Pride and Prejudice: An Overview

[imacartwright.livejournal.com]

(Please Note: This overview is, in effect, a spoiler for the original work. If you'd like to read the original or watch a film adaptation without being spoiled, read cautiously. This material contains a plot overview and character descriptions.)

Hi, everyone! My name is imacartwright and I'm excited to be driving the crack_van for one of the Small Fandoms this month.

Here is my overview for the Pride and Prejudice fandom. Enjoy!


Our Friend Jane

"It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife." So starts one of the most amazing and beloved novels ever written.

Jane Austen was an intelligent, creative, witty, charming, and single young woman. And, I believe, that she was just as outraged by the idea that a woman's worth should only be measured in terms of her wifely potential as many of us are today.

In the novel, Pride and Prejudice, she gives us the portrait of one of the strongest, wittiest, most intelligent women in fiction, Elizabeth Bennet. Some people say that Austen's characterization of Lizzy is autobiographical, and that the events in the novel are loosely based on her own experiences in dealing with men and love. Others say that Elizabeth and the events in the novel are her idealized self and the way she wished her life would have been. Either way, she sadly did not have the opportunity to share Elizabeth's happy endings in love and marraige.

Quick background info on Austen:



Jane Austen 1775--1817
"English writer, who first gave the novel its modern character through the treatment of everyday life. Although Austen was widely read in her lifetime, she published her works anonymously. The most urgent preoccupation of her young, well-bred heroines is courtship, and finally marriage in the world dominated by men. Austen herself never married. Her best-known books include PRIDE AND PREJUDICE (1813) and EMMA (1816). Virginia Woolf called her 'the most perfect artist among women.'" (Taken from http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/jausten.htm.)

For more information about Jane's life and work, check out the incredibly comprehensive Jane Austen Information Page at The Republic of Pemberley.


Plot Overview

SPOILER WARNING!!!!!

If you haven't read the book, or seen one of the several film adaptations, here's a quick overview of the plot.

(The following plot overview is mainly taken from http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/pride/summary.html, with some additions of my own.)

The news that a wealthy young gentleman named Charles Bingley has rented the manor of Netherfield causes a great stir in the nearby village of Merryton, especially in the Bennet household at the manor of Longbourn. The Bennets have five unmarried daughters—from oldest to youngest, Jane ,Elizabeth ,Mary , Kitty, and Lydia —and Mrs. Bennet is desperate to see them all married. The Bennets attend a ball at which Mr. Bingley is present. He is taken with Jane and spends much of the evening dancing with her. His close friend, Mr. Darcy, is less pleased with the evening and haughtily refuses to dance with Elizabeth, which makes everyone view him as arrogant and obnoxious.

At social functions over subsequent weeks, however, Mr. Darcy finds himself increasingly attracted to Elizabeth's charm and intelligence. Jane's friendship with Mr. Bingley also continues to burgeon, and Jane pays a visit to the Bingley mansion. On her journey to the house she is caught in a downpour and catches ill, forcing her to stay at Netherfield for several days. In order to tend to Jane, Elizabeth hikes through muddy fields and arrives with a spattered dress, much to the disdain of the snobbish Miss Bingley , Charles Bingley's sister. Miss Bingley's spite only increases when she notices that Darcy, whom she is pursuing, pays quite a bit of attention to Elizabeth.

When Elizabeth and Jane return home, they find thier cousin, Mr. Collins, visiting at Longbourn. Mr. Collins is a young clergyman who stands to inherit Mr. Bennet's property, which has been "entailed," meaning that it can only be passed down to male heirs. Mr. Collins is a pompous fool, though he is quite enthralled by the Bennet girls. Shortly after his arrival, he makes a proposal of marriage to Elizabeth. However, because she and her sister Jane have decided that they should like to marry only for love, she turns him down, wounding his pride. Meanwhile, the Bennet sisters have become friendly with militia officers stationed in Merryton. Among them is Wickham, a handsome young soldier who is friendly toward Elizabeth and tells her how Darcy cruelly cheated him out of an inheritance.

