So this morning, like every morning, I got up at around 4 for an hour on the treadmill. As I was fighting off both high blood sugar and self-loathing I had an epiphany. It’s not that I’m such a horrible, vile, misanthropic son of a gun; it’s that the rest of the world is too fucking happy. Clearly something has to be done to reduce the beauty in the world to an acceptable level.
The answer was not not ten meters away from me, on the kitchen table, waiting for me with my Cheerios: Jane Austen’s Northanger Abbey. As everyone knows, Austen is the greatest novelist who ever lived; her books have brought refreshment, amusement, enlightenment, and something else ending in ment to countless millions over the centuries. Clearly she must be eliminated from the timestream.
There was a minor complication, of course. Rhymer Rule 4 specifically prohibits violence against women, so I couldn’t just hop back in time and chop off her head before she ever put pen to paper. But there’s no rule prohibiting abducting her father on the night before her conception and administering a jackleg vasectomy, and that will work just as well.
Hmmmmm…I was going to mention that it typically takes a few months after a vasectomy for the sperm count to go to zero, but that doesn’t necessarily poke a hole (pun intended) in this plan, since Mr. Austen would probably not be in the mood for a few days.
I find this a difficult question to answer, as I’m uncertain whether I should go with the Jane Austen novel that I personally like the best, the one that I feel is most beloved by the general public, or the one most likely to appeal to a supervillain such as Skald.
Consider Mansfield Park. This is my least favorite Jane Austen novel, but it is unique in that it contains what appears to be a joke about sodomy in the British Navy.
[spoiler]Mary Crawford, the worldly “bad girl” of the novel: “Certainly my home at my uncle’s brought me acquainted with a circle of admirals. Of *Rears *and *Vices *I saw enough. Now do not suspect me of making a pun, I entreat.”
It’s debatable whether Austen intended the joke to be interpreted as a reference to the sexual practices of men who spent a lot of time at sea – she may have meant that officers tended to develop both bad habits and large butts – but few modern readers would see it any other way.[/spoiler]Imagine some prim, graying spinster working her way through the collected works of Jane Austen, and in the middle of a book about a poor but virtuous girl pining away for a man who may or may not love her, she suddenly encounters a pun about anal sex. Does this thought not bring at least a small chuckle to the lips of the wicked Skald?
You’re just supposed to talk about Jane Austen. The OP is just a hook. Though I will admit to crying a little inside that only I appear to love Abbey as it deserves.
ETA: Why is no one else quoting their favorite Jane Austen?
Given the motivation for this thread, you might do better to point out the one which has caused the greatest amount of suffering in the world.
To which end, I might mention summer reading lists. No matter what the quality of the book, nobody in history has ever enjoyed mandatory summer reading. And Austen’s works not uncommonly make it onto such lists.
That is not Austen’s fault. Anyway, the key to summer reading lists is to include a great deal of trash that nonetheless points the way to great literature.
You should weigh into your calculations that if you eliminate her from the timestream you’d also remove her descendant Steve Austin (spelling Americanized), the astronaut and prosthetic limb pioneer.
Although I voted “Emma” I have to say, without “Pride & Prejudice” I don’t think there’s one American law student who would understand the implications of the fee tail.
Not to mention the whole issue of whether Edmund’s or Henry’s chain will fit through Fanny’s cross. (Curse you, Lionel Trilling! I could have lived a full, happy life without pondering why Jane Austen wrote that!)
Yes, she was obviously referring to Rear and Vice Admirals, but if that were all there was to her statement then it wouldn’t be a pun at all. It would just be a straightforward complaint about how boring it is to hear the various admirals talking about themselves. But we’re clearly told that the statement could be taken as a pun, although Miss Crawford claims that she didn’t mean it that way.
This is also my fault for fucking around in the OP; the silly stuff was just an elaborate way to talk about the best of Austen. Ah well, it’s too late now.
[villain hat]
Clearly you did not understand the OP. I wish to reduce the amount of beauty and joy in the world and increase the amount of ugliness and insanity. Murdering Dan Brown clearly will do nothing to further that aim, and removing Stephanie Brown from the equation will actually hinder it.
[/villain hat]
M. Austen, pere’s mood aside, the fact that the biography of the unexpurgated Jane mentions several older siblings suggests that any delay in sufficient reduction of sperm count would not be a problem.
How dare you talk ill of Ms. Austen! She is poor… Her situation should secure your compassion. It was badly done, indeed!
You, Skald, whom she had known from an infant, whom she had seen grow up from a period when her notice was an honour, to have you now, in thoughtless spirits, and the pride of the moment, laugh at her, humble her…before others, many of whom (certainly some) would be entirely guided by your treatment of her.
This is not pleasant to you, Skald–and it is very far from pleasant to me; but I must, I will, I will tell you truths while I can; satisfied with proving myself your friend by very faithful counsel, and trusting that you will some time or other do me greater justice than you can do now.