Basic Trope: In a World… where marriage for money and socio-political alliances is the norm, a character chooses to marry someone they know and love already and want to spend the rest of their lives with.
- Straight: Princess Alice is betrothed to King Bob the Nth from childhood, but falls in love with Prince Charles (no, not that one). She has to fight to break off her engagement to King Bob the Nth before she can marry her Love Interest.
- Exaggerated: Princess Alice elopes with Prince Charles, then tells her father what they did.
- Downplayed: Princess Alice is given her choice of several approved men, and may pick the one she likes out of them; with luck there will be one she can love.
- Justified:
- The marriage was arranged with no input from Princess Alice or consideration for her feelings. (Especially true if King Bob the Nth is particularly unlikeable.) Prince Charles better fits the qualities of the kind of man she'd like to marry (plus she knows him better) than King Bob.
- In the society in which Alice actually lives, marrying for love and companionship is normal; in her family's cultural background, Arranged Marriage is the norm, and it's an issue of The Generation Gap. Alice's parents want her to continue cultural traditions, and Alice wants to do what she sees her peers doing.
- Inverted:
- Alice gets engaged to her longtime boyfriend Bob, but begins eyeing (and eventually leaves Bob for) Charles (despite him being average-looking and kind of a Jerkass) because he is rich and well-connected.
- Alice's society considers dating and marrying someone of one's own choice the norm, but Alice opts to have an Arranged Marriage.
- Subverted:
- Princess Alice is perfectly OK with marrying King Bob the Nth, even though she doesn't know him.
- Perfectly Arranged Marriage.
- Alice's parents are OK with her marrying someone she likes.
- Double Subverted:
- But not long before the wedding, she meets Prince Charles, and begins to have second thoughts.
- Princess Alice marries King Bob the Nth (and eventually becomes Queen Alice), but she is involved in a steamy love affair with Prince Charles on the side.
- But they specify that he be of a certain cultural background, a certain religion, a certain income bracket, etc. or else they won't approve.
- Not with Them for the Money.
- Parodied: ???
- Zig Zagged: Princess Alice has second thoughts about marrying King Bob the Nth, but then she meets him and finds she actually likes him and finds him attractive. Then she meets Prince Charles, and falls in love with him, but still goes through with the marriage to King Bob. Then she carries on an affair with Prince Charles and eventually marries him after King Bob dies.
- Averted:
- Alice faces no restrictions (be they political, religious, cultural, class-based) on whom she marries (or doesn't marry.)
- Marriage of any kind just isn't the norm in this universe. People might move in together with little or no fanfare, or they might simply have a short-term fling and then go their separate ways, but weddings and engagements are rare to nonexistent, and almost exclusive to royalty and nobility.
- Enforced: Slobs Versus Snobs, Uptown Girl, Rebellious Princess, Rich Suitor, Poor Suitor
- Lampshaded: "I want to choose who I marry!"
- Invoked: Princess Alice learns of her betrothal to King Bob the Nth, and is not happy.
- Exploited: ???
- Defied: Princess Alice is excited about marrying King Bob the Nth and having access to all his wealth... And doing her parents proud in the process.
- Discussed: ???
- Conversed: ???
- Deconstructed:
- See "Justified"
- Because Alice and Bob want to Marry for Love, they annulate their marriage, making her children illegitimate. They are snubbed of their inheritance, ill-threated by the stefather their mother married, and those who don't enter into dangerous professions to earn enough to live make marriages of conveniences. When Alice reminds her daughter with great dismay, Caroline, in front of Caroline's newborn baby, that she hasn't married for love, Caroline snaps and proudly replies that she, at least, married a good man, and made a sensible choice for her and her family. And then she gives Alice a "The Reason You Suck" Speech.
- Reconstructed:
- Not with Them for the Money
- Alice's parents butt out, on the grounds that if Alice marries someone she likes, there's less likely to be an affair, a divorce, or other scandal. (And if he just happens to be rich...)
- If Arranged Marriage is not to be done away with In-Universe, her parents take steps (probably for the above reason) to make sure they get to know each other and that they actually like each other; a Child Marriage Veto is permissible.
Back to Marry for Love
