It’s always Darcy! Darcy, Darcy, Darcy!
As Jan Brady might say. Can’t we get a little love for Mr. Tilney? Huh? *Team Tilney perks up its ears and wags its collective tail*
Alert Janeites Heather L. and Lisa sent us a link to an article in the Lexington Herald-Leader about modern women’s continuing fascination with that broody Darcy fellow. We are especially amused by the accompanying drawing.
We’re literate women, and we’re kind of iffy on “happily ever after.”
With one exception.
He’s tall, brooding and loaded.
If he had ever really existed, he’d be long dead.
The shadow of his seldom-seen smile still lingers in the recesses of our little reader-girl brains. It has, as well, stoked the romantic fantasies of generations of women worldwide.
To this day he is his own industry: in books, on TV, in movies.
To this day, dead or not, he looks darn good.
Mr. Darcy, how we love you.
Now, this is fun, despite the complete lack of any Tilney-related content whatsoever. But of course our wizened, tarlike spinster heart was softened by the following passage:
And, so you know this is not about to end anytime soon, there’s The Jane Austen Handbook: A Sensible Yet Elegant Guide to Her World by Margaret C. Sullivan, which is already selling scads on Amazon.com and it doesn’t come out until May.
(Really? Scads? Ooooh!)
(Obligatory Shameless Self-Promotion: Available for preorder! And take a peek inside! :-D)
There’s an accompanying article that includes a listing of books for the Darcy-obsessed, including, curiously, this volume, which we think has nothing to do with OUR Mr. Darcy, but looks rather fascinating nonetheless. They also included an excerpt from P&P. Huzzah for Kentucky!
February 13th, 2007 at 1:21 am
If more ladies prefer Mr. Darcy, that leaves fewer ladies with whom one must
wrestle forgraciously share Mr. Tilney.Thanks for the peek inside the book!
February 13th, 2007 at 6:25 am
Mags, I would love to take a peek inside, but that part of Quirk Books site doesn’t seem to be working properly. I just get a string of command file error thingys (whether going into the new release section via your link, or from the main page of their website).
February 13th, 2007 at 7:08 am
That leaves more Frederick Wentworth for me!
February 13th, 2007 at 9:45 am
Just think, all of those ladies are going gaga over a moody guy who doesn’t like being around people
At least Henry and Wentworth are social characters. And as Heather pointed out…there’s less competition where they’re concerned!
Thanks for the sneak peek of the book! I can’t wait for this spring for my copy to actually arrive!
February 13th, 2007 at 10:14 am
Karenlee, it seems to be working now–try it again.
February 13th, 2007 at 10:39 am
I put it down to temperament differences. The more outgoing types will go for introvert Darcy, and they’ll talk about it more. Whereas we ladies of introspection and refinement prefer the more loquacious Mr. Tilney and while we may speak less about our appreciation for him, our words reflect more depth.
February 13th, 2007 at 12:21 pm
Forget Tilney. Forget Darcy. Long live Captain Wentworth!
February 13th, 2007 at 1:25 pm
I used to live in Lexington, back before Noah and that rainstorm. I always liked the Herald-Leader and it’s good to see that they’re still employing smart women.
And if y’all are occupying the Rev. Mr. Tilney’s and Captain Wentworth’s time, does that mean I’ve got a clear shot at Mr. Knightley?
February 13th, 2007 at 1:38 pm
I was always more of a Bingley girl myself.
February 13th, 2007 at 3:26 pm
Lol! Apparently none of us is a ‘Darcy girl’… Seems we have to fight for Henry Tilney after all!
February 13th, 2007 at 3:35 pm
I was just about to send this article in, actually! Quite a treat for the Sunday paper. I’ll admit I groaned when I saw the headline, expecting the worst, but it was enjoyable. It also included a picture of “the [Colin Firth] look.” Huzzah for Kentucky indeed.
Then I had to holler out “Mags” when I saw the mention of the book. I will have to
demandask for that for my birthday.Now if only KY could get a Jane society together…
February 13th, 2007 at 10:27 pm
‘Darcy girl,’ no indeed! At the moment he is my least favorite of Austen’s gentlemen. My heart is divided between Charles Bingley, Edmund Bertram, and Henry Tilney.
February 13th, 2007 at 11:44 pm
Darcy’s “seldom-seen smile”? But– but!– he does often smile. Colin Firth, as Darcy, did not.
