Charlotte’s speech in chapter 14, in which she claims that men can have it “both ways” in marriage while women cannot, does not reflect my own beliefs. It’s my opinion that Austen intended Charlotte’s marriage as a cautionary tale against the cruelty of a society that makes it impossible for women to live unmarried. Austen is not arguing in favor of sexual freedom, only the choice to marry for genuine love or not at all. I doubt she would agree that men should have it both ways either, but I see in Darcy and Bingley a couple who will have it so, and I tried in this story to make it work. Where Elizabeth has a husband who will, indeed, be “everything” to her, I couldn’t help wanting to give Charlotte a measure of happiness beyond what her creator allowed—thus the chaste but affectionate relationship with Anne de Bourgh.
The one plot change I have made is to have Jane learn of Darcy’s direct involvement in separating her and Bingley. It seemed unlikely that this big, ugly secret could be kept forever, especially once she and Charles are engaged and can talk freely. Knowledge on both sides is essential for the success of the “bisexual” love stories. Jane and Elizabeth must understand the true nature of their eventual husbands’ friendship if their marriages are to be based on honest, informed choice. Similarly, Darcy’s recognition of the enormity of the wrong he did to Jane, and of the need to seek her forgiveness, establish the primacy of both men’s marriages in their lives. Loving their wives does not prevent them from loving each other; but the integrity of their marriages demands that they respect each other’s choice of wife and acknowledge her as a partner.
Darcy and Bingley complement each other, and their sexual relationship “completes” them, in a way that marriage to women so much like themselves can’t. Darcy may enjoy marriage with an equal, but there’s an essential part of him that can’t help being a master and a mentor. Elizabeth, while she appreciates Darcy’s library and the broadening of her intellectual horizons it provides, will never submit to a master, no matter what the morality of the time demands of a wife. Bingley, however, will always be, at heart, Darcy’s “dear boy.” Bingley loves Jane for the qualities of gentle, easygoing kindness they have in common, but he also needs that direction and decisiveness that only Darcy can supply—and Darcy enjoys having someone to look after.
It’s important to note that most bisexual people who live in societies where monogamy is the norm live in monogamous relationships. That they are capable of loving a person of either sex does not mean they have a lover of each sex simultaneously or live in a ménage. My depiction of the married lives of the Darcys and the Bingleys is not meant to be representative of all “bisexual” men, but only a faithful elaboration of Austen’s happy ending for her characters. As Alan Bennett says on the DVD of his play The History Boys, viewers or readers who criticize his work because the story or its characters aren’t “typical” are missing the point. For Bennett, the raison d’être of fiction is to show us what’s not typical, something different and interesting. The arrangement at the end of Pride / Prejudice is not meant to be “typical” of anything, but only what I imagine works best for these particular characters.
Finally, I must apologize for passing off the famous description of a novel from Northanger Abbey as Elizabeth’s, and for making Henry Tilney a (former) member of the Brotherhood of Philander. In imagining a love match between two clever people, I felt certain that Elizabeth would, in her loosening of Darcy’s straitlaced character, expose him to the pleasures of “ladies’ novels,” and the speech from the other book was too perfect to pass up. It is Austen herself, as the narrator, who defines the novel in Northanger Abbey, not a particular character, and I see Elizabeth as sharing many of her creator’s opinions, which is why I also gave her George Crabbe for a favorite poet, as he was Austen’s. As for Tilney, he seems the sort of witty, sexy man who might enjoy the “conversations” at the Brotherhood. Having come this far along in vice as to be messing with Jane Austen, a little miscegenation between novels didn’t seem so bad.
Bibliography
Although, as I claimed in the acknowledgments, this book was not the result of “research,” I did refer to some works that should be cited.
Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice. 1813. For the definitive text of Austen’s masterpiece, I used the Penguin Classics edition, edited with an introduction and notes by Vivien Jones, with the original Penguin Classics introduction by Tony Tanner, c. 2003. The notes were the source for the advice from John Gregory’s 1774 conduct manual, A Father’s Legacy to His Daughters, with which Elizabeth fortifies herself on her wedding night.
The Annotated Pride and Prejudice, edited and annotated by David M. Shapard. New York: Anchor Books, 2004. This book was invaluable for its explanations of all the minutiae and nagging questions that beset even the most devoted Janeite. Without it, I would still be puzzling over how Darcy could afford to pay ten thousand pounds, an entire year’s income, to Wickham and Lydia (he probably paid closer to one thousand) and wondering what birds Darcy and Bingley were shooting at Netherfield and Pemberley (partridges, mostly).
I also found two biographies very helpful for insights into both Austen and her characters:
Jane Aiken Hodge, Only a Novel: The Double Life of Jane Austen. New York: Coward, McCann & Geoghegan, 1972.
Claire Tomalin, Jane Austen: A Life. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1998.
The quotation that Elizabeth and Darcy share at breakfast is from George Crabbe’s poem “The Newspaper.” Excerpts from the poem appeared in a New York Times article on Sunday, June 17, 2007, that claimed it was published in 1812, but all other sources I can find agree it was published in 1785, allowing plenty of time for Darcy, Mr. Bennet, and Elizabeth to have become familiar with it.
On the Web
To learn more about me and my writing, please visit my Web site: www. annherendeen.com
Readers interested in queer history will want to check out Rictor Norton’s site: www.rictornorton.co.uk
Readers curious about my views on bisexuality, the “genetics” of sexual orientation, gay men who love women, and other sensitive topics, will find them cogently expressed in some eye-opening essays on Peter Tatchell’s Web site: www.petertatchell.net
Acknowledgments
A book like Pride / Prejudice, less the result of research than the spawn of its author’s twisted imagination, owes its existence primarily to brain fuel: in this case, coffee. But two people provided essential support that must be acknowledged. My heartfelt thanks go out to Marilyn La Monica for keeping me, if not sane, which might be counterproductive, at least functional; and to my editor, Rakesh Satyal, for giving me the two things a writer can never have enough of: understanding and appreciation of her work.
About the Author
ANN HERENDEEN, a native New Yorker and lifelong resident of Brooklyn, received a B.A. in English from Princeton University and an M.L.S. from Pratt Institute. She works as a cataloging librarian specializing in natural history. Ann’s first novel, Phyllida and the Brotherhood of Philander, was published in 2008.
www.annherendeen.com
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ALSO BY ANN HERENDEEN
Phyllida and the Brotherhood of Philander
Credits
Cover design by Gregg Kulick
Cover photograph by Richard Jenkins
Copyright
This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
PRIDE/PREJUDICE. Copyright © 2010 by Ann Herendeen. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introdu
ced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.
EPub Edition © December 2009 ISBN: 978-0-06-196627-9
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