Who is the most beloved Jane Austen couple of all time? Darcy and Elizabeth, of course, are the big crowd favorite. Why wouldn’t they be? Their personalities complement each other beautifully, and as their story develops it’s easy to discover, along with Elizabeth, what a perfect match they make. But I thought that in today’s… Read the full blog post …
Mrs. Bennet is one of Jane Austen’s most memorable characters. Clearly Austen wants us to laugh at her histrionics and her constant, blatant husband hunting, and we feel sorry for her daughters when her antics push away eligible suitors. But we are also frustrated by her lack of manners and wish she would at least… Read the full blog post …
About four years ago my husband and I introduced our children to a favorite movie of ours, The Scarlet Pimpernel, starring Jane Seymour and Anthony Andrews. If you have not seen it, I encourage you to do so as soon as possible. Our kids fell in love with the character of Sir Percival Blakeney, an… Read the full blog post …
How much money did Darcy have? Exactly how rich was he? Any Jane Austen fan knows the easy answer: Darcy was worth ten thousand pounds per year. But a debate has gone on for years. What does ten thousand pounds actually mean in today’s terms? Lots of people (including some Austen Authors) have tried over… Read the full blog post …
Charles Bingley, Darcy’s affable and somewhat heedless best friend, is a curious character in Pride and Prejudice. His inclusion in the plot is a little odd. After all, the love story between Darcy and Elizabeth could be told without Bingley’s part at all. Strictly speaking his story arc is completely unnecessary. But Bingley is a… Read the full blog post …
I think Charlotte Lucas is underrated. Do you agree? Readers of Pride and Prejudice tend to overlook Charlotte as a minor character who serves little purpose but in my opinion this is a mistake. Charlotte is a strong character in her own right, and she also serves as a warning and as a plot device.… Read the full blog post …
“That’s just like Elizabeth Bennet in Pride and Prejudice. She was too proud! Or was she too prejudiced and Mr. Darcy was too proud? I can’t remember.” Do you remember these words from the movie “You’ve Got Mail”? Joe Fox says them to Kathleen Kelly as they play out their own private drama that’s reminiscent… Read the full blog post …
Today I’d like to talk about a subject that has drawn a lot of attention recently among fans of regency romances: The first time I heard about the new Netflix series Bridgerton was when I saw fellow regency fans online talking about the “mature” scenes in it. Judging by the buzz created, there must be… Read the full blog post …
Well, it’s been almost a year since we entered this pandemic! What a year it has been!!!! With so many of our formerly favorite activities now restricted, what kinds of things have you found to fill the time? Have you developed any new hobbies? Tackled any new projects? Found yourself trying something you never thought… Read the full blog post …
“Why aren’t there any stories about Darcy and Elizabeth after they get married?” I heard this question asked at the first JASNA event I ever went to, in Washington D.C., back in 2016 or so, and it stayed in my head. An answer to the question started percolating in my imagination and before I knew… Read the full blog post …
When I first started writing Jane Austen fan fiction back in 2014, I was still relatively new to the genre. I had read a fair share of some of the most popular authors, but there were things about JAFF that I didn’t know. Most importantly, I did not know that there are some “facts” that… Read the full blog post …
Last month I discussed the aristocracy of England, a system that was so pervasive in Jane Austen’s time that she had no need to explain it to her readers. Today I’d like to talk about another system that she could assume her readers understood: the clergy of the Church of England. The Church of England,… Read the full blog post …
Aristocracy is not a word that appears in Jane Austen’s novels, but its influence shows up in them. After all, we are told that Darcy’s uncle is an earl, and Anne Elliott’s father Sir Walter obsesses over the Baronetage. Some of Austen’s funniest characters are those who revere the aristocracy the most. But what, exactly,… Read the full blog post …
