outpouring of grief, if one's first thought is to collect the heart (read, further violate the body) of someone who's death was caused by a previous violation, it speaks to me of a shocking lack of ability to empathize, in the sense of recognizing other people AS people with feelings and desires.

    I read this as a kind of madness, yes, but a madness lays bare Lovelace's fundamental inability to relate to other people more effectively than anything he's written so far. I'd interject here, though, that Lovelace isn't the only person who shows a disregard for Clarissa's wishes after her death. Her family seems surprisingly willing, given their tears and admissions of (partial) culpability for what's happened, to disregard her intention to have Belford execute her will. How truly awful, I couldn't stop thinking, to have to look outside your family for someone who will respect even your dying wishes about your body and effects. Poor Clarissa.

  8. Jessica

    Seeing it as an outpouring of grief is the only way I can get through this. Otherwise I just CANNOT. When we see this moment after so much silence from Lovelace (with Belford writing letter after letter and getting no response), Lovelace appears surprisingly calm and matter-of-fact, like someone who has been on a mission for a year and this is only the next logical step in the procedure.

    The list of demands is long; he now strikes me as someone struggling to control chaotic, traumatic circumstances. I recognize that Lovelace was driven by the desire to control Clarissa, and sometimes I hate him very much. But I also think he's capable of being overwhelmed by grief.

    If nothing else, here Lovelace seems to be running up against a wall of utter powerlessness. At this point in the novel it feels like we're seeing his demise.

  9. anthony o'keeffe

    To pick up just a couple of threads. I think it is important to realize that Lovelace here has entered the same kind of mad week that Clarissa endured. Even he himself later catches the parallel, and sees in it a kind of poetic justice, and the perhaps fearful workings of a heretofore unfeared Providence. It fascinating to me that her mad letters and his both do–as people have noted–reveal something crucial about Clarissa's and now Lovelace's unchanged self. He has been the epitome of control, and his madness reveals something completely essential to our continued construction of his identity. But just as Clarissa emerged transformed from her own madness, so will our friend Robert. To me, that's what makes the remainder of the novel so very interesting.

  10. Debra

    I would also like to refer to a passage in Letter 477, where Belford writes to Mowbrey: “You will find him [Lovelace] between PIccadilly and Kensington, most probably on horseback, riding backwards and forwards in a crazy way.” (Earlier in Letter 463, he tells Belford he rides back and forth to London 20 times a day, stuck in that terrible “present tense” between “expectation” and “reflection.”)

    Lovelace has literally lost the narrative line of his life: he has nothing to move towards and is unable to move back. That he writes a hysterical letter (and is described as mad by his family and friends for the next week) seems inevitable. I think in the letter we are discussing here, Lovelace (hysterically) re-enacts the desire to posess Clarissa's body. Not sexually, but to claim her as his rather than nobody's. He would bury her between his parents. He would fulfil the fantasy of marrying her. Of course it is a fantasy, but the alternative is to accept the dissolution of her body, the existential end of her, and to die himself. (Lovelace is not able to picture a reconciliation in Heaven).

    Of course, he is powerless, and as Meghan says, “he's lost.” But he cannot yet accept the unutterable loss of her. Not just the loss of her as a trophy, but the loss (end) of her as a person. I find this letter a remarkable document in grief.

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