To have just realised that Mr Collins got Mrs Collins in the family way.

[squoosh]

Have just re-read Pride & Prejudice for the first time in yonks and at the end Mr Collins mentions 'dear Charlotte’s situation, and his expectation of a young olive-branch. How had I not noticed that before?

I'd always imagined dear Charlotte avoiding that messy business by keeping him occupied with his sermon writing and his gardening and his pash on Lady Catherine.

But she was a woman who knew what she wanted so I wouldn't be surprised if she was the one who took conjugal matters in hand.

Good old P&P, the book that keeps on giving.

Wuthering Heights is essentially Emily's own private role-playing fantasy from her imaginary world Gondal with the names changed and the setting switched to Yorkshire, though. All four of them did fantasy role play and writing up the results in poems and stories well into adulthood - Anne probably the least, though she seems to have gone along with Emily - and Charlotte had a hard time weaning herself off the imaginary world she and Branwell had when she was a governess, but Emily had less reason than the others to give it up, as she was much the least out in the world, apart from a brief stint as a teacher, and her study in Brussels with Charlotte.

All that Byronic tempestuousness, cruelty, death and obsession and puppy-hanging makes a lot more sense if you think of it less as a novel in any conventional sense than a melodramatic private fantasy shoehorned into written form.

You get bits of it in the more melodramatic parts of Jane Eyre as well - Charlotte's Angria was full of sexually-charismatic bad boys and masochistic, obsessed women.

Charlotte famously didn't get JA at all, and couldn't see why anyone thought she was a genius, of course.

Oh bGod! I suppose it will be less of a shock the second time around

LOVE this thread. Just read the whole thing. So much to say.

Charlotte's strategy to cope with life as Mrs. Collins is in the novel:

To work in this garden was one of his most respectable pleasures; and Elizabeth admired the command of countenance with which Charlotte talked of the healthfulness of the exercise, and owned she encouraged it as much as possible.

I'm confused by the fertility issue too. 5 healthy children, all close in age. Then nothing. What kind of birth injury with Lydia's birth could have stopped more children?

She suffered from a serious case of Necessary Plot Device.

Sorry. But Austen needed to create a sense of real impending jeopardy for the Bennet women.

On the subject of Emma Thompson being too old to play Elinor, may I point out that Alan Rickman was also too old to play Colonel Brandon? His age is given in the novel as thirty-five, and Rickman was forty-nine.

"On the subject of Emma Thompson being too old to play Elinor, may I point out that Alan Rickman was also too old to play Colonel Brandon? His age is given in the novel as thirty-five, and Rickman was forty-nine."

Oh God - when reading S&S I always thought of Colonel Brandon as a middle-aged man and rather pitied Marianne for marrying him.

I now realise that he was younger than I am now

When I was in my teens and saw the film. I seriously pitied Marianne, and I thought she'd never truly love the Colonel - I'd have Brandon everyday of the week and twice on Sundays now.

If we hadn't lost Alan Rickman in the great celebrity cull of 2016 of course

It's still quite a big age gap - Marianne is sixteen at the beginning of the novel so maybe seventeen or just eighteen when she marries him. Kate Winslet was twenty, so that was pretty faithful to the novel.

Love this thread, have been dipping in and out for the past 24 hours.

On the subject of older actresses being cast in the role of the mother - the same thing with Ang Lee's S&S (she was old enough to be Emma T's mum!), and to a lesser extent with GWTW. Ellen O'Hara married Gerald at 15, if I recall. Scarlett was 16, so she'd have been barely out of her 20s.

And on other themes, I sometimes wonder to what extent Julian Fellows ripped off the 'son-less family, estate entailed away, pressure brought to bear on daughter X to marry the heir' story line. A less odious heir, to be fair.

I'm unapologetically team Firth. The scene when he strides out of Pemberley post the lake scene, booted and suited, hell bent on making a good impression on Lizzy, is perfection.

