The Other Austen

ohzmat:

Writing a paper about buying slaves, oh I mean, a paper about marriage in the 19th century. Sorry, I often can’t differentiate between the two. My bad.

ooo a lil sassy Fanny Price action

sewonandsewforth:

theotherausten:

bellenomdeplume:

theotherausten:

ravengoodwoman:

becoming-estel:

Unless you like being reminded of your inferiority and your family’s lack of manners, I fail to see how this terribly vain, prideful and utter disaster of a line would be deemed the “Best romantic line. Ever.” This is insulting to Jane Austen. She never intended for it to be a romantic dialogue. The dialogue was portrayed to show a weakness of character, the sheer hypocrisy of vanity and pride, and the need to keep one’s self in check. It’s not romantic to be told that a person struggled not to fall in love with you because you were never enough for them, because everything was wrong when it comes to you. “In vain I have struggled” would not constitute as a romantic line to me. However, if you must make Pride and Prejudice all about romance (which, to me, is not the first nor the second thing that P&P is about), then this is my opinion of what the “Best romantic line(s). Ever.” would be from the entire book:

”You are too generous to trifle with me. If your feelings are still what they were last April, tell me so at once. My affections and wishes are unchanged, but one word from you will silence me on this subject for ever.”

Okay, it’s actually three lines. I just had to include the last one because it sincerely shows how much he has grown from the pride imbecile that he was when he proposed the first time.

Lastly, “Best romantic line. Ever.” was put in bold in my rant because that quote has three lines, not one.

I will never stop trolling on people who are hell-bent on skewing Jane Austen’s well thought out plot motives into a silly romantic notion.

 Thank you.

I can’t help but to laugh when I keep on seeing that quote everywhere. Like it’s the best thing Jane Austen ever wrote.

brilliant girls!

 I do realize that this book is not only about love and I fully respect Jane and her humor and seriousness about gentry life, status, and life in general. But many people love and admire these stories for their romantic quality, including me. I do not underatand why people try to kill all the romance that is in these stories. Yes most of the confession is quite rude however, he does say “how ardently I admire and love you.” And that is fucking romantic. Enjoy a romanticless life ladies. You can all shake your angry fists at those who enjoy the romance but you won’t destory the feelings that these novels bring to people. Besides, you didn’t actually know Jane…She could have been a hopeless romantic. Why is there romance in these novels if she wasn’t? Why else would she turn down a marriage proposal from a well off man? BECAUSE SHE DIDN’T LOVE HIM. Okay, I’m done.

Of course, you’re right in that none of us knew Jane Austen. But our not knowing her is irrelevant when discussing her novels. We can certainly look at ‘facts’ about her life and the letters she left behind, but we’ll really be no closer to knowing who she was or what she intended in her writing. All we can do is interpret the novels and critique reader responses the best we can, and that’s precisely what these two women were doing above.

I love these novels wholly and completely, even and especially the romantic bits. My ‘beef’ lies with those who oversimplify the romances, plots, characters and most importantly, the biting wit and satire (of gender roles, politics, family, marriage, heterosexual courtship). There is a place for the silly ‘I love Darcy’ or ‘I hate Caroline Bingley’ admittances and that place is definitely tumblr, especially on Austen Confessions.

But my job on The Other Austen is to provide an alternative to that, where Janeites (even the ones who submit to Austen Confessions—I have!) can be critical of our dear little subculture. In particular, we can critique this new ‘Jane’ created by the 2005 adaptation of Pride and Prejudice (the one of giggling beneath the sheets, and holding hands, and proposing in the rain), perhaps in a way that we think Jane critiqued the sentimentality and hyper-sensibility of her day. Here is our safe space where no topic is safe.

And honestly now, I just made a photoset of our heroines and heroes NECKING. I’m not so fastidious as all that. :)

I agree with all of these to some extent. Did Jane Austen write these as romance novels? No, they’re satire. Do they have romance IN them? Certainly.

But one thing I will always disagree with is why Elizabeth flips her shit at Darcy when he tells her that he’s tried not to love her. 

What he’s saying this that, despite society’s views on the subject (because realistically, and it’s an especially big deal for the period, she IS far inferior to him- why should that be insulting if it’s a simple fact?), despite what his family would think, he still loves her enough to be proposing to her. “In vain I have struggled, it will not do,” means that despite all this, he loves her no matter what. You can’t tell me if you fell in love with someone inconvenient that you wouldn’t stand back for a second and say, “Oh shit, oh no, I have to fight this, it can only end badly.” If you fell in love with say, Hitler (knowing what you know now), would you be like “oh, fucking yippee!” No. So in a society where it would have been utterly unheard of for a man like Darcy to bend so low as to marry a woman of little to no acceptable society from a family so ill of reputation, his thoughts are not only perfectly justified, but I think also VERY romantic. 

And let me tell you, if the man I love came up to me and said “I tried not to love you, I did- I knew society would be against it, my family is against it, and it will be hard for us, but I don’t care, I still love you. Please let me tell you that, let me tell you how much I admire you as an individual, as a peer, and love you as a woman,” I’d fucking die. It wouldn’t be an insult- it would be the truth. In fact, if he ever did, that’s probably exactly along the lines of what he WOULD say. 

