#[ DARCY — elizabeth bennet ] | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

whetstonefires · 11 months

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You know what I realize that people underestimate with Pride & Prejudice is the strategic importance of Jane.

Because like, I recently saw Charlotte and Elizabeth contrasted as the former being pragmatic and the latter holding out for a love match, because she's younger and prettier and thinks she can afford it, and that is very much not what's happening.

The Charlotte take is correct, but the Elizabeth is all wrong. Lizzie doesn't insist on a love match. That's serendipitous and rather unexpected. She wants, exactly as Mr. Bennet says, someone she can respect. Contempt won't do. Mr. Bennet puts it in weirdly sexist terms like he's trying to avoid acknowledging what he did to himself by marrying a self-absorbed idiot, but it's still true. That's what Elizabeth is shooting for: a marriage that won't make her unhappy.

She's grown up watching how miserable her parents make one another; she's not willing to sign up for a lifetime of being bitter and lonely in her own home.

I think she is very aware, in refusing Mr. Collins, that it's reasonably unlikely that anyone she actually respects is going to want her, with her few accomplishments and her lack of property. That she is turning down security and the chance keep the house she grew up in, and all she gets in return may be spinsterhood.

But, crucially, she has absolute faith in Jane.

The bit about teaching Jane's daughters to embroider badly? That's a joke, but it's also a serious potential life plan. Jane is the best creature in the world, and a beauty; there's no chance at all she won't get married to someone worthwhile.

(Bingley mucks this up by breaking Jane's heart, but her prospects remain reasonable if their mother would lay off!)

And if Elizabeth can't replicate that feat, then there's also no doubt in her mind that Jane will let her live in her house as a dependent as long as she likes, and never let it be made shameful or awful to be that impoverished spinster aunt. It will be okay never to be married at all, because she has her sister, whom she trusts absolutely to succeed and to protect her.

And if something eventually happens to Jane's family and they can't keep her anymore, she can throw herself upon the mercy of the Gardeners, who have money and like her very much, and are likewise good people. She has a support network--not a perfect or impregnable one, but it exists. It gives her realistic options.

Spinsterhood was a very dangerous choice; there are reasons you would go to considerable lengths not to risk it.

But Elizabeth has Jane, and her pride, and an understanding of what marrying someone who will make you miserable costs.

That's part of the thesis of the book, I would say! Recurring Austen thought. How important it is not to marry someone who will make you, specifically, unhappy.

She would rather be a dependent of people she likes and trusts than of someone she doesn't, even if the latter is formally considered more secure; she would rather live in a happy, reasonable household as an extra than be the mistress of her own home, but that home is full of Mr. Collins and her mother.

This is a calculation she's making consciously! She's not counting on a better marriage coming along. She just feels the most likely bad outcome from refusing Mr. Collins is still much better than the certain outcome of accepting him. Which is being stuck with Mr. Collins forever.

Elizabeth is also being pragmatic. Austen also endorses her choice, for the person she is and the concerns she has. She's just picking different trade-offs than Charlotte.

Elizabeth's flaw is not in her own priorities; she doesn't make a reckless choice and get lucky. But in being unable to accept that Charlotte's are different, and it doesn't mean there's anything wrong with Charlotte.

Because realistically, when your marriage is your whole family and career forever, and you only get to pick the ones that offer themselves to you, when you are legally bound to the status of dependent, you're always going to be making some trade-offs.

😂 Even the unrealistically ideal dream scenario of wealthy handsome clever ethical Mr. Darcy still asks you to undergo personal growth, accommodate someone else's communication style, and eat a little crow.

#hoc est meum #pride and prejudice #elizabeth bennet #charlotte lucas #meta #charlotte is a much less sociable person than lizzie #so avoiding her husband most of the time and not seeking out his company is more viable for her!#she also has more patience for people being wrong #partly i think because she kinds checks out and lets them get on with it which lizzie isn't too great at even with her mother #people have different needs like that's a thing okay #marriage #spinsterhood #pragmatism #like if elizabeth had to listen to collins talk for a few months straight she would be nearly insane with rage #he's not just a low-quality man he's a man designed to be the worst for her specifically #also note that because jane's marriage is elizabeth's fallback plan #darcy screwed her over personally by interfering between her and bingley #she ofc does not bring this up how could she #but it's intensifying the anger during the hunsford rejection i think

