To think that Victorian rain was much more malevolent than contemporary rain?

[squoosh]

Whenever a character in a Wilkie Collins novel goes for a walk in the rain they either get pneumonia resulting in near death or develop sudden onset rain related delirium and then die. In Pride and Prejudice Jane Bennett's illness meant she was confined to Netherfield for a week after hoofing it over in the rain.

Am I alone in my disappointment with our weedy modern rain that doesn't even provoke a sneeze much less madness and pneumonia?

YANBU! I think you're a genius.

Just an excellent thread title.

I am sure you are right though, see also Vistorian Fog. Lethal.

But how far did Jane Bennett walk in malevolent rain in soaked non-water resistant clothing to return to her cold and draughty Victorian home with probably dampish bed covers.?

What about purple rain?

Jane Bennet was malingering so she could throw herself at Mr Bingley.
But YANBU, these days rain is more like an aphrodisiac, any characters caught out in the rain must spontaneously divest themselves of any clothing and bonk either in the rain, or in a nearby barn.

Yes, it's amazing how many Victorian characters go out in the rain and develop a chill which leads to pneumonia and an early death.

But JosieZ makes a good point - and deaths from respiratory disease before the Clean Air Act were incredibly high. (Visit Delhi on a smoggy day and you'll see why.)

Also, no antibiotics, so chest infections really could become fatal.

Oh that's nothing new, Katienana - in the Aeneid Dido and Aeneas get caught in a storm and have to retreat to a cave for a passionate shag.

Katianna in who case I prefer contemporary rain!

Isn't it all to do with proper coats and decent medicines...?

Oh and Jane Bennett's rain was obviously malevolent Regency rain as opposed to malevolent Victorian rain.

I feel a literary experiment coming on. Next time it's raining hard I'm going to don my nightie and old paddock boots Jane Bennet garb and walk 5K. Do you think an air-conditioned North American house will serve as an appropriate sub. for a drafty moors cottage? I shall report back with the results.

I think the ground was also a lot more dangerous then too; so many twisted ankles . Maybe that was due to the sub-par footwear though?

It's one of the benefits of what the daily mail would call the nanny state. Rain is far more regulated than it used to be. In fact i think the government are hoping to introduce more 'choice' back into rainfall but as we can see the impact it will have on the nhs.

Thomas Hardy rain was lethal. Carried 'em off good and quick.

If the were lucky enough to recover from said pneumonia their looks would almost certainly have faded very dramatically. Reprieve from death but not from the curse of being a 'former great beauty'.

Hmm, in the cities it probably WAS more malevolent (love that word ), containing as it did the dissolved outpourings of the dark satanic mills. Round about the Misses Bennett, it probably had more to do with the lack of hairdryers and central heating, and that doctors were just quacks who could offer nothing more than "stay warm" advice or prescribe some foul-tasting gloop that did more harm than good.

I think the summer rain in Jane Eyre was the most malevolent.

It is midsummer and swelteringly hot when Jane makes her terrible discovery about Rochester.

She flees and within minutes is dying from cold, starvation and exposure, needing to be nursed back to health by Ejaculating St John Rivers and his worthy sisters.

Now THAT'S impressive.

You're forgetting too that it was right and proper for a Victorian/Regency lady to be rendered insensible by the elements. A woman who could walk in the rain without ending up a rose-cheeked damsel in distress on her sickbed would be suspected of having a farmerish background and perhaps be deemed unsuitable for gentlemanly consumption. Or some such.

Mind you, didn't poor Charlotte Bronte herself "catch her death" from walking across a wet lawn in too flimsy slippers?

or did I get that from Victoria Wood?

YY re Regency Rain

Marianne Dashwood had to be carried home when it rained.

< Ponders asking DH to try this next time it's pissing it down >

Plus if you could never rub up against dance cheek to cheek with a man, how were you going to have a feel of the goods assess their...ahem...manliness without forcing them to carry you? It was a ploy to get some cheap thrills.

I wonder if anyone was EVER really warm in those big houses without Mr Bingley to shag let alone if you'd got frozen through and soaking.

Maybe it was because people really thought that you "caught cold" from being cold, so if they needed someone ill as part of the plot there was an obligation to produce the Guilty Rainstorm or Draughty Window and detail it lavishly.

(I love Wilkie Collins btw)

Speaking of which, why do we never, ever get sent away "for our health" any more? The NHS may offer me antibiotics but I've never been given a prescription for 3 months in Greece, more's the pity.

God yeah Cailin, those girls with sturdy untwistable ankles must have been constantly frustrated.

To be fair, Marianne had sprained her ankle, after the manner of 1960's Doctor Who companion (they breed 21st century companions with stronger ankles).

Thank god for Goretex say I. Even a job lot of Barbour jackets would revolutionise the plots of most of 19th century literature.

Ah yes. So she had.

That's an ailment you hardly get these days though isn't it.

Wasn't the treatment to lace up your lacrosse boot really tightly?

How about Mrs Wotsit dying on Egdon Heath in The Return of the Native? Isn't it actually quite a nice day?

Oh hang on. Maybe she gets bitten by a snake ...