At the beginning of winter, the Bingleys and Darcy leave Netherfield and return to London, much to Jane's dismay. A further shock arrives with the news that Mr. Collins has become engaged to Charlotte Lucas , Elizabeth's best friend and the daughter of a local nobleman, Sir William Lucas. Charlotte explains to Elizabeth that she is getting older and needs the match for financial reasons. Charlotte and Mr. Collins get married and Elizabeth promises to visit them at their new home. As winter progresses, Jane visits her Aunt and Uncle Gardiner's family in London (hoping also that she might see Mr. Bingley). However, Miss Bingley visits her and behaves rudely, while Mr. Bingley fails to visit her at all. The marriage prospects for the Bennet girls appear bleak.

That spring, Elizabeth visits Charlotte, who now lives in Kent, near Rosings, the home of Mr. Collins's patron, Lady Catherine de Bourgh , who is also Darcy's aunt. Darcy calls on Lady Catherine and encounters Elizabeth, whose presence leads him to make a number of visits to the Collins's home, where she is staying. One day, he makes a shocking and extremely ungentlemanlike proposal of marriage, which Elizabeth quickly refuses. She tells Darcy that she considers him arrogant and unpleasant, then scolds him for steering Bingley away from Jane and disinheriting Wickham. Darcy leaves her but shortly thereafter delivers a letter to her. In this letter, he admits that he urged Bingley to distance himself from Jane, but claims he did so only because he thought their romance was not serious. As for Wickham, he informs Elizabeth that the young officer is a liar and that the real cause of their disagreement was Wickham's attempt to elope with his young sister and ward, Georgiana Darcy.

This letter causes Elizabeth to reevaluate her feelings about Darcy. She returns home and acts coldly toward Wickham. The militia is leaving town, which makes the younger, rather man-crazy, Bennet girls distraught. Lydia manages to obtain permission from her father, despite Elizabeth's protests (she doesn't reveal Wickham's true nature to her father), to spend the summer with Col. Forrester and his wife in Brighton, where Wickham's regiment will be stationed.

In June, Elizabeth takes a trip into Derbyshire with her Aunt and Uncle Gardiner. The trip eventually takes her to Lambton, a town near Pemberley, which is Darcy's estate. She visits Pemberley, after making sure that Darcy is away, and delights in the building and grounds, while hearing from Darcy's servants that he is a wonderful, generous master. Suddenly, Darcy arrives and behaves cordially toward her. Making no mention of his proposal, he entertains the Gardiners and invites Elizabeth to meet his sister.

Shortly thereafter, however, a letter arrives from home, telling Elizabeth that Lydia has eloped with Wickham and that the couple is nowhere to be found, which suggests that they may be living together out of wedlock. Fearful of the disgrace such a situation would bring on her entire family, Elizabeth hastens home, after revealing the secret to Darcy, and convincing herself that she shall never have the chance to get to know Darcy better, now that she has realizes that she has fallen in love with him. He, however, hastens to London to trackdown the wayward couple, unbeknownst to anyone else. Mr. Gardiner and Mr. Bennet also go off to search for Lydia, but Mr. Bennet eventually returns home empty-handed. Just when all hope seems lost, a letter comes from Mr. Gardiner saying that the couple has been found and that Wickham has agreed to marry Lydia in exchange for an annual income. The Bennets are convinced that Mr. Gardiner has paid off Wickham, but Elizabeth learns secretly via correspondence from her Aunt Gardiner that the source of the money, and of her family's salvation, was none other than Darcy.

Now married, Wickham and Lydia return to Longbourn briefly, where Mr. Bennet treats them coldly. They then depart for Wickham's new assignment in the North of England. Shortly thereafter, Bingley returns to Netherfield and resumes his courtship of Jane. Darcy goes to stay with him and pays visits to the Bennets but makes no mention of his desire to marry Elizabeth. Darcy tells Bingley that Jane had been in London during he winter and apologizes for his part in keeping them separated. He then goes to London for a short time. While he is gone, Bingley proposes to Jane, to the delight of everyone but Bingley's haughty sister.