I'm unapologetically team Firth. The scene when he strides out of Pemberley post the lake scene, booted and suited, hell bent on making a good impression on Lizzy, is perfection.

Yes.

Thanks Missturnstyles I knew I remembered the gardening bit from the book. although the 'most respectable pleasures' sounds like he had some unrespectable pleasures rampant shagging of Charlotte Honestly, if I have a Matt Smith \David Bamber\Tom Hollander\Mr Collins sex dream tonight, I'm blaming the Genteel Ladies Reading Circle [hard stare]

Oh and him choosing the green jacket for the proposal that didn't happen

Agree that actor who played Mr Collins in Firth/Ehle BBC version was extremely good and that in the book Charlotte knew exactly what she was doing, in all ways. She was trying her best to arrange a relatively comfortable and secure future for herself while seeing as little of Mr Collins as she possibly could.

However, what concerns me re the whole plot of Pride and Prejudice is that - however admirable a heroine Lizzie may be - Mr Darcy is in effect replicating the decision made by Elizabeth's father, a decision which Jane Austen identifies as ill-advised. He's chosing to marry a woman who he fancies, not someone who can fulfil the important and responsible duties expected (by conventional society) of the wife of a man of his wealth, status and power. Perhaps Lizzie will grow into these duties and fulfil them well, but she has not had the childhood experience and upbringing to prepare herself for them. Does anyone else think that Jane Austen's 'happy ending' of P and P is a bit unresolved? Does she really convince us that 'love is all you need' (even though Darcy persuades himself that it is)? Compared with 'Persuasion', is it all a bit sketchy, perhaps?

On the subject of Persuasion, don't you think that it's a vastly better novel and also (in the 1995 version) a vastly better film? Amanda Root, Ciaran Hinds, Fiona Shaw and the late lamented Susan Fleetwood are all quite wonderful, IMHO.

However, what concerns me re the whole plot of Pride and Prejudice is that - however admirable a heroine Lizzie may be - Mr Darcy is in effect replicating the decision made by Elizabeth's father, a decision which Jane Austen identifies as ill-advised. He's chosing to marry a woman who he fancies, not someone who can fulfil the important and responsible duties expected (by conventional society) of the wife of a man of his wealth, status and power.

I have to say, I disagree with this.

While Darcy is undoubtedly very attracted to Elizabeth, he also respects the very bones of her. That's the entire point.

He's never met another woman like her. She sends him packing (unthinkable), so he goes away, regroups, and then endeavours to deserve her. He knows she will make an ideal mistress of Pemberley.

I love Persuasion, and doubly love the 1995 adaptation. Ciaran Hinds? Phwoar. It's definitely a better novel, IMO. It's my favourite JA.

Mary and Mr Collins would have been a great match, actually. But remember Lady Catherine being sniffy about 'the youngest already out while the eldest is not yet married?!' ...perhaps poor old Mary was dying to take a shot at him, but couldn't while Lizzie and Jane were still faffing about. My god, there's a POV fanfic in that...

With great respect Dowager - and this is all just personal opinion, after all, and we are both 100% entitled to say what we think, and be heard - I think that it's a bit anachronistic to think that 'respect' would smooth out all potential marital problems for Lizzie and Mr Darcy. As the Mr Collins/Charlotte marriage shows, the conventions of the day were businesslike and practical, not about personal romantic or sexual feelings. In the book, Jane Austen is deliberately - maybe cynically - contrasting the Collins's situation of 'making the best of a limited range of options' with something much more revolutionary, allowing personal feelings (of respect, attraction or a whole range of other things) to override centuries of convention. Earlier posters have already spoken about this tension between the old order and the new romantics in Austen's books- and how much Jane herself identified with either side, or not ...

Leaving opinion aside, as a matter of fact, it was certainly expected that the mistress of a great house would play an active and very responsible part in managing it once she married the owner, and that all her actions would have to bear in mind any possible effect they might have on his public reputation and position. Traditionally, a young woman had to be born to such a high rank in society, in order to learn what to do from childood, and perform her duties well.