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zipadeea · 1 year

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One of my favorite things about Pride and Prejudice is the Bennet family’s complete cluelessness about Darcy and Elizabeth. Like, if this were a tv show about the Bennets, Darcy and Elizabeth are like, the D storyline. The whole family is trying to get Jane and Bingley together, the regiment is stationed in Meryton, Mr. Collins is taking the house, Lydia and Wickham are obviously the climax, these people have a lot going on. And then, once the regiment has left and Jane and Lydia and Mr. Collins are married and everything seems resolved: plot twist! They’ve got random nobility at the door in the middle of the night telling the know-it-all sister who has been home on and off through the year not to marry the rando rich guy they all hate simply because they’re family and loyal to each other damnit and he called the know-it-all sister ugly once.

And then, of course, they all find out Lizzy and Darcy are actually very in love and literally all of the good things that have happened to them this year are a direct consequence of Darcy loving Lizzy lolol.

#pride and prejudice #i am once again watching 2005 pride and prejudice #mr darcy #Elizabeth Bennet #jane austen #it's just so good

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dogzcats · 9 months

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#pride and prejudice #p&p2005 #elizabeth bennet #pride and prejudice 2005 #mr darcy #elizabeth x darcy #keira knightley #matthew mcfayden #perioddramaedit #perioddramasource #austenedit #jane austen #regencyedit #anna attempts photoshop #rain scene #1k+#5k+#10k+#10k

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laurenillustrated · 3 months

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“She is tolerable; but not handsome enough to tempt me.”

Pride and Prejudice illustration based on the book.

#jane austen #jane austen art #jane austin quote #pride and prejudice #pride and prejudice art #mr darcy #fitzwilliam darcy #elizabeth bennet #lizzie bennet #elizabeth and darcy #book illustrations #book illustration #character illustration #illustration art #kids illustration #regency period #regency era #regency england

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duchess-of-new-shire · 1 year

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My favorite ship dynamic of all time, ever, is a little something I like to call anxiety x audacity

Examples:

#ship #ship dynamics #miss piggy #kermit #the muppets #pride and prejudice #elizabeth bennet #lizzy bennet #mr darcy #fitzwilliam darcy #jane austen #the good place #chidi anagonye #chidi and eleanor #eleanor shellstrop

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nerdside · 8 months

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Pride and Prejudice characters + being a mood

#pride and prejudice #jane austen #film edit #movie edit #mine #my edit #elizabeth x darcy #mr darcy #elizabeth bennet #keira knightley #matthew macfadyen #papedit #lizzy bennet #fitzwilliam darcy #period drama

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wylansvanhendriks · 2 years

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jane austen was right!!!!! i AM half agony half hope!!!!! if i loved you less i COULD talk about it more!!!!!!!! i WAS in the middle before i knew i had begun!!!!!!!

#maybe im not a jane austen heroine maybe im the pathetic love interest head over heels for them #jane austen #persuasion #emma #pride and prejudice #frederick wentworth #george knightley #fitzwilliam darcy #anne elliot #emma woodhouse #elizabeth bennet #book: persuasion #book: emma #book: pride and prejudice #text #userevaz

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checkoutmybookshelf · 8 months

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This was too good not to share, and I am now putting out into the world the desire for an animated, animal friends version of Pride and Prejudice that does EXACTLY THIS. It would be AMAZING.

For anyone interested in the original: https://www.tumblr.com/pagerunner/191002786668/pride-prejudice-2005-dir-joe-wright

I found the screengrab on pinterest originally, so give the OG poster a like too!

#classic literature memes #literature memes #pride and prejudice #mr. bingley #mr. darcy #elizabeth bennet #regency novel #regency romance #jane austen

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literarybrainrot · 2 months

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Pride and Prejudice is actually hilarious cause Elizabeth goes to the Netherfield Ball with the purpose of finding out what Darcy's closest friends think about Wickham, and when they all tell her Darcy is a really nice guy and Wickham is a liar she literally goes "Mr. Darcy has somehow managed to trick all of his closest friends into thinking he's a good person but I know something about him that they don't (that he sucks)"

#pride and prejudice #elizabeth bennet #fitzwilliam darcy #jane austen

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firawren · 6 months

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