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Ross and Elizabeth's Sham Childish Love! A Past and Mistaken Identity

Ross Poldark and Elizabeth side profile looking sternly at each other with the image of the young Elizabeth Ross did love and words sating 'sham Childish love A Past and mistaken identity'

Love without a true knowledge in the object of that love is just infatuation, while idealism is the fuel that keeps that infatuation going.

This post continues to explore the theme of Ross Poldark's sham desire for Elizabeth as covered in the previous one called 'Ross's Fall Out Of Love With Elizabeth (Winston Graham's Notes Of Ross's Sham Desire). That previous post was particularly inspired by Winston Graham's archived handwritten story plan notes for his Poldark story. Specifically there was a relevant entry where he wrote that "Before Elizabeth marries George Ross has his way with her...Ross finds that his desire for Elizabeth is a sham." As the second of three in a series exploring Ross's 'sham desire' for Elizabeth, this post focuses on the root cause of the sham and has Elizabeth's true character at the heart of this (though not under intense examination in this post). Indeed, a fundamental and central issue which most definitely adds to the logic of why Ross's desire for Elizabeth was actually a sham was Ross's idealism of Elizabeth based on his teenage experience of her. Indeed there is a theme of their relationship being based on only a 'childish' love between them which Elizabeth seemed to be more conscious of and therefore any desire by either of them for the other being based on this. This was without the experience of an adult love to test the genuineness in reality and their present day. There is theme that Winston Graham inserts into the story which raises the question of how much adult Ross and Elizabeth really knew each other. Certainly in the first instance, the eventual realisation so many years later by Ross of his 'sham desire' of Elizabeth is hardly surprising if he was actually in love with the girl that Elizabeth once was, rather than the woman that Elizabeth had become. Hence, Ross's belief that he loved Elizabeth, also as the new man he became, was likely based on an identity he held for her that was mistaken because of change in her by then. 

Loving Elizabeth The Girl, Elizabeth The Woman, Or Both?

Ross left Elizabeth for War around June 1781 and returned in October 1783. Winston Graham did not invest time in Ross and Elizabeth's back story from before he left and while he was away. From the information available it does not appear that Ross and Elizabeth had a very long relationship before he went off to war. There was no clear impression that they had even spent much time alone together without company. There was a reference to them once snatching some time together in a summerhouse as if alone time was not a common occurrence and that therefore it was a moment that was noteworthy and memorable for them. However Ross likely carried himself through The American War stuck in time in terms of his teenage young love of Elizabeth. As is common for men at war Ross could easily have fallen into dreaming and fantasising about Elizabeth, of returning to her 'as she was then' and hanging on to a rose tinted vision of what a proper lived out relationship with her would be like.  

Against the horror of the war that Ross both witnessed and participated in, a romanticised vision of returning to Elizabeth and starting a life with her would have kept him going. He alluded to how much he had hoped in this when he confronted her six months after she had married Francis. However, in light of a short and possibly secret courtship with the long separation that followed when Ross went off to the war, Ross's true knowledge and understanding of the Elizabeth he returned to can fairly be questioned. This is important when considering the idea of Elizabeth as the object of Ross's love, but yet being loved by him based on who he believed her to still be, but who she might not have been anymore. The quote that opens this essay speaks to the idea that for a love and desire to be genuine and based in reality, then the true nature and essence of that object of love must not be mistaken and therefore not based on a mistaken identity or character.

While Ross was at Francis and Elizabeth's wedding reception, Ross thought back to when he had first met Elizabeth and that she had often left him tongue tide ‘…until he came to know her as she really was.’ That indeed gives the impression of his familiarity of the Elizabeth from way back then. At that point Ross certainly felt that he knew her well and other than Ross often thinking of Elizabeth as 'lovely' Winston Graham did not give much of an idea of what Elizabeth had been like beforehand and what Ross's assessment was based on. However, in any case, having just returned from being separated from Elizabeth for 28 months and thus this being 2 years and 4 months, again a valid question is 'how much did Ross really know Elizabeth as the woman that she had become since?' But Winston Graham did actually provide subtle narrative that could easily be missed and which pointed to a narrative of not only Elizabeth having changed as a person in the time that Ross was away, but of Ross having changed too. Indeed it would not be long that they would both come to see they had changed and admit this themselves. This is even if for Ross this awareness came later and even then did not cause him initially to reassess his desire for Elizabeth.