While the family celebrates, Lady Catherine de Bourgh pays a visit to Longbourn. She corners Elizabeth and says that she has heard that Darcy, her nephew, is planning to marry her. Since she considers a Bennet an unsuitable match for a Darcy, and insists that her own daughter is meant to become Darcy's wife, Lady Catherine demands that Elizabeth promise to refuse him. Elizabeth spiritedly refuses, saying she is not engaged to Darcy, but she will not promise anything against her own happiness.

When Darcy returns to Hertfordshire, he accompanies Bingley on a visit to Longbourn. Elizabeth and Darcy go out walking together and she thanks him for taking care of the matter with Lydia. He then tells her that his feelings have not altered since the spring while apologizing for his previous hurtful proposal. She tenderly accepts. Jane and Bingley and Elizabeth and Darcy are married in a double ceremony.


Interested in reading the original text by Jane Austen? Because the work is in the public domain, the complete text is available in several places on the internet. Here are two of them: an Annotated hypertext version of the novel at The Republic of Pemberley site, and the complete novel at Austen.com.


Fandom Introduction

So, why is there such a collection of fan fiction on the internet today that is based on a book by Jane Austen? The answer is simple. In 1995, the BBC aired its famous production of Pride and Prejudice.

The Darcy "Look"

They cast Colin Firth as the brooding, smouldering, and sexy Mr. Darcy. They took a little poetic liscense and added a scene where he dives into a pond. Immediately after, he happens upon Elizabet Bennet again for the first time in months and his shirt is wet. She gets flustered at the sight of him (I would say she got wet at the sight of him, but that's just crass! ;) ), as did fangirls around the world, and the rest, as they say is history.

The Wet!Shirt!

Poor Colin Firth has since been elevated to pop icon status. He can't seem to escape Mr. Darcy and, according to recent interviews (as well as his willingness to play Mark Darcy, an homage to the original Mr. Darcy, in not one, but two Bridget Jones' Diary movies), it looks like he's actually stopped trying.

I'd say that it is resonable to assume that most of the P&P fic out there was largely inspired by this BBC production, commonly referred to as P&P2. So, those are the faces I'll put with the characters. Get ready, 'cause there's quite a few.


Character Photos & Descriptions

(Most of the following information I took from http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/pride/characters.html.)


The Principals


Miss Elizabeth Bennet
The novel's protagonist. The second daughter of Mr. Bennet form Hertfordshire, Elizabeth (aged 20) is the most intelligent and sensible of the five Bennet sisters. She is well read and quick-witted, with a tongue that occasionally proves too sharp for her own good. Her realization of Darcy's essential goodness eventually triumphs over her initial prejudice against him.


Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy
A wealthy gentleman from Derbyshire (aged 28), the master of Pemberley , and the nephew of Lady Catherine de Bourgh. Though Darcy is intelligent and honest, his excess of pride causes him to look down on his social inferiors. Over the course of the novel, he tempers his class-consciousness and learns to admire and love Elizabeth for her strong character. (In fan fiction, his pride is often explained by his intense shyness.)


Miss Jane Bennet
The eldest and most beautiful Bennet sister. Jane is more reserved and gentler than Elizabeth. The easy pleasantness with which she and Bingley interact contrasts starkly with the mutual distaste that marks the (initial) encounters between Elizabeth and Darcy. (She is Elizabeth's most beloved sister and closest confidant.)


Mr. Charles Bingley
Darcy's considerably wealthy best friend. Bingley's purchase of Netherfield, an estate near the Bennets, serves as the impetus for the novel. He is a genial, well-intentioned gentleman, whose easy-going nature contrasts with Darcy's initially discourteous demeanor. He is blissfully uncaring about class differences. (He is easily swayed by the opinions of his haughty sisters as well as those of Darcy.)


Miss Lydia Bennet
The youngest Bennet sister (aged 15), she is gossipy, immature, and self-involved. Unlike Elizabeth, Lydia flings herself headlong into romance and ends up running off with Wickham.


Mr. George Wickham
A handsome, fortune-hunting militia officer. Wickham's good looks and charm attract Elizabeth initially, but Darcy's revelation about Wickham's disreputable past clues her in to his true nature and simultaneously draws her closer to Darcy. (He is the son of the late Mr. Darcy's steward. The late Mr. Darcy took care of him after his own father's death. He grew up at Pemberley with Darcy.)


