Jane Austen's men. Who's top of the slap list?

[CurlewKate]

Not the obvious ones, like Mr Collins or Walter Elliott, but the slightly less obvious ones. At the moment, mine are:

Sir Thomas Bertram
James Moreland (although he is such a wonderful, completely timeless character!)
John Dashwood.

Come to think of it, a harder question is is there a single man in Austen who doesn't deserve a slap? Even the heroes, Darcy, Wentworth, Ferrars, Knightly - all pretty slappable at one time or another?

Cross post with maxelly!

But sure, aren't we all.

I like him really, but Mr Knightley is insufferably patronising to Emma when she has insulted the older women (who frankly IS very irritating). She knows she's been unkind and doesn't need him to point it out.

I'll take Wentworth over Darcy ANY day, but his comment about Anne being so altered (i.e looks a lot older than her years) that he would not have known her again - is deeply hurtful. Granted, Austen said that he didn't expect it to be repeated, let alone to Anne, but it was cruel. It's much worse than Darcy's comment about Elizabeth, because Anne can't laugh it off in the way LIzzie does.

She's the heroine of Joan Aiken's sequel, and a very likeable protagonist.

Fanny and Edmund are removed to Antigua to sort out Sir Thomas's estates after his death, and the action centres on the Crawfords returning to Mansfield, and the comedy from Julia Bertram, now married to Mr Yates, turning into a new version of Aunt Norris.

I think Knightley's making the point that Emma is unfairly using her rank to publicly slap someone down who can't or won't answer back. It's a 19c version of 'check your privilege' - something that Emma has a lot of and Miss Bates has none. And TBF, she is rude.

I know there’s always one fun sponge who comes in to say really eye-rolling things like ‘it’s not cool to talk about slapping people and if it was a man saying this about a woman he’d be castigated’. So I’ll volunteer myself for this role today!

Realise it’s giving totally fun-sponge vibes but thought it was worth saying!

How about John Dashwood in S&S?

He knows damned well what his father intended but let his half sisters live on the fringes with barely enough.

Even nice, steady Robert Martin is clearly an idiot no man with a half a brain would contemplate marrying dimwit Harriet. Ditto Captain Benwick he glooms around mainlining poetry after Fanny Harville dies and promptly rebounds onto Louisa Musgrove when she's recovering from a fairly serious head injury. And as a pp said, one dreads to imagine what happens once they're married and Louisa bounces back to being her silly, lively, non-poetry-reading self and finds herself married to Mr Emo.

Argh, I just realised he’s the last name in the OP - sorry!

I'm perfectly happy to contemplate slapping imaginary literary characters from novels written 200 years ago.

Quite.

True ... but it's the WAY he does it. In modern terms, there's a real whiff of teacher-going-out-with-bright-sixth-former about their relationship.

If Frank had said something, it would have been more like, "fergodsake, Em, that was a bit much ... fucking funny though!"

Admiral Croft? The excellent Mrs Croft seems to like him, anyway.

And as a pp said, one dreads to imagine what happens once they're married and Louisa bounces back to being her silly, lively, non-poetry-reading self and finds herself married to Mr Emo

"Never mind daddy, kids; you know him, he's just being miserable and wants to read poems all day. Who wants to go to the funfair and eat themselves sick on candyfloss??"

Mr and Mrs Bennet MkII.

Say it quietly, but I have sometimes wondered if Mrs Croft doesn't always want to be going out for walks or drives a deux and would like some alone time...

Edmund Bertram. I always wished Fanny had found another dishy chap to run off with sticking two fingers up at Edmund at the end. Mansfield park is a very unsatisfying book for many reasons.

Mr Elton, the vicar in Emma.
John Dashwood and Frank Churchill.

Mr Bingley, for being such a wet blanket.

Mr Darcy. Thinking you're better than other people is no excuse for being miserable and offensive if your friend takes you to a local dance.

Hmm, you have a point there.

But she was in charge of the steering, whatever the Admiral thought, so she could probably have managed it.

Completely agree.

I even want to slap the ever wet Charles Bingley - especially in BBC's P&P - I hate him and Jane! They're both too "nice" and get completely walked over.

But when Mark strong does it it's really good. He's so upset!

He allowed his wife to bully him. He should have stood up to her. If she was a man, she'd be slappable