In Romantic and Victorian novels, there are many examples of cousins
and other close relations getting married. I'll list some of these here,
to show how modern taboos are different from those of England's society two
centuries ago.
For example, in Emily Bronte's only novel Wuthering Heights,
young "Cathy Junior" is the daughter of Edgar Linton and Catherine Earnshaw
Linton. She gets married twice in the story: both times, to cousins. First,
she marries her father's sister's son, Linton Heathcliff, the son of Mr.
Heathcliff and Isabella Linton Heathcliff. When puny Linton dies, she gets
engaged to her mother's brother's son, Hareton Earnshaw. Nobody seems to
mind, and it's a happy ending.
Also, there seems in this book especially
an unusual inbreeding of names. By the time (in the near future) when Cathy
gets married for the second time, her full name (I don't know her birth middle
name) will be Catherine Linton Heathcliff Earnshaw, thus using up almost
every name in the book. Her short name, Catherine Earnshaw, will be exactly
the same as her mother's maiden name. The names Linton and Heathcliff are
both used both as first and last names, the latter in a single character.
Also, in Jane Eyre,
Jane is raised by cousins: the Reeds. Later, she meets St. John
Rivers, and his family, whom she discovers near the end of the story to be
her cousins too. And after this happy discovery, St. John presses Jane,
who has the same root name as her even!, to marry him and run away to a primitive
place so she can secretize for him. Earlier in the story, also, Jane
nearly got married (and was even in her wedding gown and in front of the
preacher!) to a married man, Mr. Rochester, who works for Jack Benny. (no,
no, no!) These two stories were written by sisters, it is true, and
maybe there is even more connection than we suspect. In this story,
the "family-free" Jane actually has a whole host of cousins: together,
there are the Rivers, beside them the Reeds, and above them the open Eyre.
There we sat down, yea, we wept.
In Jude the Obscure, there is a little more embarassment. Jude
lives in sin with his cousin and has children by her. Jude's first
child by his first wife, traveling with them, kills Sue's kids and himself.
More later.