Supporting Players


Mr. Bennet
The patriarch of the Bennet family, a gentleman of modest income with five unmarried daughters. Mr. Bennet has a sarcastic, cynical sense of humor that he uses to purposefully irritate his wife. Though he loves his daughters (Elizabeth in particular), he often fails as a parent, preferring to withdraw from the never-ending marriage concerns of the women around him rather than offer help. (His estate, Longbourn, is entailed to his nephew, Mr. William Collins, upon his death and so, his daughters will not inherit it.)


Mrs. Bennet
Mr. Bennet's wife, a foolish, noisy woman whose only goal in life is to see her daughters married. Because of her low breeding and often unbecoming behavior, Mrs. Bennet often repels the very suitors whom she tries to attract for her daughters. (She spends most of her time gossiping with her sister, Mrs. Philips.)


Miss Mary Bennet
The middle Bennet sister, bookish and pedantic. (She is the only one who seems to be fond of Mr. Collins! She sepnds most of her time practicing the pianoforte and quoting from Fordyce's Sermons.)


Miss Kitty Bennet
The fourth Bennet sister. Like Lydia, she is girlishly enthralled with the soldiers.


Miss Caroline Bingley
Bingleys snobbish sister. Miss Bingley bears inordinate disdain for Elizabeth's middle-class background. Her vain attempts to garner Darcy's attention cause Darcy to admire Elizabeth's self-possessed character even more. (Since both she and her brother are unmarried, and their parents are dead, she "keeps house" for Charles.)


Mrs. Louisa Hurst
Bingley's other sister. Her and her husband, Mr. Hurst tag along with Bingley and Caroline wherever they go. She is much like her sister in temperment. Her husband mainly just sits around and eats, sleeps, and occasionally can be roused to hunt.


Miss Georgiana Darcy
Darcy's sister. She is immensely pretty and just as shy. She has great skill at playing the pianoforte. (She is more than 10 years younger than Darcy and she has had an unfortunate experience with Wickham.)


Lady Catherine de Bourgh
A rich, bossy noblewoman; Mr. Collins's patron and Darcy's aunt. Lady Catherine epitomizes class snobbery, especially in her attempts to order the middle-class Elizabeth away from her well-bred nephew.


Miss Anne de Bourgh
Lady Catherine's daughter, who, unlike the Bennet daughters, will inherit her family home upon the death of her mother. She is very sickly. Lady Catherine is convinced that she will be able to bring about a marraige between Anne and Darcy and insists that they are already engaged. (Anne is one of a handful of lesser characters in the book that sometimes gets much meatier roles in fan fic. She is often paired with Col. Fitzwilliam and is often much stronger, in mind and will, if not in health, than she is in the novel.)


Colonel Richard Fitzwilliam
Darcy's cousin and co-guardian of Gerogiana since the death of the Darcy's parents. He accompanies Darcy to visit thier aunt, Lady Catherine de Bourgh. (In fan fiction, is sometimes is portrayed as having a crush on Elizabeth. He also often used as a foil for Darcy, in that he is easy-going and gets along well with strangers, where Darcy is reserved, shy, and sometimes haughty. However, the cousins are almost always portrayed as the very best and closest of friends.)


Mr. and Mrs. Gardiner
Mrs. Bennet's brother and his wife. The Gardiners, caring, nurturing, and full of common sense, often prove to be better parents to the Bennet daughters than Mr. Bennet and his wife. (Mr. Gardiner works in trade in London. In fan fic, the relationship the Gardiner's share is often a model on which Darcy and Elizabeth try to base thier own.)


Mr. William Collins
A pompous, generally idiotic clergyman who stands to inherit Mr. Bennet's property. Mr. Collins's own social status is nothing to brag about, but he takes great pains to let everyone and anyone know that Lady Catherine de Bourgh serves as his patroness. He is the worst combination of snobbish and obsequious. (But, my, oh my, does he provide some hilarious comedic moments!)


Miss Charlotte Lucas
Elizabeth's dear friend. Pragmatic where Elizabeth is romantic, and also six years older than Elizabeth, Charlotte does not view love as the most vital component of a marriage. She is more interested in having a comfortable home. Thus, when Mr. Collins proposes (after Elizabeth has turned him down), she accepts.