Post War Ross and Elizabeth-  New, Grown, Mature and Different!


"But, Ross, ours was a boy-and-girl attachment. I was very fond of you and still am. But you went away.....and with Francis it was different. I loved him. I'd grown up. We were not children but grown people."
Elizabeth to Ross  'Ross Poldark' (Internal Book 1 Chapter7)

Elizabeth: Version 2


Before Ross's understanding of the 'sham desire' he had held for Elizabeth after 9th May, both of them had long before raised the issue themselves of them being different and changed people after Ross's return from The American War. This was to the extent that it would be remiss to ignore it as a narrative theme that Winston Graham laid down. For instance, in the first book, when Ross at Easter had his first real confrontation with Elizabeth six months after she had married Francis, and at that point asked why she did not wait for him, she told him "....with Francis it was different. I loved him. I'd grown up. We were not children but grown people." In this it is clear that Elizabeth spoke about Ross going away as if that was a significant period for her where she continued living life, moving on and perhaps growing as a person too. Not only did Elizabeth introduce into the story narrative the idea of her having grown and changed, but she indicated that she now viewed her romance with Ross as something 'childish'. Hence, it seemed it was something she looked on as having outgrown because she had changed through the process of 'growing up'. Therefore Elizabeth who was older then, had a different perspective on what she loved and desired. Naturally that gives the impression of a romance which as an older Elizabeth she viewed in reflection was not real or to be taken seriously at all. Elizabeth's stance must be considered in this essay as her stance perhaps shows an outlook that had some merit to it but which Ross failed to take early on.

The Key To The Sham: Changed Person - Changed Desires

'Only I have changed, Demelza. And it is your fault.'
Ross thinking of why he no longer loved Elizabeth as he did before -'The Four Swans' (Internal Book 1 Chapter 12)

In further support of the impact of Elizabeth's growth and change of character while Ross was away at war, Elizabeth said to him in the first edition text of the first book that "..We could not be happy together, we are not the right temperament to blend, to live in amity...." Thus Elizabeth was communicating that as she had grown up and changed she had come to a new understanding about compatibility and what she now wanted and needed in a life partner. Thus she felt differently about Ross because she had changed. This is entirely reasonable and realistic and it is ironic that if not for fear of another argument based on misunderstanding, this is the very same explanation that Ross wished to give to Demelza years later about why he no longer desired Elizabeth. Ross too had consciously recognised only by the forth book that he was changed from the person he was when he fell for Elizabeth and how this made the difference. Indeed when a person and their outlook and values change, so it it often the case that their desires do too. For instance, a teenager who loved the thrill of a bad boy type boyfriend, can grow up to be a woman then wanting something different for her life such as a wholesome family life with healthy love instead of the toxic but thrilling love of yesteryear. That bad boy is then is no longer, appealing attractive and desirable to her as a husband. 

Ross's thinking that he no longer desired Elizabeth because being with and loving Demelza had changed him, essentially answers half of the reason why his desire of Elizabeth was a sham. Inadvertently Demelza had showed him something different that he realised in the end he could not get with Elizabeth. Demelza's part in this (the revelation of Ross's 'sham desire' of Elizabeth) will be more of the focus in the follow up post. However it is the case that Ross's realisation was delayed because of his idealism of Elizabeth and perhaps because for a time he thought she was a first love that could give him what Demelza could, if not better. This is a 'flawless' love and relationship (or near enough to what Demelza offered him which overall made him happy). The issue with Ross was that he did not work out until later that the real and changed Elizabeth no longer fitted the mould or the new standard. 

