To think that most Jane Austen's heroines didn't find happiness in marriage?

[bgmama]

I am a big fan and I must have read the books a hundred times, but I am starting to realize that most heroes in her books are either assholes or idiots and towards the end of the book they stop being assholes or idiots and become worthy of marrying the heroine. I am not talking only of Mr Darcy here, but most others too. AIBU to think that this transformation didn't last very long and they went back to their usual ways shortly after the marriage was consummated? And that the heroines were miserable and were told to LTB at some point during their lives?

@Seasawride I think childbirth fever is a streptococcal infection, not related to mastitis.

Yes. I think the two were sometimes confused because the white pus of puerphal fever looked milky.

Childbirth fever is possibly what killed Jane Seymour. Also Mary Wollenstonecraft after she gave birth to Mary Shelley.

I can see the allure of celibacy for women back then.

Well fuck me I feel all inspired now!!

I had it as my waters broke early and then had a retained placenta! I had antibiotics

I may start writing tomorrow! see where I go!

Mind you it was 19 years ago! Genius may have died

Five brothers, actually . Could none of them proved for Jane, Cassandra and their mother?

*provide

@pallisers It is still a problem today, there was a heartbreaking article in the Guardian a couple of years ago to raise awareness with a widower whose wife had recently died from it as it had gone unrecognised until too late.

Lol Seasaw. I'd be dead many times over we're it not for modern medicine, and that's one of the reasons. So far I've yet to change the course of cultural history.

I love this thread.

Thank you everyone - I need to go back and re-read all JA to start off with, then re-read Wild Sagasso Sea as I can't really remember much.

Incidentally, has anyone read Deborah? It's about Anne Debourg. Was quite an interesting story but I can't remember who wrote it.

I have been so enjoying this tread .
My little bit of input - didn't Lady Caroline Lamb scandalise society by damping her muslin dress during her affair with Lord Byron ?

Brilliant thread.

@pallisers, I agree with you about that speech. I am always quoting it in my head. Plus ‘people live forever when there is an annuity to be paid’. I once overheard a conversation in Mother’s care home where a woman was complaining that “people live forever when care home fees have to be paid”.A very modern take on JA.

Normally I hate film adaptations but I can watch Harriet Walker as Fanny Dashwood over and over. She is superb in every scene

Tbf the brothers did support their mother and sisters, they put in a sum of money each yearly to provide for them. What I don't understand is why the rich brother didn't provide them with a home much sooner than he did. yy to Harriet walker being a marvelous Fanny dashwood, she really nailed it.

Normally I hate film adaptations but I can watch Harriet Walker as Fanny Dashwood over and over. She is superb in every scene

She is indeed!

The scene where Lucy Steele reveals her engagement to Edward (after Fanny has told her that any family in the land, not matter how great, would be delighted to welcome her int their midst) - that scene is pure comic genius!

I LOVE Harriet Walter.

If Wickham was the son of a gamekeeper then doesn't that show that even then society was quite fluid.
It's a long time since I read Mansfield Park but wasn't Lady Bertram's sister living in poverty?

Even today estates which practice primo geniture often don't make much provision for the daughters and younger sons.
When the owner of a large estate and stately home in Yorkshire died in 1986 his younger children were left £5000 each - though I know £5000 went further in 1986 than it does now.
Today obviously women from all economic backgrounds can earn their own money.

estates don't provide for DD and younger DSs - the bad ones don't in this country, that's for sure. It's seen as very poor form in most cultures to scrape every pound coin and ornament up to 'make an eldest son' while disinheriting most of your children. Never a good move.

In the old days no one could have got away with that because the DDs would have been unmarriageable. Usually the DS got the land (with men on it, for labour and/or war) while the galz got the cash.

I know someone whose DB, a year older, scored an extremely valuable set of farms in Devon while the other 4 DCs had to borrow money to pay for the funeral. Not great for family relations, and in families like that you need your nearest and dearest onside.

Mostly now they go to the eldest child regardless of sex. Assuming s/he wants it, which often they don't. Recently, I know of a very old estate that went 50:50 to the eldest DD and DS.

The scene where Lucy Steele reveals her engagement to Edward (after Fanny has told her that any family in the land, not matter how great, would be delighted to welcome her int their midst) - that scene is pure comic genius!

best scene ever!

Actually primogeniture and "making an eldest son of him" was a way of consolidating land and power. The penal laws in Ireland expressly forbade catholics from leaving everything to an eldest son - instead land and money had to be divided - ensuring that each succeeding generation would be weaker in terms of consolidated land/money/power

There is a thread running at the moment in which a brother and his wife are being criticised - and in many cases applauded - for leaving a widowed mother, if not financially, then very much emotionally, in the lurch.

Every post I read I think of Fanny Dashwood so reasonably explaining why they cannot help more. I like the "Maybe next year" about Eleanor and Marianne going to stay with them.

Plus ca change. I'm sure Georgian MNetters would have been egging on Fanny Dashwood and telling her she needed her space and to put her own family first...

Bit off topic, but on a recent visit to the Jane Austen house dd and I were much surprised to see "The Mysteries of Udolpho" on the shelves. Perhaps I'm a bit, er, thick, but I hadn't realised they were real.

I definitely think a better second half of Northanger Abbey could have been penned. Perhaps Mrs Tilney could have been holed up in the West Wing, or Henry Tilney himself a murderer instead of insipid suitor.

I loved that scene too. Harriet Walter perfect for Fanny Dashwood, as for every other role I've ever seen her in.

Wickham's father wasn't a gamekeeper, he was Mr Darcy Senior's steward, running his estate. He might not have been gentry, but must have been highly trusted and reasonably well educated. Mr D Snr was Wickham's godfather.

Re splitting estates - this practice isn't without its problems. It's a common inheritance practice in parts of India and SE Asia to divide land among all the sons (there are matrilineal societies like Kerala but they're rare). What tends to happen a few generations down the line is that you end up with a patchwork of tiny small holdings, none big enough to actually support a family.

In most agrarian societies, it's therefore more common to see some sort of pattern where the oldest son gets the land, with younger sons being supported to go into various trades. (Which is effectively what we see in JA - oldest son gets the estate, younger sons go into the army or the church).

Or for JA's preference, the navy, where a son of reasonably good family but 'nothing but himself to recommend him' could acquire capital through legalized piracy prize money. The army was more likely to require capital investment in order to buy a commission in a good regiment.

JA prefers any version of a self made man (gentleman but in a profession) to an idle rentier like Frank Churchill or John Yates.

Laneor which often they don't.
That's interesting. Which estates weren't wanted by whoever inherited them? Did they sell them or let them?
If they're left 50/50 they have to be sold presumably - so I suppose that's why they are left to one person, usually the oldest son, in order to keep them in the family.

I also love the quote about the Moreland Family. “A family of 10 children will always be called a fine family when there are enough heads, arms and legs for the number”

I never know if this is a joke or whether it refers to children having birth defects.

I am not sure if my Gran ever read JA, but when ever the hordes of visiting GCs left she would say, “make sure you’ve all got your, arms legs and heads. And make sure they are on the right bodies.

Or for JA's preference, the navy, where a son of reasonably good family but 'nothing but himself to recommend him' could acquire capital through legalized piracy prize money. The army was more likely to require capital investment in order to buy a commission in a good regiment.

Isn't there a line at the end of Persuasian where she says something like the navy officers will continue to prosper as long as they are lucky enough to be at war with Napoleon.