I think that it's interesting that Jane Austen chooses not to explore the relationship between Lizzie and Darcy much beyond marriage. To me, that's a sign that she is ambivalent. But, given her own upbringing and social situation, that's probably as far off piste as she could safely allow herself to go.

Best. Thread. EVER.

On the subject of Melanie in GWTW: she is described as being small and slight with a girlish figure and "flat hips", and she was attended during the birth of her son only by Scarlett and Prissy - people with no midwifery or other medical training and near-totally ignorant about labour and birth (though Scarlett had had a child of her own, but the labour was very quick and she doesn't seem to remember a great deal about it).

Melanie was in labour for hours and hours before her son was eventually born - then they immediately whacked her into a horse-drawn cart for a road trip to Tara, through a war zone, in the Georgia sun. Who knows what injuries she suffered during the birth and subsequent trip, that left her unable to bear any more children safely. Though I'm not sure why her subsequent pregnancy, in itself, would actually have killed her in the way it was said to have done.

Puerperal fever is just sepsis basically, is that right?

In that case, a miscarriage could quite easily cause it (retained products, or some doctor with no idea of washing his hands checking up on her).

Though, obviously, wouldn't answer why Pompous Doctor Bloke tells her she can't risk it.

Yes, like lots of literature, it ends at the wedding. We don't see how she copes with running the house. JA seems to take quite a dim view of marriage, especially when you look at the Bennet's marriage and the Collins's marriage. Maybe the minutiae of domestic life is too boring!

Yeah, that's the thing - she's clearly told that she must not have any more pregnancies or she'll die. But for some reason she can't stay away from Dreadfully Drippy Ashley, he upduffs her and she promptly keels over, right on schedule.

Coincidence, perhaps? Or the damage from the first birth causes the miscarriage which causes the sepsis as you say.

(IAN remotely any kind of medical professional, in case that's not completely obvious)

I often wondered whether JA never wrote about the married lives of Lizzie, Jane, Emma, Elinor etc was because for a time she had endless experience of the singles market which past say 23 dried up for her but was still observable in younger relations and acquaintainces she had zero experience of the internal workings of marital life and thus could never fictionalise it.

I man how aware was she even of sex, that was generally a quiet conversation with an engaged daughter about thinking for England etc and she wouldnt even have got that chat. Awareness less than that of a teenage virgin today I'd imagine.

I think you're right, Songbird, which is also why she never writes about men's private conversations; she was never party to them, and writers of adaptations have to add them in.

I think JA was perfectly aware of sex. I believe a lot of the marketing of JA as a somewhat genteel, innocent spinster was down to a Victorian biography written about her by her nephew, Austen-Leigh, following her death.

According to her extant letters (many were destroyed by Cassandra) she had a vicious sense of humour and, I would guess, a solid grasp of the realities of life.

I have been reading the 'What Matters In Austin' book recommended earlier, it is great! Really interesting.

I agree with Dowager about Lizzie being a suitable wife for Darcy. He's so attracted to her because of her intelligence, tact and dignity. Although the position of being his wife may have been hard, these qualities are easily enough to make her able to learn how to do it.

I think he does jump into it in a slightly Mr Bennett like way the fist time he proposes, when he fancies her but actually thinks she is quite unsuitable. But by the second proposal, he realises that she is actually very suitable and there is a happy conclusion because his desire to marry her is both passionate and rational. I think they would have been very happy.

I'm not suggesting respect would smooth out all potential marriage problems - life isn't, and never has been, like that!

I was just disagreeing with the idea that the Darcy/Elizabeth match was akin to the Bennett match. I don't see it. That's not to say I'm right! This thread is nothing more than our own personal interpretations of the story - that's what makes the discussion so fascinating (and the book so compelling).

It's incredible to think how many great classics were ruined by intense dissection at school, and yet here we are doing exactly that, and loving it!