I think that scene is as much meant to show LIZZIE’S pride as Darcy’s. That she wouldn’t be able to put herself in his shoes and understand that. I get her being upset about his keeping Jane and Bingley apart, but to accuse him of what she did where regards his sentiments regarding her situation in life is just being prideful herself, not being able to see past her prejudices against him like he was able to put aside his for her. 

We always think of Darcy as being the dick the whole time, but if you look at the situation, he was able to put aside his ‘pride and prejudice’ before she was. 

/Rant.

^amazing

bellenomdeplume:

theotherausten:

ravengoodwoman:

becoming-estel:

Unless you like being reminded of your inferiority and your family’s lack of manners, I fail to see how this terribly vain, prideful and utter disaster of a line would be deemed the “Best romantic line. Ever.” This is insulting to Jane Austen. She never intended for it to be a romantic dialogue. The dialogue was portrayed to show a weakness of character, the sheer hypocrisy of vanity and pride, and the need to keep one’s self in check. It’s not romantic to be told that a person struggled not to fall in love with you because you were never enough for them, because everything was wrong when it comes to you. “In vain I have struggled” would not constitute as a romantic line to me. However, if you must make Pride and Prejudice all about romance (which, to me, is not the first nor the second thing that P&P is about), then this is my opinion of what the “Best romantic line(s). Ever.” would be from the entire book:

”You are too generous to trifle with me. If your feelings are still what they were last April, tell me so at once. My affections and wishes are unchanged, but one word from you will silence me on this subject for ever.”

Okay, it’s actually three lines. I just had to include the last one because it sincerely shows how much he has grown from the pride imbecile that he was when he proposed the first time.

Lastly, “Best romantic line. Ever.” was put in bold in my rant because that quote has three lines, not one.

I will never stop trolling on people who are hell-bent on skewing Jane Austen’s well thought out plot motives into a silly romantic notion.

 Thank you.

I can’t help but to laugh when I keep on seeing that quote everywhere. Like it’s the best thing Jane Austen ever wrote.

brilliant girls!

 I do realize that this book is not only about love and I fully respect Jane and her humor and seriousness about gentry life, status, and life in general. But many people love and admire these stories for their romantic quality, including me. I do not underatand why people try to kill all the romance that is in these stories. Yes most of the confession is quite rude however, he does say “how ardently I admire and love you.” And that is fucking romantic. Enjoy a romanticless life ladies. You can all shake your angry fists at those who enjoy the romance but you won’t destory the feelings that these novels bring to people. Besides, you didn’t actually know Jane…She could have been a hopeless romantic. Why is there romance in these novels if she wasn’t? Why else would she turn down a marriage proposal from a well off man? BECAUSE SHE DIDN’T LOVE HIM. Okay, I’m done.

Of course, you’re right in that none of us knew Jane Austen. But our not knowing her is irrelevant when discussing her novels. We can certainly look at ‘facts’ about her life and the letters she left behind, but we’ll really be no closer to knowing who she was or what she intended in her writing. All we can do is interpret the novels and critique reader responses the best we can, and that’s precisely what these two women were doing above.

I love these novels wholly and completely, even and especially the romantic bits. My ‘beef’ lies with those who oversimplify the romances, plots, characters and most importantly, the biting wit and satire (of gender roles, politics, family, marriage, heterosexual courtship). There is a place for the silly ‘I love Darcy’ or ‘I hate Caroline Bingley’ admittances and that place is definitely tumblr, especially on Austen Confessions.

But my job on The Other Austen is to provide an alternative to that, where Janeites (even the ones who submit to Austen Confessions—I have!) can be critical of our dear little subculture. In particular, we can critique this new ‘Jane’ created by the 2005 adaptation of Pride and Prejudice (the one of giggling beneath the sheets, and holding hands, and proposing in the rain), perhaps in a way that we think Jane critiqued the sentimentality and hyper-sensibility of her day. Here is our safe space where no topic is safe.

And honestly now, I just made a photoset of our heroines and heroes NECKING. I’m not so fastidious as all that. :)

ravengoodwoman:

becoming-estel:

Unless you like being reminded of your inferiority and your family’s lack of manners, I fail to see how this terribly vain, prideful and utter disaster of a line would be deemed the “Best romantic line. Ever.” This is insulting to Jane Austen. She never intended for it to be a romantic dialogue. The dialogue was portrayed to show a weakness of character, the sheer hypocrisy of vanity and pride, and the need to keep one’s self in check. It’s not romantic to be told that a person struggled not to fall in love with you because you were never enough for them, because everything was wrong when it comes to you. “In vain I have struggled” would not constitute as a romantic line to me. However, if you must make Pride and Prejudice all about romance (which, to me, is not the first nor the second thing that P&P is about), then this is my opinion of what the “Best romantic line(s). Ever.” would be from the entire book:

”You are too generous to trifle with me. If your feelings are still what they were last April, tell me so at once. My affections and wishes are unchanged, but one word from you will silence me on this subject for ever.”

Okay, it’s actually three lines. I just had to include the last one because it sincerely shows how much he has grown from the pride imbecile that he was when he proposed the first time.

Lastly, “Best romantic line. Ever.” was put in bold in my rant because that quote has three lines, not one.

I will never stop trolling on people who are hell-bent on skewing Jane Austen’s well thought out plot motives into a silly romantic notion.

 Thank you.

I can’t help but to laugh when I keep on seeing that quote everywhere. Like it’s the best thing Jane Austen ever wrote.

brilliant girls!