Throughout The Marriage Plot, we are given the impression that Madeleine has

certain notions about how things ought to be, or what her reality should look like. As
such, she tends not to admit the truth to herself, adjusting her perception of reality to fit
with a more pleasing version of her appearance. This leads to an aversion to confronting
those realities Madeleine finds uncomfortable, those that do not fit with the image of
herself, and her life, that she has in mind.
We are given examples of this in her interactions with Mitchell and Dabney,
where she avoids acknowledging certain distasteful truths about her actions towards
them. Madeleine disapproved of the idea of meaningless, extremely satisfying sex, and
so rather that admit to herself that her relationship with Dabney was purely physical, she
exaggerated Dabneys mental abilities in order to not feel shallow for wanting his body,
going so far as to convince herself that she was in love with him. (p. 36). Madeleine
distorts her own reality to justify certain actions, opting for the subjective over the
objective view. In need of male attention, Madeleine flirts with Mitchell without entirely
admitting it to herself, and uses the gel incident as a pretext for getting Mitchell out of
her bedroom and for covering up the fact that shed been flirting with him in the first
place (p. 15). In these two examples we see Madeleine trying to fit into a mold she has
constructed for herself, attempting to remain consistent with an image she likes
anything that is not consistent with what she believes to be proper is delicately
discounted.
Even on her graduation day, we are presented with a scene in which Madeleine
seeks to ignore the undesirable facts of the night prior:
Madeleine was hoping to ignore the room and everything in it. She was hoping to drift
back down into the oblivion where shed been safely couched for the last three hours.
Any higher level of wakefulness would force her to come to grips with certain
disagreeable facts: for instance, the amount and variety of alcohol shed imbibed last
night, and the fact that shed gone to sleep with her contacts in. Thinking about specifics
would, in turn, call to mind the reasons shed drunk so much in the first place, which she
definitely didnt want to do. And so Madeleine adjusted her pillow, blocking out the
morning light, and tried to fall back to sleep. (p 4).
Exposed by the daylight, Madeleine avoids confronting the reality of her actions, their
causes, and the inevitable but unpalatable fact that graduation looms regardless of her
lack of future plans. By the time graduation weekend rolled around, Madeleine was
doing her best to ignore it (p. 81)
Here we note another characteristic emerging: Madeleine is fairly directionless,
lacking a purpose. She never truly makes any choices for herself: she essentially falls into
her field of study, pursuing a thesis not because she has any conviction or motivation to
do so, but rather because she has no real reason not to do so. English was what people
who didnt know what to major in majored in. (p.21) Madeleine is lackluster when it
comes to seizing the day: she avoids confronting notions concerning the future,
neglecting to check her mailbox for acceptance letters and failing to call and enquire
about her application status at Yale because Im scared to find out that Ive been
rejected. Rather than independently forge forward into the future, Madeleine rejects the

teaching position in China she is offered, perhaps because that solution is not a desirable
one, one which fits in with her ideals. The one plan she did have, to live with Leonard,
was really not her plan at all. She lives in denial, shoving the boxes she had packed to go
to Pilgrim Lake into the corner where they no longer present evidence of her total lack
of a plan or direction.
In times of uncertainty, we inevitably gravitate towards what we know, finding
comfort in the familiar. As graduation looms, Madeleine is faced with the daunting task
of finding an acceptable reality for herself, a post-college trajectory that can be justified.
So, she seeks refuge in what is known to her: the marriage plot.
The marriage plot surrounds Madeleine, both in her academic and personal life.
Whether it concerns her mother, who gave up her dreams of acting to become a wife and
mother, or her sister who trades spunkiness and sass to follow the same path, or the very
fact she has spent her college education crafting a thesis around this concept, the
marriage plot is undoubtedly what Madeleine knows from beginning to end. And therein
lies the appeal: Here is an outcome that has been shown to be an acceptable one by both
her mother and sister, a way to fit in nicely with the image of what ought to be. Here is
something that counters the fear of the unknown, the vast and ambiguous sea of
possibilities the future presents. Here is a trajectory whose landing point is identified
with exact precision. Here is a direction, a plan for the future, a sign of being grown-up.
Here is a purpose: to care for an individual who, being manic-depressive, requires a
caretaker. In this way, we see that the marriage plot provides a viable solution to
Madeleines problems.