Once again, perhaps to push the idea of Elizabeth not really initially preferring Francis over Ross, the latest television adaption did not follow the book narrative of Elizabeth articulating quite convincingly her reasons for choosing to marry Francis and not him. That section of dialogue was stripped out with her only saying to Ross there "I love Francis." It is likely that this was to serve a differing narrative that Elizabeth was not all that sure about preferring Francis more when Winston Graham did write in the fourth book Elizabeth telling Ross that she genuinely did think she loved Francis better at the time. Still in this Easter scene in the first book Elizabeth did speak more of her connection with Francis to elaborated on this. In backing up her position she alluded to a change in her which went against Ross in terms of what she desired. Speaking of her and Francis, one of the things Elizabeth said was "Our tastes were the same ..." This was as if she no longer felt she was compatible with Ross and further that she preferred Francis. She desired Francis more, thinking he was better for her. 

Of course it is possible that realising that you are not compatible with someone does not necessarily suddenly stop the desire for that person or perhaps just for their attention, but knowing that there are aspects of a person that would not get on well or blend with you typically will at least eventually chips away at their holistic appeal. This then tends to make that person less desirable as a person to be a life partner with. Regardless of any inner conflict, despite her early romance with Ross, Elizabeth's actions indicated that she had found another man other than Ross more appealing and desirable to share her future with and she gave her reasons for this. 

A Childish Lack Of Understanding and Wisdom


Naïve:

Having or showing a lack of experience, judgment or information.
Dictionary.Com

Lacking worldly experience or understanding /Unaffectedly or foolishly simple; childlike; artless.
Your Dictionary

Deficient in wordly wisdom / marked by unaffected simplicity.
Merriam-Webster.Com


Despite Elizabeth feeling upset at Ross's angry disapproval of her betrayal in marrying Francis, and despite her being stirred by some unknown feeling about him, her comments to Ross at their Easter meeting in the first book did not seem to be fleeting or without substance. As stated Elizabeth doubled down on her then preference for Francis years later and so she instead they seemed to be honestly based on a new mature perspective of Elizabeth's. This is despite what Elizabeth may have implied to Ross, such as ten years later in 'Warleggan' when she made a questionable romantic disclosure implying she loved him after all (and still did?). But that was indeed questionable because for years after that Easter meeting Elizabeth had nevertheless maintained her stance in her personal thoughts that her romance with Ross had not been a serious love, but was childish. This includes even after Ross had married Demelza! It was three years after her marriage to Francis when Elizabeth seemed interested in courting Ross's attention and then had thoughts to regain her ascendancy of Ross over Demelza after he had married and brought he out to meet the family six months later. As covered in 'Reaching Out For Ross Poldark', that suggested that Elizabeth's desire for Ross was somewhat conditional, artificial and probably more about desiring his attention as a person she was fond of but who she thought loved her and therefore would willingly attend to her need for admiration and treasuring.

Elizabeth - A Changed Outlook That Was Not Reversed

The significance of Elizabeth maintaining her stance nearly five years later in 1788 that her romance with Ross was 'childish' speaks to the idea that when you grow and change it's hard to undo that change or go back on that new enlightenment. Elizabeth's unchanged position can be seen even after she formulated a plan years later to secure and renew Ross's interest in her despite him being a newly married man. Winston Graham's narration implied that this actually was not based on some epiphany that she did love him after all (as she later implied to Ross) but a 'Spirit of competition with Demelza' in her disbelief and a wounded ego. For instance, nearly five years after Ross's return to Cornwall in chapter six of the first edition of 'Demelza', and therefore long past that Easter confrontation with Ross in April 1784, Winston Graham's narration showed that Elizabeth still held this dismissive view of her teenage love of Ross. He did this when in relation to having a five year flashback of Ross's return to Cornwall he wrote that Elizabeth had thought that this had served '...to remind her of her childish promise, like the re-emergence of someone dead.' In light of this Graham therefore continued to give the impression of Elizabeth having moved well on from that teenage romance with Ross to a different state of mind about it. This is whereby in framing her agreement to marry Ross as a 'childish promise' Elizabeth seemed to imply it was one based on a lack of wisdom and informed judgment. Elizabeth still continued to see it that way thereafter and Winston Graham did not document a reversal that he confirmed as a narrator. Thereby Elizabeth essentially undermined her young love of Ross and the very marriage promise this was based on. This shows that she indeed did consider that it was not to be taken serious as a real love. 

