5 of the Best Proposals in Books

Recent Empire State escapades (and a friend’s engagement) have me thinking about proposals: the good, the bad and the cringeworthy. The proposal is a watershed in any relationship. It's soul-bearing on both sides, but when the moment is right, it can feel like the most natural thing in the world. For many authors of yore, proposals were the gateway to happily-ever-after. So this week I have put together some of the best proposals in romance books.

However, not every proposal goes swimmingly. Jane Austen famously shied away from adding successful proposals in her novels while including the gory detail of some truly painful misfires. So yes, I have included the "rough draft" proposals (as well as some downright disasters). Aaaand of course, beware of spoilers!

1. Laurie and Amy March

Little Women by Louisa May Alcott

Chaotic, fun, and genuinely lovely, I've always had a soft spot for Laurie from Little Women. He has grown up as an honorary member of the March household and decides that he loves Jo (tear-away tomboy and writer) but doesn't really know what he's doing. The proposal begins like a fight: “we’ve got to have it out." 

"I've loved you ever since I've known you, Jo, couldn't help it, you've been so good to me. I've tried to show it, but you wouldn't let me. Now I'm going to make you hear, and give me an answer, for I can't go on so any longer." 

Despite Jo's attempts to stop him, Laurie keeps digging by outlining the ways he's trying to change himself in order to deserve Jo. The entire proposal reveals that Laurie and Jo are more suited as friends than romantic partners. Laurie confuses his admiration for Jo (and their easy, fun connection) as a sign that they're meant to be more. It's little wonder, then, that Jo kindly but firmly rejects him: "I don't believe it's the right sort of love, and I'd rather not try it,"

Much later, Laurie realises he has feelings for Jo's sister, Amy. It seems that Laurie has learnt his lesson to have a courtship “as calm and simple as possible". Laurie is still Laurie, though, so he proposes in broad daylight (rather than the romantic moonlit proposal he'd planned):

"How well we pull together, don’t we?" said Amy, who objected to silence just then. 

"So well that I wish we might always pull in the same boat. Will you, Amy?" very tenderly. 

‘"Yes, Laurie,’" very low. 

As a kid, it always made me sad that Jo and Laurie weren't meant to be. But marriages are a meeting of minds. Amy and Laurie are already very much at one, so The Big Question needs only to be hinted at, rather than forced out. It feels like Laurie is finishing Amy’s thought (in contrast to Jo’s desperate attempts to stop him proposing to her: “Teddy. Please don't"). Rather than flashy romance, this proposal is a quiet promise to work together through thick and thin.

2. Jane Eyre and Mr Rochester

Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë

Grandmother of dark romance, this gothic love story has a special place in my heart. Jane Eyre is a strong-willed young woman who has survived the loss of her parents and an abusive childhood before arriving at Thornfield Hall as a governess. She meets and falls in love with Thornfield's brooding owner, Mr Rochester.

One evening, Rochester brings Jane on a jasmine-scented evening stroll in the sweeping grounds of Thornfield Hall. He says he feels "as if I had a string somewhere under my left ribs, tightly and inextricably knotted to a similar string situated in the corresponding quarter of your little frame". Despite this admission of attachment to Jane, he falsely claims he's betrothed to a Ms Ingram - beautiful, charming and rich. Jane is moved to confess her feeling that Thornfield and its moody master have become home to her;

“I grieve to leave Thornfield: I love Thornfield:—I love it, because I have lived in it a full and delightful life,—momentarily at least. [...]. I have known you, Mr. Rochester; and it strikes me with terror and anguish to feel I absolutely must be torn from you for ever. I see the necessity of departure; and it is like looking on the necessity of death.”

“Where do you see the necessity?” he asked suddenly.

“Where? You, sir, have placed it before me.”

“In what shape?”

“In the shape of Miss Ingram; a noble and beautiful woman—your bride.”

