In Nostromo, Decoud is stuck on the island for only a week yet commits suicide out of loneliness. Oliver Twist spends most of the novel recovering from some ailment that anyone else would brush off without a thought.

Here Jane is described as emaciated after only a day without a meal. A day. It’s all beautifully written and heart wrenching, but it’s only a day.

The constitution of protagonists is questionable.