A new scene added to the the last TV Poldark
adaptation against the spirit of Winston 
Graham's narrative which has Elizabeth 
immediately and with certainty wanting to pursue
Ross on his return instead of marry Francis but
being fiercely dissuaded by her mother. Where
in the book Elizabeth maintained that at this
point she had herself felt she loved Francis better.
The last adaption of Poldark for television created a different narrative of Elizabeth's perspective of her romance with Ross. For that it was as if Elizabeth's love for Ross came flooding back when he returned to Cornwall, that she was excited by his return and that had it not been for her mother she wanted Ross to claim her back, after which she could cancel her engagement with Francis. New scenes were written in to sell what was not Winston's Graham's narrative and which included one scene of Elizabeth's mother having to have a firm word with her where she conveyed to Elizabeth she should put Ross out of her mind and remain committed to marrying Francis. However in contrast to the revision of the television adaption, in the original and true Poldark story Graham instead had doubled down on this idea that Elizabeth was never really sold on her teenage romance with Ross being the real thing (real love). He did this when in the same chapter six scene of that first edition text of 'Demelza', he wrote about Elizabeth thinking that she and Ross had much younger minds and perspectives before he went to the war. Therefore her 'grown' mindset was that their childish love and promise to marry each other was ill informed and too idealistic since they were much younger back then. He narrated that Elizabeth had thought to herself that 'They were both very young, both very much in earnest, both rather naïve.....Now, now, she was so mature.' 

Of course, the reference to maturity by Elizabeth is another thing that suggests Elizabeth's belief was that she had grown, had more wisdom and therefore she was looking down on a relationship she had when she was younger and also what she then felt for Ross. Again Elizabeth essentially undermined her teenage romance with Ross by believing they had felt that way for each other due to age and naivety. It is also notable that even with Elizabeth thinking in 'Warleggan' that Ross had no money for them to run away together after he took her by force, there was no narration both before or after that Elizbeth desired Ross on romantic grounds rather than on practical grounds given the patriarchal society which limited options for women and her trepidation about marrying a man like George. Also Winston Graham still reported in his narration some time before the 9th May incident that Elizabeth's feelings for Ross had never quite been 'definable' to her. That reinforced the notion that she never really reach a point of being convinced she had a real romantic love for Ross. 

Elizabeth Version 3: The Ever Changing Elizabeth


'How she had changed! Not outwardly: there was very little, she thought, to see outwardly (after all, twenty-four was not a great age and she had only had one child) but inwardly the difference was great.'
Elizabeth Poldark's private thoughts  'Demelza' (first edition) Internal Book 1 Chapter 6


Winston Graham continued to share more of Elizabeth's personal reflections in the first edition of 'Demelza' which supports the idea that she really was no longer the girl that Ross had fallen for before he went to war. For instance, in that chapter six scene (as referred to above) Elizabeth continued to think of her new life and the responsibilities she had as the woman she was. Elizabeth thought of the disappointments she had experienced that had changed her. This would surely have included the demise of her marriage to Francis as Winston Graham had actually indicated in his narration later on in the first edition of that book that this was the source of this feeling. It was when Elizabeth was at the Truro ball when he wrote that 'Her marriage had not at all turned out as expected.' Also at that point Winston Graham referred to Elizabeth as a '..beautiful, rather over-reserved disappointed young woman.' But back to thinking of her 'childish promise' to Ross in that sixth first edition chapter of 'Demelza', Elizabeth further thought quite specifically 'How she had changed! Not outwardly: there was very little....but inwardly the difference was great.'

