Last night we had part 2 of Pride & Prejudice on PBS. I’m surprised there’s been no discussion of this show, although most of us who are Asten fans have seen it several times.
This is so well done. The look on Mr Darcy’s face when Lady Catherine de Bourgh interrupts his conversation with Elizabeth Bennet. And her snub “You will never be truly proficient unless you practice. You can come to Rosing on play on the pianoforte in the governess’s room. You will be in no one’s way there” - just calculated to seem beneficent and yet put her exactly in her place. And I really think Col. Fitzwilliam seems like a great guy. I think there should be a story written about him, and finding an Elizabeth Bennet of his own.
I seem to recall that one or another of the modern sequels did exactly this… Darcy’s Diary by Amanda Grange – hooks the colonel up with Anne de Bourgh.
Most of these modern sequels really suck, BTW, but I keep reading them anyway. Penance, maybe, for me being alive while Jane Austen is dead. But I hate the ‘Diary’ ones by Grange less than the rest, because they aren’t really sequels, per se, but cover the same time frame as the novels but through the hero’s eyes.
I always figured Lady Catherine would immediately set Col. Fitzwilliam up with Anne - and Fitzwilliam - requiring a heiress and picking one related to him likely to kick off with her first pregnancy - would take her up on it. I hope Col. Fitzwilliams second marriage is to his Elizabeth.
To be fair, though, we know nothing about Anne except that Lizzie (whom we know is prone to overly-quick first impressions) thinks she looks ‘sickly & cross.’ Maybe being amrried to a nice guy like the colonel and out from under her mother’s thumb, Anne turns out to be a nice girl after all.
Didn’t know this was on PBS, but I checked the DVD out of the library on Saturday and watched the whole thing in one sitting yesterday. Nice bathtub, too. And that man has an excellent tailor. Mmmmm.
I just read the Amanda Grange book (I thought it was pretty bad) and it does portray Anne as being more perky when she’s away from her mother. And Lady Catherine is pleased enough for Anne to marry Col. Fitzwilliam, except that she’s outraged that the couple expects her to move into the dower house.
And I think the official phrase we adopted earlier for this P&P version was “Wet Colin Firth.”
The Darcy one was better than the Knightley one, though. I usually like Mr. Knightley, but he was actively creepy in the Grange book. The age difference doesn’t bother me so much in Emma, but in this modern one it just really wigged me out. Capt. Wentworth’s Diary is out next (in May, I think) – I’m not optimistic (Capt. Wentworth being my top favorite Austen hero), but I’m sure I’ll read it anyway. It’s like picking a scab – I just can’t help myself.
Mr. Collins and Lady Catherine both comment on her health, so we have three sources for sickly. And Charlotte says, through Maria, commenting on Miss De Bourgh keeping Charlotte out in all this wind “it is the greatest of favors when Miss De Bourgh comes in.” Nor does she make much attempt at conversation. She may be a sweet shy girl, raised without understanding decent manners and under the instruction of someone other than her mother, be a decent human being - but she isn’t portrayed by anyone as that - that isn’t just Elizabeth’s perception.
Is Grange’s stuff really the best there is? Are none of the modern sequels, or the other parallel stories, any better? This is the first one I’ve tried.
The best I’ve tried – other than Joan Aiken’s parallel to Emma, Joan Fairfax – that one wasn’t too bad.
The sequels that I’ve tried were all universally bad, although that may be at least partly because they don’t match up with my idea of how the characters ought to end up. I’m trying to think of a specific example – I can’t think of the book, but in one of the sequels to Sense & Sensibility, Marianne leaves Colonel Brandon and joins a utopian commune with Willoughby! It was enough to make your hair stand up straight on your head, I’ll tell you!
Dangerosa – I haven’t re-read P&P in years and I’d forgotten about Anne keeping Charlotte out in the wind – you’re right, that does speak of inconsideration. For whatever reason, though, I’ve always thought of her as a figure of pity. I might be ‘sickly & cross’ myself if I was caged up with Lady Catherine my whole life long. So I’ve always liked the idea that Colonel Fitzwilliam might pep her up a bit.
