Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen

 

"I love you, most ardently" says Sir Fitzwilliam Darcy upon his first proposal to Elizabeth Bennet, the modern woman no older than one and twenty. Rosamund Pike who plays her sister Jane in the 2005 movie Pride & Prejudice narrated the book on Audible. I listened at 1,2 speed reading along, at a 20% faster pace than normally, enjoying every minute of this entirely splendid work, this all time classic of Western Literature, the core, it's beating heart, the greatest love story of all time unlocked for me the mystery of all others to Jane Austen's work. I set out to read this book to see if truly it is the great love story everyone says it is, and secondly to understand the frenzy nay, cult, that has been hence inspired. Women all over the world, on YouTube, Facebook and internet forums, having the hots for a fictional man, why is Mr. Darcy so great? 

Until now I've struggled with Jane Austen's books, it took me months to finish Mansfield Park and a long time to understand who was who in Sense and Sensibility, I read one third of Emma and did not finish it. I attempted Northanger Abbey and Persuasion but hardly turned a page before putting the books away. Much like the heroine of Pride and Prejudice, Elizabeth or Lizzy, I now regret my prejudice against Jane Austen, I recall calling her books such as "wading through shit" assuredly I made hasty judgements and now I only blame myself and the time I live in. Our poor brains are not used to concentrating on stories that unfold slowly like the petals of a rose in a vase of warm water, petal by petal. Literary fast food is not good for us, and I am positively sure that I will digest Pride and Prejudice for a very long time still. I will try to recount my strongest impressions of this read as follows: 

Firstly the movie adaptation of Pride and Prejudice 2005 is not true to the original story in many aspects. I've also seen the BBC Miniseries 1995 with Colin Firth, who by many is considered the better Mr. Darcy. While I read (and listened to Audible) I could only picture in my head the cast of the 2005 movie. Soon it'll be twenty years since that adaptation and thirty years since the Colin Firth adaptation and still women are madly in love. In my reading, I inevitably gain personal insight and healing and perspective. After finishing my read I had one chief realization of my own: I admit that my former marriages and choices for nuptial bliss have been entirely amiss. That much like Lizzy's youngest sister Lydia, I've been a foolish woman, a girl brought up with no direction. 

Jane Austen writes a great deal about silly women and women with depth. Lizzy is her fathers favorite, in a household of five daughters and elderly parents it's a true concern to marry the young women well. The arrival of a certain rich man named Mr. Bingley awakes the matchmaking mother. Events ensue where Lizzy is introduced to Mr. Bingley's good friend Mr. Darcy. He seems at first pompous and rude, full of himself and his own wealth. Mrs. Bennet, Lizzy's mother is the first of all silly women, her henlike forward ways repel Mr. Darcy and prompts him to form a bad opinion of the whole family. He causes his friend to cut ties to Jane Bennet the oldest daughter whom Mr. Bingley has taken a fancy to. When Lizzy finds this out her judgement of Darcy becomes even more severe. The red coat army men of Merriton figure at every ball and the sisters soon find a certain Mr. Wickham a desirable candidate. Darcy and Wickham dislike each other a great deal. In the course of time Lizzy hears from Wickham his side of the story whereupon she decides to dislike Darcy even more. She spreads an ill opinion of him in the whole neighborhood. All the while Mr. Darcy actually loves Lizzy and is interested in marrying her, he proposes and she turns him down. But as she finds out about him being the sole benefactor of her family she begins to think differently of him. 

For me the most intriguing part on film and in the book is the moment where Lizzy follows her aunt and the aunts husband to Pemberley park, the residence of Mr. Darcy. He is not thought to be home. She then moves like a voyeur trough his palace, beholding his portrait as she slowly falls in love. The scene is beautiful in many ways, she sees the image of the man she likes and yet she knows something of his inmost being, an affection and appreciation for his soul. True love then, is more than fortune and fine halls, more than looks and impressions, it is said in the Old Country, that manners maketh man. Or as Christ said "by the fruit ye shall know the tree" then what Lizzy begins to realize is that Darcy is a honorable guy, a man of his word, a solid man, a good man. Lurking around in his palace of course she then meets him but the suspense prior is exciting. 

Elizabeth Bennet is the image of the modern woman, the woman who emerges and re-emerges time and again, through ancient classical times to recency era Britain, she's the Victorian woman, and the 20th century woman, she's the post war woman and maybe even the present day woman. She dares to form her own opinions and stand by them, despite her socioeconomic standing is not not secure she doesn't sacrifice her mind to the benefit of others, but keeps her morals and her mind in the face of adversity and high born people who believe to be in a higher status than she. Integrity is her strength. 

What then is Mr. Darcy's strength? - His forbearance and self-restraint is unmatched in all literature, so much so, that he becomes alive. He is a Christlike figure, who sacrifices from his fortune to mend and recover the errors of others, mainly those of Lydia and Mr. Wickham who elope almost as Wickham taking the fair young sixteen year old sister as hostage. When Lizzy finds out Mr. Darcy's true character she regrets her hasty judgements and how her words have impacted many people's opinion of him. Darcy also is very impressionable, when in love, he is a man capable of reform too, the things Lizzy criticized him of and the mistakes he made where wrongs that he corrected. Both Lizzy and Darcy where ready to admit to their mistakes, and this ability, very feminine attribute, the quickness to recover thereof is just all the more a manly feature in him. Who wouldn't want a man who is quick to admit to error and quick to reform himself. But the one thing about Darcy that is absolutely most compelling is his steadfastness. For a woman to be in love, the man must stand still, and this he manages through it all, despite change of scenery and feelings, he is prepared to love her long. 

What is required of them both is the sort of individuality which one could imagine to have been rare then when everyone was together, mother and father and siblings all invited to the same balls and sitting around the hearth of fire, with no screens but the canvas of their own imagination. Communications and means of transport where slow, letters and horses. Life was different then, in essence what makes Pride and Prejudice so peculiar is that it's a very modern love story in a very old sort of country scenery. Though there are many characters and lively and wonderful they are, still it almost is that Elizabeth Bennet and Fitzwilliam Darcy are looking each other deep into each others souls from the onset, a fixation, that so apparent at last, was always meant to be. It's a story of second chances and that's what warms the heart better than a fire, that there might be another round, a happier ending still. 

If I was a Bennet sister I would have been Lydia, who hopefully by now, at almost the age of a spinster by Jane Austen standards, would now have morphed into a Lizzy with dept and wisdom as she gained after carefully reviewing her way of seeing things, as it where. Then where is my Mr. Darcy? At least I take great comfort in the fact that I am in good company in wondering so, for the internet and the actual world is full of women who ask the same.