“'My bride! What bride? I have no bride! My bride is here [...] because my equal is here, and my likeness.'"

While Rochester's engagement to Blanche Ingram was fabricated, his ACTUAL CURRENT WIFE, Bertha, is very much real. After Rochester's deception is uncovered, a distraught Jane leaves for the moors. She meets a missionary called St John Rivers, who decides that Jane is “formed for labour, not for love” and proposes she become his wife “not for my pleasure but for my sovereign’s service". I mean, that is setting the bar awfully high – wedded not only to St John but also to God?!

Fortunately, Jane rejects his advances and eventually finds her way back to Thornfield (now a pile of ash) and Mr Rochester, now a humbled and changed man. He recognises her as his "skylark" from her voice alone, lending weight to his original assertion that beyond the trappings of wealth and beauty, the two are bound together. His final proposal is almost apologetic, describing himself as a "poor blind man". Jane accepts his proposal with the iconic line "Reader, I married him". Theirs truly is a meeting of souls, against all odds.

3. Anne Elliot and Captain WEntworth

Persuasion by Jane Austen

Anne Elliot's and Frederick Wentworth's first courtship is more or less taken as read in Persuasion;

“It would be difficult to say which had seen the highest perfection in the other, or which had been the happiest; she, in receiving his declarations and proposals, or he in having them accepted.” 

However, the engagement is short-lived. Anne's family are unhappy with Wentworth; he lacks social connections and wealth. Anne ends the engagement, and a heartbroken Wentworth leaves Somerset to join the navy. Almost a decade later, he returns as a naval captain and self-made man. The novel charts their subsequent reconciliation from Sommerset to Bath, culminating in a deeply vulnerable and romantic letter:

"You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope. Tell me not that I am too late, that such precious feelings are gone for ever. I offer myself to you again with a heart even more your own than when you almost broke it, eight years and a half ago."

Fans of Miss Austen will know that Anne and Captain Wentworth’s rocky beginning closely resembles that of Austen’s sister. Cassandra Austen was engaged to a Thomas Fowle, but they postponed the wedding in order to save up. Fowle accepted a position as a military captain and later died from yellow fever. Persuasion writes Cassandra her happily-ever-after, but not without acknowledging the painful process in which their love is forged.

4. Almanzo Wilder And Laura Ingalls

These Happy Golden Years by Laura Ingalls Wilder

This proposal scene between Laura and her beau of several summers, Almanzo, has got to be one of the most awkward I've ever read. Almanzo goes for the hint, hint, tack, and Laura is quick-witted in response:

'Your hand is so small!' Almanzo said. 'How would you like an engagement ring?' 

'It depends who was offering it,' Laura replied. 

'And if it was me?' 

'Then it would depend on the ring.' Laura drew her hand away. 

A perfect mix of pithy and playful – these are clearly two people who know each other very deeply. The proposal is, of course, a success (as the author's name testifies!)

5. Lauren and David

The Secret by Eve M. Riley

Nowadays, romances don't always end in "I do". Not all of my techboys find their HEA with marriage - for some, the mutual understanding that they are "all in" is enough.

However, in The Secret, Liss's sister Lauren receives a pretty picture-perfect proposal, complete with chronological notes about milestones in their relationship (like tickets to the baseball game where they shared their first kiss):

I pick up my phone to look at the message, and a photo of a hand sporting a huge diamond ring is sitting in my WhatsApp. Followed by a picture of my sister in tears being hugged into a broad chest. Shit. I press the call button.

“Oh my God, Lauren!”

David laughs in the background as my sister hiccups in my ear.

“Oh, Liss …” she garbles.

“He proposed? Oh, congratulations, honey!”

A shaky breath whispers across my ear, and David murmurs, “You okay?” before his chuckling fades away.

“He left clues all over the house!” she chokes out, snuffling.

Which fictional proposals have you reaching for the tissues? Let me know below

Love, Eve x

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