I always link it with the scene earlier in the novel, just after Peter arrives in Oxford - they talk in her room, and when he leaves he takes her gown rather than his own. I can't remember the scene exactly, but she thinks idly, that they're both the same anyway, but then, that it's "strange that they should be the same." (paraphrasing wildly there, sorry!)
The point being made is that he's the rich aristocrat who saved her from the gallows, and she resents him for it - she resents having had to be saved, mostly - and she resents that his charm and money can get him whatever he wants, which seemingly includes her, but that here, he doesn't have superiority - they both have BA degrees from Oxford, they were both scholars, they are intellectual equals. And she agrees to marry him only when he addresses her as "magistra" - a title she's only entitled to because of her degree - because it emphasises that theirs will be a marriage of equals.
Sorry for being lengthy - it's one of my favourite books, so I've thought about it a lot. :)
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2007-07-09 08:45 am (UTC)The point being made is that he's the rich aristocrat who saved her from the gallows, and she resents him for it - she resents having had to be saved, mostly - and she resents that his charm and money can get him whatever he wants, which seemingly includes her, but that here, he doesn't have superiority - they both have BA degrees from Oxford, they were both scholars, they are intellectual equals. And she agrees to marry him only when he addresses her as "magistra" - a title she's only entitled to because of her degree - because it emphasises that theirs will be a marriage of equals.
Sorry for being lengthy - it's one of my favourite books, so I've thought about it a lot. :)