[Hitch]

Originally Posted by hildea

Absolutely. Elizabeth is flawed, but that is part of what makes her an interesting character. Jane is the most perfect person of the sisters, and the most boring



You mean, if she were a real person, not a character in a book? I'm sure you're right, and most women would have accepted a proposal in that situation. But since the book became popular at the time, I have to believe that Elizabeth's behaviour wasn't seen as outrageously unrealistic by readers then.

Yes, that's what I mean. Seriously. One of 5 sisters, with zero prospects, especially now, having burnt Mr. Collins, that repugnant toady. She doesn't yet know that Wyckham is a fiend, though, granted and he's expressed some prior interest in here, but by the time of the proposal, hasn't he already latched on to the young lady that's getting, what 15K pounds? I think so. (I freely grant that this part may occur after Elizabeth knows about him being a seducer of girls, etc.) I don't recall exactly, but she knows, one way or the other, or strongly suspects, by the time of the proposal, I believe, that Wyckham isn't going to be her future hubby.

So...yes, in a real-world scenario, arrogant or not, offended or not, I gotta think that given women's options at this time, she'd have accepted that proposal.

(In the book she definitively does decline. He proposes, she answers literally "not if you were the last man on earth", and that's that. At the time she has no reason to believe he will ever renew his proposal, and if lady Charlotte hadn't meddled, he never would have.)

Oh, yes, no doubt 'bout it. Her declination is one of the great bits in the book. (I also thought that they did a fantastic job with it in the '90's P&P with Colin Firth and Jennifer Ehle.)

Same here. (Well, I was a girl in the 70s and early 80s, but I recognize those feelings.)

Yup. When I read it, I was already starting to do my "bit" for Women's Lib. Of course, back then, we were mostly fighting for "equal pay, equal work." Honestly, that's still how I feel--if you can support yourself or you and yours, everything else is manageable. But hey, that's just me.

Originally Posted by Renate

Why is everybody who believes in reincarnation previously of an exalted stature?

I say that all the time. I mean, Princess this or Empress that. What a load of hooey. Given the odds--I mean, even in the UK, in the late 1700's-early 1800's, they had what, the Upper 10K? 10K people of "noble" status? Out of the entire population? So if you were a reincarnated Brit, wouldn't you more likely be the scullery maid, improperly accused of theft when you turn down m'lord's advances, thrown out on the street w/o a reference and thence turned to Ho'ing? I mean, come ON.

If I am a reincarnation it's a heck of a lot more likely that I was a toddler who died at three of dysentary.

Yup, or an impressed sailor who died on his first trip, or some other equally horrible life for the average person.

Hitch