Ross Acknowledges "A Different Elizabeth"

"...you've changed so much-inwardly I mean."
Ross to Elizabeth at the Trevaunance Party 'Warleggan' (Internal Book 1 Chapter 3)


Even though Ross once told Demelza that Elizabeth and not changed much but had just 'coarsened', quite revealingly at times he did stray into conversation with Elizabeth whereby he did actually acknowledge a very different Elizabeth after all. Though of course, perhaps that 'coarsening' was enough to make all the difference! Yet initially, in the third book 'Jeremy Poldark', as Elizabeth flirted with Ross in her infamous mesmeric red dress in seeking to regain her ascendancy in his mind over Demelza, Ross said to her "You are a little changed from when we first met." But just as Elizabeth had thought of herself before, this was not just about outward appearance and it seems that Ross did not mean it that way either. He made that clear in a later meeting with her. It was a couple of years later in 'Warleggan', when Ross addressed the matter again. While sitting next to each other at the Trevaunance party Ross commented to Elizabeth that "...you've changed so much-inwardly I mean." When Elizabeth prodded him, he expanded saying "It's a different Elizabeth, that's all." In no way suggesting that this was in a bad way but in contradiction to his minimisation to Demelza Ross  continued saying "But startling at times. I understand now how young you were when you promised to marry me." Thus Winston Graham pushed the idea of a changed Elizabeth and that both she and Ross agreed on this.  In this scene Ross was indeed suggesting inadvertently that Elizabeth was now quite far removed from the girl he had fallen in love with and that her youth at the time was a factor in why she had agreed to marry him. This is just as Elizabeth had thought.

Ross Changed Too!!!

'The dividing line was his time in America. They had been his formative years. He had gone out a wild youth and came back a mature man.'
Narrative on Ross 'The Black Moon' (Internal Book 1 Chapter 5)

Ross and Elizabeth did not see each other
a lot after his return in 1783 when
she married Francis
As well as Ross recognising how Elizabeth had changed Elizabeth had initiated a strand of the conversation at the Trevanaunce party where she acknowledged that her knowledge about him over many years was little. She said to him "I know very little of you Ross. How often have we met in five years? A dozen times?" Ross had replied in agreement saying "...perhaps you're right. I am inclined to agree, I know very little of you either..." Indeed after a two and half year separation due to the war and then a further separation of about ten years, during which Ross and Elizabeth went down different paths and married other people, Ross and Elizabeth were indeed different people from when they first fell in love before the war and had not go to know the new people they were. Even Ross, at a point some years later in 'Jeremy Poldark' wondered to himself about whether a spark he got from touching Elizabeth's arm, against his love of Demelza was '......because he loved Elizabeth more-or because he knew her less?' 

Ross was at war for 2 years and 4 months
and returned a changed man 
according to Winston Graham's narrative.
Indeed from all this, and since Ross thought it himself it really can be seen that there is a strong theme that counters the idea that Ross knew Elizabeth very well as the person she had grown to be when he returned from the war. Perhaps unbeknown or unnoticed by many readers, but Winston Graham really did take a number of opportunities to convey this through Ross and Elizabeth's own dialogue. However since he narrated that Ross came back a more mature person Winston Graham also pressed the point (as with the excerpt above), that Ross's time at war was also a time of change for him too. He returned a changed man too. Accordingly the narration had both Ross and Elizabeth identifying that since his return from war they did not know each other so well after all. 

Ross's Love: Frozen Back In Time?


‘He might have been back in Trenwith thirteen years ago, looking at the girl who had then meant everything in life to him and on whose word his whole future hung.’
Ross with Elizabeth at Sawle Church Graveyard ‘The Four Swans’ (Internal Book 1 Chapter 11)

Despite an academic awareness that Elizabeth had changed as a person. It is clear that Ross did not relate that back to his desire and consider if this should impact this. However in greater awareness after 9th May 1794 when he by then realised his desire for Elizabeth was a sham, Ross did actually confirm at the end of 'Warleggan' that his ten year devotion to Elizabeth since his return from war had indeed been based on an 'idealised relationship' with her. Ross's later meeting with Elizabeth in 'The Four Swans' three years after their night together drops a big hint about how on a psychological basis Ross's love for Elizabeth was indeed associated with the Elizabeth who he knew before he went to war, rather than the Elizabeth he returned to and who she then was.