My least favorite is Mr. Darcy Takes a Wife. Darcy has, under no circumstances, a throbbing manhood. I’m sure Darcy and Elizabeth have a truly amiable marriage - in every sense - and I’m as sure that I don’t want to know ANY MORE about THAT.
Jess, I feel some pity for Anne as well - who knows if she was actually sickly, or if Lady Catherine - overbearing and perhaps overprotected - merely sheltered her into being such. She seems to be about Darcy’s age (27) “in their cradles we planned the match” - and isn’t dead yet - and has been ill so long she never learned to play the pianoforte, so it does seem unlikely that she is someone like Bronte’s Helen Burns, dying of consumption, and just more likely that she was always small and not terribly energetic - then labeled and pampered into something like true infirmity. And who wants Lady Catherine as a mother.
I can’t, however, bring myself to redeem her enough to make Fitzwilliam truly happy. He seems enchanted (like Darcy) by Elizabeth’s spunk - and nothing can make me think Anne has spunk.
My only complaints about the BBC P&P is that Jennifer Ehle’s makeup is horrible, and we are never made to understand what will happen to these girls if they don’t marry. The Keira Knightly version was too heavy handed with that, but at least you had a clue that the Bennet girls were one marriage and one decent uncle away from living in a walkup flat in the bad part of Bath once their father died - like Anne Elliot’s friend Mrs. Smith or Emma’s Mrs. Bates.
Also, they, for some inexplicable reason, don’t include the best line in the book
“I admire all my sons in law. Wickham is perhaps my favorite. But I think I’ll like your husband quite as well as Jane’s.”
I just read an “extension” book of P&P. It was horrid. I cannot find words bad enough for it. I think it was titled, These Three Remain or some such. Author is Something Aidan. She wrote a Darcy trilogy–essentially P&P from Darcy’s point of view. In it, Darcy acts like a moonstruck calf–I have no idea how disagreeable, proud Darcy acts because I only read the last book in the set. The in-love Darcy is an inept, silly ass. This is NOT Darcy. She did make Anne De Burgh somewhat interesting, but the rest of it… I’ll never read another thing by this woman. Blech.
But Dangerosa–if Anne is such a sickly girl–why is she out in that wind that she is so rude to keep Charlotte out in, if you follow me? Always puzzled me–that and just how Lady Catherine “heard” about this supposed engagement–I smell plot device…
I’m going to watch Bride and Prejudice tonight. Austen meets India/Bollywood. Should be fun!
I’ve always assumed Anne was bundled into her carriage in bonnet, coat and lap robe - getting “fresh air” without actually having to walk further than the front door. And that Charlotte gets to go stand in the wind (its March when this happens as I recall) probably in a bonnet she stuck on her head walking out the door, but not properly dressed to stand outside talking.
Lady Catherine hears about the supposed engagement because Sir William Lucas (or his wife) writes his daughter that he expects it - information that Mr. Collins of course, immediately gossips to her. Why Sir William expects it is a mystery to Lizzie, but I’ve always thought Sir William - who recognizes Bingley’s attachment for Jane as more than mere flirtation (and doesn’t have her mother’s bias), is a more astute observer of admiration than he is given credit for.
Another Austen book I enjoyed (hugely) is this one: Flirting with Pride and Prejudice: Fresh Perspectives on the Original Chick-Lit Masterpiece
It’s a collection of contemporary fiction authors discussing all aspects of P&P. Lots of info, but humor and pure zaniness as well (P&P as a reality show? Lizzy with a cell phone?) Dangerosa–I see your point. There was a school of thought in Victorian times that cold, fresh air was beneficial to those with TB. They would bundle up the pts and make them sleep in freezing rooms etc, so no doubt Anne’s “airings” were similar. Mr Collins–I have no trouble at all with him jumping to conclusions like that. It sounds like him. And then, Lucas, who jumped the shark at the ball re Jane and Bingley (which drew Darcy’s attention to the matter and acted as the catalyst for the party to remove to London), would have no trouble doing that again (since he never knew it was his careless words that put the whole thing in motion…). It fits.