I don’t think that I could pick a favorite Austen gentleman. Darcy would be in the top few, though. He is lovely. *feels as if she’s only going with the popular candidate* I rather like Col Brandon right now, too.
February 14th, 2007 at 3:27 am
Elizabeth is right…Mr. Darcy did smile often in the book. I can’t believe there are no “Darcy girls” here…good…more for me then
Ms. Administrator, maybe you should make some kind of survey here as to who is everyone’s favorite gentlemen…the article seemed to think it was Darcy but from the looks for things, looks like I’m the only one from the 14 who posted comments…hmmm…
February 14th, 2007 at 9:10 am
I know I’m taking a chance jumping into an all-female discussion, but here goes….
It’s obvious why Darcy is the MAN. He is the romantic lead. He is the ultimate romantic lead in what is, rightly or wrongly, considered the first romance novel, the original chick-lit. He’s got it all under control, except of course his emotions toward Lizzy. He’s got looks, he’s got brains, he loves his sister, his pride doesn’t extend to selfishness in dealing with those under his responsibility, and he’s got a ton of money. He makes Rochester look pathetic. Rochester talked too much, was homely, and seemed positively in agony. (I haven’t checked out Heathcliff yet…)
And Pride and Prejudice gets all the press. Not being an English Lit major, until the past year or so, I never heard of any other Austen novel, though I had heard of Emma and Sense and Sensibility as movies.
And even within the Jane Austen canon, Darcy is obviously the lead stud muffin. Brandon is an older man in obvious pain, Edward Ferrars is a wuss, and Willoughby, the only hunk candidate, is a villain. Bingley is your stereotypical not overly bright (if he is bright, he doesn’t show it) Nice Guy. Henry Crawford is handsome but a villain, and Edmund, the other handsome candidate, is, well, as you say, the Lord High Mayor of Wankerville. A virtuous bore. You don’t know that Knightley is anything but a big brother until the book is almost over, and Frank Churchill is a cad. Wentworth was quite a hunk, but he doesn’t stand out as much because his love interest, Anne Eliot, didn’t sparkle nearly as much as Lizzy; and he didn’t DO nearly as much in Persuasion as Darcy did in Pride and Prejudice. And Tilney.. I’m sorry, but he didn’t impress me at all. His interest in Catherine seemed almost an afterthought; I don’t remember him communicating tender feelings to her until very late in the novel, if at all.
The notes in the article about Darcy being called Mister and that Jane Austen makes you fill in the details didn’t seem to me all that relevant. Those two things are characteristic of all Jane Austen novels.
I have often wondered about how Pride and Prejudice would have went if Bingley had not been in the picture. Jane was the prettiest of the sisters; she thought highly of Darcy even when everyone else didn’t; and Darcy remarked that she was the prettiest lady in the room at the Meryton assembly. He thought very highly of her. He very well may not have chosen to approach Jane out of respect for Bingley. But then, there would have been no “Pride and Prejudice”. Darcy would have been the only character with those qualities.
February 14th, 2007 at 9:48 am
Elessar, put up yer dukes, cuz Darcy is MY MAN and Colin Firth IS Darcy!
Curt, love that you have thought all this through and come to the only reasonable conclusion: “Darcy is obviously the lead stud muffin.”
Such lovely thoughts for Valentine’s Day!
February 14th, 2007 at 10:44 am
And Tilney.. I’m sorry, but he didn’t impress me at all. His interest in Catherine seemed almost an afterthought; I don’t remember him communicating tender feelings to her until very late in the novel, if at all.
That’s my problem with NA also, but Heather and Kelley, et al have tried to help me see the error of my ways.
That said, perhaps Wentworth is my favorite because I first read Persuasion when I was in my late 30s (and, as we all know, 40 is the new 30!). I don’t need “light, bright and sparkling” anymore. I like Persuasion because it’s about someone who is a grown up and who understands that life ain’t fair. She doesn’t have stars in her eyes. She understands that actions have consequences. I love P&P dearly, but it doesn’t move me the way Persuasion does. Persuasion makes me laugh and it makes me cry. It’s probably the most beautiful book I’ve ever read.
