Regarding Pride and Prejudice

[tmashuk]

I have one question regarding Pride and Prejudice.....

In chapter 13.....Mr. Bennet at first mentions Mr. Collins to be his cousins....afterwards Mr. Collins is treated as the cousins of Miss Bennts...

How is it possible?

 

[5jj]

My father's cousin is my cousin - to a different degree.

My father's first cousin is my first cousin once removed, but we generally just use the word 'cousin'.

 

[tmashuk]

well, I understand that Mr. Collins is the son of Mr. Bennet's brother...... and a cousin to Miss Bennets......Then should he not be a nephew to Mr. Bennet?

If a word like Nephew is there then why use cousin? Is it not an honest mistake? Or, in western culture something like that really exists?

Toufiq

 

[5jj]

well, I understand that Mr. Collins is the son of Mr. Bennet's brother.

Could you quote the words from the novel that lead you to believe this?

 

[tmashuk]

chapter 13== Mr. Bennet says
This roused a general astonishment; and he had the pleasure of being eagerly questioned by his wife and his five daughters at once.
After amusing himself some time with their curiosity, he thus explained:
"About a month ago I received this letter; and about a fortnight ago I answered it, for I thought it a case of some delicacy, and requiring early attention. It is from my cousin, Mr. Collins, who, when I am dead, may turn you all out of this house as soon as he pleases."
.................
then the letter from Collins

"Hunsford, near Westerham, Kent,
"15th October.
"Dear Sir,—"The disagreement subsisting between yourself and my late honoured father always gave me much uneasiness,
....................................................................................
then there is a section after the letter from Collins--

To Catherine and Lydia, neither the letter nor its writer were in any degree interesting. It was next to impossible that their cousin should come in a scarlet coat,

..................................
This relation seems pretty conflicting to me.....

Thanks...
Toufiq

 

[5jj]

There is no indication anywhere in the passages you have quoted to suggest that the 'late honoured father' of Mr Collins and Mr Bennet were brothers.

We are told only that Mr Collins is a cousin of Mr Bennet, and that he is also a cousin of Mr Bennet's daughters. This is fine, as I have explained.

 

[5jj]

If your parents and mine are siblings, you and I are first cousins; if our grandparents are siblings, we are second cousins; If our great-grandparents are siblings, we are third cousins, and so on.
If there is a one-generation gap, we are ‘xth cousins once removed’ – for example, I am the first cousin once removed of my father’s first cousin; if there is a two-generation gap, we are ‘xth cousins twice removed', and so on.

As I have already mentioned, we are not normally concerned about family relationships in such detail. We normally refer to a relative as ‘a cousin’, or possibly ‘some sort of (distant) cousin’. You will see detailed descriptions only in writing about well-known people –

The Duchess of Cornwall is Prince Charles’s ninth cousin once removed.
Ulysses Grant and Franklin D Roosevelt were fourth cousins once removed.
Fivejedjon and Queen Elizabeth II are seventh cousins three times removed"


*ps, Liz has been known to boast of the relationship, but I rarely mention it, as some of third to sixth cousins were conceived on the wrong side of the blanket.
http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O214-bornonthewrongsidfthblnkt.html

..

 

[BobK]

What 5jj says is true: the OP has no cited any textual support for the idea that the cousin is really a nephew. But in Shakespeare's time (and possibly still in Austen's) the word 'cousin' was used with a very general sense of blood relationship. I believe - though I don't have the text to hand - even Shakespearean brothers address each other as 'coz'.

b

 

[tmashuk]

hmmm......well...I still am researching on it....there has to an explanation solid enough to prove this...not just suppositions.....

 

[Tdol]

The word is known to be used in a casual way rather than a specific way when talking about relationships outside the area of genealogy. This is not a supposition- it is a fact. You haven't produced any textual evidence, so where is this research? When I was a child, it was common to call friends of your parents uncle or aunt even though they were not related at all. This flexible use of family terms for people is common in many languages and cultures.

 

[BobK]

I have to admit I'm amazed at tmashuk's imperviousness to argument:-?. I wonder what sort of 'research' this is.

b

 

[5jj]

The only research that would have any relevance here would be finding a quotation from the book itself stating that the two men are brothers - but this won't happen, because there isn't one. There isn't one, because as the quotation tmashuk himself has already provided shows, they are cousins.

There has been only one supposition in this thread so far - in the first dozen or so word of post #3

 

[Tdol]

When I lived in Cambodia, I called all the tuk-tuk drivers brother- does that mean I have 500 hundred real brothers there? Maybe this research would show that, even when the facts don't.