From family relations and custom to economic security and personal sacrifice, there are a variety of aspects of love and marriage revealed through literature. Chinua Achebe's "Marriage is a Private Affair," O. Henry's "The Gift of the Magi," and Kate Chopin's "The Kiss" are short stories that reveal quite different aspects of love and marriage. While "The Gift of the Magi" shows selfless love that sacrifices all for the beloved other; "The Kiss" reflects a woman's acceptance that one must marry for economic security more than feelings of the heart, and "Marriage is a Private Affair" shows how complex family relations can become once a new member of the family is added through marriage. Despite these differences, "The Gift of the Magi" and "Marriage is a Private Affair" shows love conquers all; while "The Kiss" shows that love must take a secondary position to more practical concerns in marriage.
In "Marriage is a Private Affair," we see how family relations are complicated by the addition of a new member through marriage. Nene thinks Naemeka's reluctance to tell his father about their love - being from different tribes - is foolish, but he tells her of the custom, "If your father were alive and lived in the heart of the Ibibio-land he would be exactly like my father" (Achebe 2). Naemeka and Nene love each other, but their tribal differences are too great a barrier for Naemeka's father Okeke to accept. He rejects his daughter-in-law because he wants his son to follow Igbo custom and marry a girl from his tribe in an arranged marriage. Instead Naemeka marries the girl he loves. The father is stubborn and clings to his beliefs, missing out on eight years of the married couples' life, including the birth of two grandsons. Ultimately, Nene loves her husband and children enough to take great pains to appeal to Okeke to mend his relationship wit
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