Sir William Lucas
Charlotte and Maria's father. He is a jovial and well-meaning gentleman of Hertfordshire. In the beginning of the saga, he hosts a couple of parties which are the setting for Elizabeth and Darcy's first meetings. He also accompanies Maria and Elizabeth into Kent to visit Charlotte and Mr. Collins.


Maria Lucas
Charlotte's younger sister. She is around the same age as Kitty and Lydia Bennet.


For more information on all things Pride and Prejudice, check out the Pride & Prejudice FAQ at The Republic of Pemberley.


Major Fic Archive Links

It should be noted that there are two major types of Pride and Prejudice fan fiction. The first type are stories that are set in regency-era England, like the novel. They are generally either meant as epilogues or retellings of the original. The second type are stories set in modern times. While they generally contain the same themes and resemble the plot of the original story, they can greatly differ in style and tone, etc. All of the other general things we know and love about fan fiction apply for both types. While most stories center on the relationship between Darcy and Elizabeth, some are about other couples. There are het and slash pairings and ratings vary from G though to NC-17. There are some genuinely wonderful original characters, as well as plenty of "Mary Sues."

• Firthness
  All Darcy, all the time. This is a multi-dimensional site for fans of Colin Firth and Jane Austen. There are very active message boards, fic challenges, and an extensive fic archive, containing regency-era stories and ones set in modern times. Go ahead, take a dive into the pond! Darcyfic is a Yahoo! mailing list for fan fic that is Darcy-centric and it's archive is located at Firthness.


• darcy.gatefiction.com
  One of my favorite places to get my Darcy-fic fix. It houses five author's works, has a great smut page, and most of the fic is set in modern times. (Judy-Lynne's work is my favorite!)


• The Darybyshire Writers' Guild
  This is a huge archive where you can find fic based on all of Jane Austen's works, but the majority of the fic is Pride and Prejudice-based, since it is arguably the most well-known and best-loved of her books. It is into dived into two areas: the Epilogue Abbey, where you can find fic set in the time and usually written in the style of Austen's original works, and the Fantasia Gallery, which houses AU fic, usually set in modern times, but using the same general characterizations of your favorite Austen personas. This site also has a message board.


• Interested in reading a published sequel (fan fic for money, folks) to Pride and Prejudice? Then check out this page at The Republic of Pemberley site. Be warned! These are novels written by contemporary authors, and are usually written in a completely different style and tone from the original, and sometimes including themes that Jane Austen would have never tackled in the early 1800s. (The only one that I've read is The Bar Sinister, by Linda Berdoll. While I think it was a great read and an excellent book by today's romance novel standards, it was certainly jarring to think of it as a sequel to the original.)

Please feel free to leave links for additional archives or personal rec pages in the comments. Also, if you have any other information, corrections, or clarifications relating to the original book or the BBC production, please leave a comment as well.

Thanks for reading and I hope you enjoy my Pride and Prejudice fan fic recs this month.

Comments

Re: Oh!

[damned-colonial.livejournal.com]

But... all the antagonistic history between them! Two men who grew up together, who know each other like brothers... their fumbling adolescent experimentation in the Pemberley woods... then Wickham starts playing the rake, drinking, gambling... Darcy is the responsible one, tells him not to be a bloody idiot... they fight, they have make-up sex, they fight some more... Darcy is torn, but can't go on dealing with Wickham's increasing screwedupness... breaks up with him... then in a fit of wossname, Wickham tries to get back at him by eloping with his sister... and then when they see each other in the street in Meryton... tell me that isn't the horrified "omg it's my ex!" moment from hell?

But Brandon? Brandon and Darcy? Oh boy, wouldn't they have some notes to compare! There'd be a definite sympathy there, if Darcy could put his pride aside and bring himself to explain the whole Wickham saga in the first place, of course. Hrm actually, that could be rather interesting... I wonder what Darcy would think of Brandon's story, whether it would make him like Brandon better or scorn him? Either way, definite potential.

Re: Oh!

[bagira.livejournal.com]

Ummmmmm.... By Colonel, I meant Fitzwilliam, of course. :)