As if in acknowledgement of a love experience that was infuriating and did not quite make it in keeping with the 'true love wins' and 'true love endures' theory, at that time of Ross talking to Elizabeth at the graveyard he had a fleeting moment '..when his frustrated love for her had welled up afresh.' It is to be noted that there was no element of permanence given to this feeling through the narration even as Ross left the scene. Yet it must be no coincidence that this throwback feeling coincided with Ross looking at Elizabeth and thinking that 'he might have been back in Trenwith, looking at the girl (Elizabeth)..' who he had loved at the time. Just as with Gunnar Ardelius's quote it is then easy to see that this throwback feeling was about Ross's memories of his feeling with Elizabeth from before, rather than the Elizabeth that stood before him. Presumably if it was about her as she was then, then he would have experienced a similar feeling each time he saw her thereafter. He did not! In fact there is a stark difference to Ross emotional reaction on meetings with Elizabeth after 'Warleggan' and while there was understandably at her gruesome death he explained this related to a 'selfish grief' from the reality he may lose Demelza while maintaining his position that Elizabeth was a woman he 'once loved'.  

Indeed Winston Graham's narration of Ross experiencing a flush of 'frustrated love' for Elizabeth while visualising her as the young version of Elizabeth does lean into Graham's theme of Ross before his 'sham desire' epiphany having not moved past the girl he had fallen for as the object of his love, rather than the grown Elizabeth. This narrative of Ross visualising the Elizabeth as the girl back in Trenwith at the time of the graveyard meeting is the crux of the matter when considering Ross's mentality around the love and desire he thought he had for her. Ross's wave of nostalgia over Elizabeth does suggest that the memory of the young Elizabeth was a dominating vision in his mind that was linked to Ross's feeling of love for her (albeit a frustrated love). 

Changed! To Blend Or Not To Blend

Clearly the significance of Ross and Elizabeth not really knowing each other is the concern when conceding that they had both changed over the ten years. Of course, it does not always follow that change will always be a bad thing for a couple. Change can actually be good here. But perhaps Elizabeth as a conformist and a conversative and then some 'coarsening' of this would be change in the wrong direction to agree with Ross. Equally while it might be thought that Ross going to war a wild youth and coming back more mature might make him even more suited to Elizabeth, perhaps not if the maturity he gained was still somehow at a cost to their compatibility. For instance, a more ground in liberal mindset against Elizabeth's coarser contrasting view may have led to issues during the course of a long marriage. This is especially if Ross's maturity is what birthed in him principles of social justice and political views where his rebelliousness and anti conformism was newly channelled through activism that challenged authority and ruffled feathers. The issue here is that irritation and frustrations to the full exposure of the character of your other half is a killer to appeal. It exposes as a sham the desire initially had for them prior to this exposure. Elizabeth had forecast so early, soon after Ross return to Cornwall that their characters would not blend for them to live in amity. 

Unless Ross and Elizabeth fell in a real and true love with each other all over again as the new, older and different people that they had become, then actually their feelings of love were for their former younger selves as child hood sweethearts. Gunnar Ardelius's wise words profess that what is left is a love for the memories of their sweet childish romance. However it should not be disregarded that on Elizabeth's side, as she explained herself at that time on Ross's return, that she at least felt fondness of him. Like Ross's idealism of Elizabeth this likely sustained a sham desire by both of them, despite barely spending time together post war. On the other hand, ironically, Francis and Elizabeth spending time together in marriage caused them to realised that they did not love each other really. The 'sham desire' had been exposed and desire was lost. Elizabeth had then determined that what she thought was love of Francis was not. With the new, different and grown Ross and Elizabeth, given Winston Graham's mindset that they were not to be, all roads in the detail of the narrative would have led to the unveiling of the 'sham desire' somehow, and further to Demelza gracing Ross's life as the vital character to change the course of it. Winston Graham had just chosen to use the incident on 9th May as the mechanism to force Ross to that realisation through an examination of his true values in a woman, companion, lover, mother of his child and one that he thereafter found did not compare to any other.