February 14th, 2007 at 11:00 am
I actually can’t choose between the Austen heros. Darcy is not my type because I have too much in common with him (not the money, sadly). I adore Mr. Knightley’s wisdom. I admire Charles Bingley’s cheerful and outgoing nature. I rave about Henry Tilney’s sense of humor and decency. And Colonel Brandon is just so in love and devoted, who wouldn’t just want to give him a big sqeeze? Imagine combining all of those men! That would be too much! (if there is such a thing as too much)
February 14th, 2007 at 12:30 pm
And Tilney.. I’m sorry, but he didn’t impress me at all. His interest in Catherine seemed almost an afterthought; I don’t remember him communicating tender feelings to her until very late in the novel, if at all.
VIPER IN MY BOSOM!!!!
BLASPHEMY! BLASPHEMY ON AUSTENBLOG!!!
(I keed, I keed!)
So it’s tender feelings you want, eh? Well, okay, it’s Valentine’s Day, what the heck.
Vol. II, Ch. 1:
“Your brother will not mind it, I know,” said she, “because I heard him say before that he hated dancing; but it was very good-natured in him to think of it. I suppose he saw Isabella sitting down, and fancied she might wish for a partner; but he is quite mistaken, for she would not dance upon any account in the world.”
Henry smiled, and said, “How very little trouble it can give you to understand the motive of other people’s actions.”
“Why? — What do you mean?”
“With you, it is not, How is such a one likely to be influenced, What is the inducement most likely to act upon such a person’s feelings, age, situation, and probable habits of life considered? — but, How should I be influenced, what would be my inducement in acting so and so?”
“I do not understand you.”
“Then we are on very unequal terms, for I understand you perfectly well.”
“Me? — yes; I cannot speak well enough to be unintelligible.”
“Bravo! — an excellent satire on modern language.”
“But pray tell me what you mean.”
“Shall I indeed? — Do you really desire it? But you are not aware of the consequences; it will involve you in a very cruel embarrassment, and certainly bring on a disagreement between us.
“No, no; it shall not do either; I am not afraid.”
“Well, then, I only meant that your attributing my brother’s wish of dancing with Miss Thorpe to good-nature alone convinced me of your being superior in good-nature yourself to all the rest of the world.”
Catherine blushed and disclaimed, and the gentleman’s predictions were verified.
Vol. II, Ch. VII:
“But now you love a hyacinth. So much the better. You have gained a new source of enjoyment, and it is well to have as many holds upon happiness as possible. Besides, a taste for flowers is always desirable in your sex, as a means of getting you out of doors, and tempting you to more frequent exercise than you would otherwise take. And though the love of a hyacinth may be rather domestic, who can tell, the sentiment once raised, but you may in time come to love a rose?”
Or even a Henry.
And let’s not forget the best of all…Vol. II, Ch. IX:
“If I understand you rightly, you had formed a surmise of such horror as I have hardly words to — Dear Miss Morland, consider the dreadful nature of the suspicions you have entertained. What have you been judging from? Remember the country and the age in which we live. Remember that we are English, that we are Christians. Consult your own understanding, your own sense of the probable, your own observation of what is passing around you. — Does our education prepare us for such atrocities? Do our laws connive at them? Could they be perpetrated without being known, in a country like this, where social and literary intercourse is on such a footing, where every man is surrounded by a neighbourhood of voluntary spies, and where roads and newspapers lay everything open? Dearest Miss Morland, what ideas have you been admitting?”
Even when he’s rather appalled with her and giving her a bit of a dressing-down, she is Dearest Miss Morland. The boy’s in wub.
February 14th, 2007 at 12:43 pm
Holy Jane, come out, Darcy Girlz! This Darcy girl is coming out of the closet…I read P&P as my first-ever-Jane 22 years ago at tender age 18, so sue me…I adore Brandon, and Wentworth is tops too, but how could one not love Mr. Darcy for the way he went to London to help Lydia with no expectation of return? The way he subjected himself to that humiliation just to make right his own part? I think he shows the most emotional growth of all the male characters. Knightly, Tilney, Wentworth, Ferrars, Brandon, all of them did not have to alter as much, though they were forebearing and patient. Edmund did have to get over Mary but he fell into Fanny’s adoration, he did not have to go to gallant lengths to win her. Darcy really had to risk all.
