200 Years of Mr Darcy

Dear Ms Austen, 

200 years ago, your timeless novel was published and the women the world over fell in love with your anti-hero, the man beast that is Mr Fitzwilliam Darcy. 


Thank you, 

All womankind. 


As I've mentioned in many a previous blog, my love affair with Pride and Prejudice and all things Jane Austen is a long one, beginning at the age of 7 when my Father gave me the book. My copy had a white cover and a illustrated picture of Elizabeth who was inexplicably blonde. But brushing that aside, my copy is now battered, slightly torn and re-read a hundred times over.It's got me through many a bout of heartbreak, illness and rainy Saturday night.

Austenland - A Pilgrimage

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that all avid Jane Austen fans should make a pilgrimage to see where she wrote and lived.

And so, on Sunday, my very patient boyfriend drove me to Hampshire, lovingly signposted as "Jane Austen Country" to visit the house she lived in with mother and sister Cassandra until her death in 1817.

The village of Chawton is home to Jane Austen's House and Museum, is a small, quiet, green village, and it isn't hard to imagine what is would have been like in Regency times (coach loads of American tourists aside).

Similarly to the Jane Austen Centre in Bath, the house itself is nothing remarkable, being a medium sized cottage filled with replica Regency furniture and squeaky floorboards,

A Truth Universally Acknowledged

My recent mood I’ve been in lately has left me a bit restless. And in my restlessness I’ve been calling upon my old friends to calm me down. 

I first read Pride and Prejudice when I was 9 years old.  I remember my teacher at the time thought it was too advanced for me, but I had been reading lengthy stories since I was a wee lass (The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe when I was 6).

The story of Darcy and Elizabeth has enchanted me for 18 years. The language of Austen has comforted me for nearly as long. 

Jane Austen was a single lady, who by the time she was my age had written magical stories that have since become some of the most widely read books of all time.

This may sound horribly geeky, but my favourite books are my friends.  When I’ve been sick in bed, or home on a Saturday night, they have always been there.

And they always will. 

Mr Darcy, You Are Just Not Rude Enough.

I am enjoying a delicious, rare day off where i have nothing planned and nothing to do.  So to indulge myself I have made a plunger coffee and am sitting down to watch some Regency finery in Pride & Prejudice.

NOT the classic 90s BBC Mini-Series with the delectable Colin Firth, but the atrocious 2004 version starring my nemesis Keira Knightley and Matthew MacFadyen.

I have many problems with this movie. The first being Keira Knightley is a wooden actress and a terrible choice to play one of the greatest heroine in literary history. It always looks as if she is trying to hard and can’t breathe. 

My second issue is that Mr Darcy is all wrong.  Usually I enjoy MacFadyen as an actor, especially in Spooks,  but he could officially be the worst Mr Darcy in history.  Hot, yes.  Haughty? No. Disdainful? No. He’s all over the place. 

Mr Bingley is portrayed as an idiot and they only give him one sister (Did Mrs Hurst die in some strange accident that the movie goer is unaware of?).  Mrs Bennet is not nearly annoying enough.

Also the movie goes against societal mores of the time. When Jane Bennett is sick in Netherfield, Mr Bingley would NEVER have presumed to go into her room.  To do so would be practically to confirm and engagement.   

So I am baffled as to why I put this movie on this morning on my day off. Especially because I am perfectly aware that Knightley makes me want to staple my ears and eyes shut so I don’t have to look or hear her. 

Next time I’ll stick to Colin Firth and Jennifer Ehle.

Ultra Violent Zombie Mayhem? Pfftt.

One of my favourite people suggested I write a blog about zombies, and whilst they can be very entertaining in a grotesque flesh-eating way, I was reminded of a hideous book I recently tried to read.  “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: The Classic Regency Romance Now With Ultra Violent Zombie Mayhem”. 

As dedicated readers of this blog will know, I am a lover of anything Jane Austen.  I love the whole regency era. The customs, language, dances and love stories all fill me with a warm fuzzy feeling and I gladly read any Jane Austen related spin off written.

This book however, was complete and utter rubbish.

It was unlikely enough that Mr Darcy was a time traveller from present day who actually fell in love with Jane Austen (another Jane Austen spin-off), but ZOMBIES?? Attacking the good people of Meryton and England? 

Reading one scene, the first dance at Meryton to be precise, where Darcy mutters the immortal words “She is tolerable I suppose”, I sat aghast as zombies attacked and the Bennett sisters drew daggers from their garters and fought back.  Mr Darcy, as is his disposition, just stood by.  It was then that I shut the book firmly, went to my happy place and pretended that the whole dreadful experience had never occurred. 

My strong recommendation to you dear readers is if you are ever tempted to read this book, to slap yourself really hard until the thought goes away.

Why I'm Forever Lost In Austen

Once or twice a year, or whenever I feel the flu coming on, I pick up a tattered copy of Pride and Prejudice, proudly presented to me by my Father at age 7, I open and...

“It is a truth universally acknowledged that...”

I had a particularly nasty day today, and the comfort that the familiar words between Elizabeth and Darcy bring me still, after a love affair between them and I lasting nearly 20 years, is inexplicable. But it comforts me. Like a hug from Dad, tea from Nanna, one of Pa’s hankies when my nose is runny, it is one of the things in life I don’t think I could ever live without. Desert Island scenario.. I honestly think one of things I would want to be stranded with is my copy of Pride and Prejudice.

Jane Austen is one of my heroes, I will read, watch, listen to anything even remotely to do with her or her stories. I even have a copy of “Jane Austen’s Guide to Dating.” I cannot offer up any rational reason as to why I love her so, but I think it is because I secretly wish to belong to a simpler time, when it was scandalous for a gentleman to be alone with a lady and thrilling if they brush the skin of the upper arm where the sleeve meets the glove. A man that could dance was not considered a “dandy” and one’s world was one’s village. I love the freedom that (Western) 21st Century woman enjoy, and am proud of the Suffragettes who fought so hard for our liberation. But secretly, deep down, I want Mr Darcy to gallop towards me on his noble steed, preferably adorned in wet shirt a-la the delectable Colin Firth and lay his coat over a puddle so my feet will not get wet *sigh*.