Essay Questions

What is the significance of time setting in Chesil Beach?

Edward and Florence get married in 1962, which is significant as at around this time Britain underwent a sexual revolution, with attitudes changing towards sexuality and relationships. This being said, the couple grew up in the 1940s, when attitudes were not as lenient. Instead, sexuality was not discussed, and people were discouraged from having any sexual relationships until marriage.

Before their first sexual encounter as a married couple, Edward and Florence are apprehensive, and fail to talk about their feelings openly. Perhaps the time of their upbringing has contributed to their apprehension in talking about sexuality openly. As such, we can see their struggles with sexual intimacy in the text as a comment on strict and traditional attitudes before the sexual revolution, and how they were damaging to interpersonal relationships.

Later in the text we see that Edward fully embraces the liberation of the "swinging sixties” and enjoys the freedoms that it brings. Here we see a contrast to attitudes in the 1960s compared to the 1940s, when the couple were growing up.

How do Edward's and Florence's respective backgrounds influence their attitudes and behavior?

Edward and Florence belong to different social classes in the novel, which influences their characters in different ways. Florence has an upper-class upbringing, which is strict and serious. Her traditional upbringing may have influenced her attitudes towards sexuality, and her inability to speak about her feelings openly.

Edward's father is a schoolmaster, and his mother suffers with brain damage, meaning he has a very different upbringing. Edward is perhaps the more liberated of the two and seems more comfortable about the prospect of their wedding night. Edward is not as sexually inhibited, and struggles to understand Florence's feelings, and to control his anger. As such, there is a comment on the relationship between social class and attitudes towards sexuality.