“Nothing was done that he did not do himself…He had followed them purposely to town, he had taken on himself all the trouble and mortification attendant on such a research; in which supplication had been necessary to a woman whom he must abominate and despise, and where he was reduced to meet, frequently meet, reason with, persuade, and finally bribe, the man whom he always most wished to avoid, and whose very name it was punishment to him to pronounce. He had done all this for a girl whom he could neither regard nor esteem. Her heart did whisper that he had done it for her.”
What’s not to love?
February 14th, 2007 at 1:20 pm
Well, Mags! Somehow, I knew I would not get away with it.
Jessica, I do have a question. When the narrator said, “He had done all this for a girl whom he could neither regard nor esteem”, was the girl referred to Lydia or Elizabeth? Lydia, for her moral standing, or Elizabeth, because he felt he would never be able to “regard or esteem” her with any expectation of her reciprocating his regard or esteem?
February 14th, 2007 at 4:39 pm
Hey Curt–who’s your favorite heroine, then?
February 14th, 2007 at 8:22 pm
There’s something so sparkling about P&P, about Lizzy and Darcy getting together that I just love the story. It’s perfection. But if I am choosing the man for me, then it must be Wentworth. To love me for so many years after I’ve turned him down and to write me such a beautiful letter when he thinks all hope is lost. There’s a man I will be able to love and rely on.
PS Curt B - Darcy definitely feels a high regard and esteem for Lizzy, as he makes clear when Lizzy accepts his second proposal. So the reference must be to Lydia, who he tolerates after his marriage for Lizzy’s sake, although he will never go as far as to admit Wickham to his house.
February 14th, 2007 at 11:07 pm
Susan, my impression is that it is Lydia, too, but the question came to my mind because of the next sentence, which was obviously referring to Lizzy. The parallelism: … “He had done all this for a girl whom he could neither regard nor esteem”…. “he had done it for her”. To me the “her” was a bit ambiguous in reference. Certainly he had the regard and esteem for Lizzy; the question I had in mind was whether the passage might mean he didn’t think he “could” show it with any expectation of her returning it.
My favorite heroine, Mags? My snap response would be Lizzy; she is witty and intelligent and beautiful, yet there is depth to her. But wit is not everything, so in the end I find it hard to rank her ahead of Anne Eliot or Emma Woodhouse. There is something to the intelligence and the cocky self-assurance of Emma, yet she is willing to take correction from others and learn from her mistakes. And Anne is a wise, solid, affectionate woman whom stupid men might ignore because she is supposedly past her “prime”, but to whom wise men would surely pay attention. I would hate to have to single out one of the three as the favorite.
February 15th, 2007 at 2:32 am
Sandra, keep your hands off my Mr. Knightley–he’s already spoken for! (Especially Jeremy Northam’s Mr. Knightley…hot!)
February 15th, 2007 at 11:43 am
Suzanne! By what right do you claim the Northam Knightley? Shouldn’t we all have an equal shot at him?
February 15th, 2007 at 2:02 pm
Curt, it is Lydia he cannot esteem, yet he did all this for her to right a wrong he believes he assisted. That’s where his true disinterestedness shines forth. Yet in her heart Lizzy dares to hope that in may all have been for her only, a thought he confims when she does accept him at the second proposal. Read it again, it is as delicious the twentieth time as the first.
February 15th, 2007 at 2:18 pm
I’m a Darcy fan too! I think it’s largely for the reasons Jessica Irene put forth, but admit that Colin Firth has something to do with it too. Unfortunately, we’d never work in real life, as I’m more reserved and serious and need someone more outgoing and cheerful. Sigh.
February 15th, 2007 at 3:07 pm
Ina-all right, I will share him. Actually I liked your comment earlier about combining all of the Austen heroes. Wouldn’t that be divine? I’d even settle for a combination of two or three of them.
February 15th, 2007 at 4:16 pm
Oh dear, Suzanne and Ina. It looks like we may have to set up a rota, as some devoted fangirls did in another fandom to which I belong. There was much competiton for several different heroes and we finally decided to end the carnage by playing nice and sharing. You can only have one at a time and you must pass him on after a specific length of time. I’ll send along Northam Knightley in several months.
[grins evilly]
February 17th, 2007 at 2:24 am
Okay, we’ve gotta get some distance between Mr. Darcy and Colin Firth for gosh sakes! I read all Jane’s works before I saw any on film and we can’t get all off track about which characters we admire based on casting.