Francis and Elizabeth's Sham Desire: Lesson To Be Learnt

"I married for what I thought was love. and it did not last for a twelvemonth.....We thought ourselves in love with each other..."

Elizabeth to Morwenna about her marriage to Francis 'The Black Moon' ( Internal book 2 Chapter 4)

Additional insights from the first edition of the second book suggest as indicated earlier in this essay, that not only did Elizabeth change while Ross was at war but she experienced further change within her marriage to Francis too. There can be little doubt that the disappointments she experience (like Francis did too) were central to that. While in the first edition of the first book Winston Graham narrated Elizabeth smiling at Francis at their engagement dinner as her 'lover', by the time of the fourth book 'Warleggan' he narrated that in Elizabeth's experience of marriage she discovered that '..she found mother love uncomplex and wholly satisfying: in such a relationship there were no mental reservation, no attitudes to be sustained, and no conflict.' Accordingly Elizabeth's desire for Francis had been sham. It had been based on a vision of what she thought he was and that she expected to be agreeable with her as a lifelong partner. Elizabeth had thought hers and Francis's tastes were the same. They were not! Or not enough of them were. Undoubtedly this created conflict and unhappiness within Francis and Elizabeth's marriage where she hated having to sustain a certain attitude. 

'They were all sentimentalists at heart, the Poldarks, Verity thought.....Francis Too......He expected too much of life, of Elizabeth. Especially of Elizabeth.'
'Demelza' (Book2 chapter 6)

It would be quite wrong to think Elizabeth's sham desire for Francis meant that she should have chosen and desired Ross after all, if the reason for what made her pairing with Francis unwise, would apply with Ross too. For instance, if Francis's gambling irritated Elizabeth then Ross's general risk-taking may have had a similar response. Equally Francis's desire for Elizabeth had proved to be a sham too and it was well documented that he was disappointed by how she had turned out to be as a wife for him having expected her to be different from how she was. As he sardonically said, she was more of an angel than a wife and he alluded to her being cold and detached in an ivory cage (First edition 'Demelza'). Elizabeth and Francis's experience of a sham desire in each other shows how easily this can occur. This is especially during an age where courtships might have been short, constrained and where a best behaviour presentation could hold out until after marriage and neither gets full exposure to all the crooks and crevices of each other's characters beforehand. In that case it would be a game of chance. That is a reminder that 'childish' love is often this precisely because of a lack of judgement and wisdom that generally comes from experience. 

Changed For Someone Else


'...he had always had something in common with this world -it was a part of himself just as much as his innate breeding as a Poldark was part of himself. That he had married a miner's daughter had confirmed the union not created it.'
Narrative on Ross marrying Demelza  'The Angry Tide' (Internal Book 1 Chapter 8 Pt3

Perhaps Ross with being happy and having an ongoing desire for Demelza was not so much a case of luck as he at least knew her as his housemaid for several years before. However Elizabeth and Ross had had no run at adult love as the older people they were. Therefore they had no run to know for sure if they really would have found each other desirable within that and with longevity depending on their temperaments and how this blended. With Elizabeth recognising that she had changed inwardly throughout her marriage, is it not the case that Elizabeth's inward change actually made her more likely to be more satisfied and successful in a marriage with George than with a man like Ross following her marriage with Francis? Equally with Ross being changed by the war, perhaps he became a person that was then more suited to Demelza. Having said this, the narrative from Winston Graham from 'The Angry Tide' that Ross marrying a girl like Demelza only confirmed a union with a world he already innately had something in common with, also confirms Graham set mindset that Demelza was made for him far above Elizabeth and theirs was indeed a desire that did not prove to be a sham or 'something shabby' as Ross once mentioned. 

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