Bridget Jones's Diary

As Bridget and all of her friends experience a range of romantic difficulties, The Importance of Friendship in Challenging Times becomes a pivotal rallying point for Fielding’s broader feminist critique, for Bridget’s drunken nights out with her friends create safe spaces for the whole group to air mutual dissatisfaction and frustration with the inconsistency and cruelty of the men in their life. As they all drunkenly label their romantic interests nothing more than “bastards” (127), the raucous nature of their bitter solidarity highlights the stereotypical struggle to both conform to society’s expectations and find a way to mitigate the frustrations of doing so. Despite the frivolous tone of these late-night soirees, the friends also support each other in much more serious ways, as when Bridget calls Sharon with news of her pregnancy scare. In this scene, Sharon’s immediate willingness to meet Bridget attests to the strength of their friendship, and Sharon shows her empathy by reassuring Bridget in a moment of stress and extreme vulnerability.

Even as Bridget and her friends find numerous faults with the men they continue to pursue, The Desire for Self-Improvement also reveals their perpetual insecurity and dissatisfaction with their own lives and personal attributes, reflecting the pervading influence of society’s unfair standards. For example, Bridget becomes increasingly worried about her weight, and her lowest moments often stem from diet-related shame, for whenever she has a hangover, she is invariably drawn to unhealthy comfort foods that sabotage her efforts at weight loss. Similarly, when Bridget is worried that she is pregnant and fears that Daniel is not interested in her, she comforts herself with an array of unhealthy food choices, admitting to devouring “1 milky way,” “2 pieces unbaked lemon cheesecake,” and “1 chocolate Viennoise dessert thing with cream on top” in order to “try to make [her]self feel better” (115). Although this extensive list is designed to have a comedic effect, the written admission also highlights her feelings of inadequacy and shame, causing her to chides herself and resolve to “keep an eye on weight” (117) as though losing a few extra pounds is the key to a happier life. Thus, Fielding uses Bridget’s anxieties to explore the damaging impact of diet culture; the protagonist develops an unhealthy relationship with food, binge-eating to comfort herself and then suffering intense self-loathing in the aftermath of her choices. As the diary entries unfold, her recurring worries become a cyclical pattern that exacerbates her low self-esteem.

Even when Bridget reaches her goal weight, she receives none of the expected congratulations for her long efforts; instead, her friends treat her to even more criticism by stating that she looks “drawn” (106) and has lost the weight too quickly. Thus, even when she does her utmost to conform to society’s expectations, she fails to meet society’s impossible standards. This scene therefore illustrates the pitfalls of linking self-esteem to physical appearance alone. Her initial sense of wonder at achieving her goal weight “after eighteen years” is quickly dampened by external judgment. The underlying psychology here is quite damaging, for Bridget has long since internalized the societal conditioning that celebrates thin women and mocks and derides women with larger bodies, and she therefore assumes that weight loss equates to happiness. As a result, she feels devastated when her long efforts to lose weight loss do not bring her the confidence, beauty, and romance that she has been taught to crave. Faced with the anticlimactic reception of her accomplishment, she is forced to realize the pointlessness of her years of obsession, self-loathing and harmful dieting.

Bridget also pursues The Desire for Self-Improvement in less tangible ways, especially when she attempts to achieve happiness and peace by following various self-help theories. With this trend in the protagonist’s behavior, Fielding critiques the culture of self-help books, and this trend is further explored in the friends’ discussions about Jude’s book on the art of Zen. The characters’ fixation upon esoteric means of self-improvement is rendered ridiculous by the narrative’s clear implications that the true sources of the women’s dissatisfaction are the immature and inconsiderate men with whom they are romantically involved. In this context, their repeated efforts at achieving a poorly defined version of self-actualization and peace proves to be a practical impossibility. Fielding emphasizes the irony in this contrast by juxtaposing the women’s mutual soul-searching sessions with evidence of their male acquaintances’ infidelity. As Bridget and Jude discuss Zen principles, Bridget is faced with evidence that Jeremy is cheating on Magda. Thus, Fielding’s satirical work suggests that Sexist Attitudes in Contemporary Dating are the main cause of the women’s spiritual complaints, and their failure to apply Zen principles has nothing to do with it.

As these interwoven conflicts unfold, Fielding’s descriptions of her male characters are less than complimentary, and her characterization of Daniel borders on an exaggerated collection of stereotypes regarding the Sexist Attitudes in Contemporary Dating. Daniel is often portrayed as being untrustworthy, inconsiderate, and downright sleazy, and his lack of respect for Bridget is clearly displayed in his cavalier, offhand approach to their sexual reunion. Because the encounter begins with his drunken request to use her bathroom, the scene can be interpreted as a heavy-handed form of symbolism, for Daniel clearly uses Bridget as a “dumping ground” of sorts and believes her to exist solely for his own convenience. Likewise, when he has no practical need of her services, he finds her easy to forget and discard until his next need arises. This unhealthy dynamic also manifests in his utter indifference to her at work after he has just spent 72 hours at her flat, and his unfaithfulness to Bridget is also foreshadowed in his careless attitude toward the other women in his life, as when he fails to recognize Vanessa, a former sexual conquest, when they meet at a party. While these examples are potent warning signs of his problematic outlook and incompatibility with Bridget, his true misogyny is fully revealed when he makes a tasteless joke about diets and dating. Fielding therefore indicates that Daniel only values women for their perceived sexual appeal and believes that women only “deserve” to be taken out to eat if they are thin and attractive. His penchant for emotional abuse is ultimately cemented when he openly mocks Bridget’s weight by callously calling her “my plumptious” (112). With these details, Fielding ensures that Daniel becomes a completely irredeemable character in the narrative despite Bridget’s overly forgiving nature.

Significantly, Daniel’s worst qualities are timed to coincide with Bridget’s more favorable reevaluation of Mark. When he defends Bridget from Perpetua’s mockery at the literary launch party by cleverly framing Bridget’s enjoyment of Blind Date through the academic lens of Postmodernism, his strategic intervention disrupts Perpetua’s attempt to paint Bridget as shallow and stupid. By praising Bridget as a “top post-modernist” and thwarting Perpetua’s cruel criticism, Mark reveals himself to be a kinder soul than Bridget initially supposed. This unanticipated show of social support foreshadows his broader role in her life in the coming chapters. Significantly, even Bridget’s friends engage in a more favorable reevaluation of Mark, for Jude now regards him as being “incredibly nice and attractive” (104). The intertextuality of the novel continues as well, for Fielding intends Daniel to be a modern parallel of Jane Austen’s charming but deceitful Mr. Wickham, while Mark plays a very similar role to that of Austen’s Mr. Darcy, whose initial aloofness and rude demeanor is belied by the fact that he is genuinely kind-hearted. Ultimately, just like their classic literary counterparts, Daniel and Mark serve as foils to one another, and their contrasting behavior foreshadows Bridget’s eventual romantic attachment to Mark at the novel’s conclusion.