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That was a fascinating read, thanks.
[Some spoilers for P&P]
I do argue with some of her analysis, especially with Wickham’s ability just to walk away from his gambling debts. He’d have lost his commission in any case and then what? In light of that, I can see his running away with Lydia was a move of desperation, not just sexual predation; he’d have been no worse off and there was always the possibility of being able to get some money out of Mr. Bennet. Also, marriage was the only possible way of saving the situation for Lydia. No matter how she managed the trauma as she aged, if she developed any self-awareness at all she would have realized it.
But I quibble. It was a powerful indictment of Wickham as sexual predator and as Milan points out, Austen was spot-on about the psychology two centuries before it was an identified “thing.” And the universal themes of money and power/powerlessness are endlessly interesting. Anyone who thinks it’s just the wealthy having a whinge has no understanding or empathy at all for women who could be left next to destitute.
I read an engrossing book about younger sons in the Regency and the point was made that in a typical Regency family of comfortable/moneyed means with six children, only three could expect to be as well off as their family of origin. In the winner-take-all system of inheritance, younger sons at least were given a means of subsistence/support in the army or the church, or were fitted out in law or medicine. But the daughters? I always thought that Lizzy and Jane were far too blasé about the increasingly likely ruin they faced. Did they think the Gardiners would take them in? They had children of their own to provide for. Lizzy should have been far more understanding of poor Charlotte. Speaking of whom, good for her! She saw her chance and took it. And speaking of the Gardiners and winner-take-all, a case in point. The son got an education; the daughters got bupkes.
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