I’ve seen the idea tossed around on here that Darcy and Emma Woodhouse have similar character arcs, and I’d like to expand on that idea. Every female lead from a Jane Austen novel has a male equivalent with a similar personality and plot arc in one of the other books. Don’t believe me? Read on.
Emma Woodhouse & Fitzwilliam Darcy
Both Emma and Darcy were handed all of life’s gifts on a silver platter: looks, money, brains. They were also given a ton of social responsibility at a relatively young age, and with no one to check their worst impulses, they are solely reliant on their own judgement, motivated by good intentions but sometimes screwing up royally. They both fall for the only person who is capable of calling them out on their BS. They both ruin a friend’s chance at happiness in love due to concerns about social class, only to bring the couple back together after learning the error of their ways. Occasionally they come off as haughty, and they have a tendency to say rude things that they don’t really mean without thinking, but they love their family and friends fiercely, and grow immensely as people over the course of their respective novels.
Fanny Price & Edward Ferrars
This isn’t a comparison I’ve heard outside of my own head, but there are so many parallels between these two! They’re both quiet people who have a tendency to fade into the background, overwhelmed by the more dominant personalities of their families, but containing hidden depths and a moral compass of steel. Both are faced with the prospect of marrying an exceptionally wealthy person, and are subject to huge amounts of pressure from their families, only to turn them down. At that point in the narrative, they stand no chance of ever getting to be with the person they love, and risk poverty and ostracism by turning down the rich suitor, and they do it anyway. Not out of any hope of truly finding love, mind you, but because they believe it is the right thing to do, and thus the only thing to be done.
Elizabeth Bennet & Henry Tilney
Both Lizzie and Tilney are mega-extroverts. They love nothing more than to poke fun, both at others and at themselves. They’re the life of the party, the center of attention. Not exceptionally attractive, but you’re too busy laughing to notice. They both cause family falling-outs by rejecting wealth in the hopes of gaining love, and they both have a sweetly-introverted sister who they love more than anything on the face of this planet.
Elinor Dashwood & George Knightley
These two have the same sort of energy: almost a Mom Friend. They’re intensely pragmatic, thinking realistically about finances and the other humdrum realities of life that others refuse to acknowledge. In social situations they fulfill the same part in the dynamic, smoothing over ruffled feathers and putting up with some true absurdities, always the very picture of kindness and propriety. Elinor’s reactions to Anne Steele and the other less-intelligent people she meets at Barton Park read very similarly to how Knightley handles Mrs. Elton. Knightley’s pre-romantic dynamic with Emma is similar to Elinor’s with Marianne, the same sort of exasperated fondness at their best friend who can’t control her impulses and thinks she knows everything.
Marianne Dashwood & Frederick Wentworth
Both Wentworth and Marianne have the same hot-headed force of will, which serves Wentworth so well in the Navy and Marianne so poorly in London drawing rooms. They’re both unlucky in their first loves, thinking things are reciprocated and expecting a ring when there was none forthcoming, due more to familial pressures than to lack of affection by their counterpart. The difference in their fates is due not to them, but to their love interests: Anne is the very definition of constancy and devotion, and Willoughby is... not, to say the least.
Jane Bennet & Colonel Brandon
(For the record, I know the Bingleys aren’t technically protagonists, but I’m including them anyway because I love them, and you can’t tell me not to). Both Jane and the Colonel are painfully reserved, to the point where others underestimate the true depths of their feelings, but just because it’s not obvious doesn’t mean it’s not there. Other people (Willoughby, Darcy) misinterpret this quietness, reading what they want into Jane and CB’s characters to serve their own ends. They’re loved by all in their respective social circles, and everyone in their stories supports their romantic aims, but family scandals, as well as rivals real and imagined, keep the lovers apart until the end of their respective books.
Anne Elliot & Edmund Bertram
They’re both unassuming, introverted middle children of baronets, sandwiched between frivolous, self-important older siblings who spend away the younger sibling’s inheritance, and younger sisters who will do anything for attention. They’re both portrayed by the narrative as being the only person in their family with more sense than vanity, doing their best to set their wayward relatives on better paths. Both make a decision early on regarding their love lives that seemed to be a great idea at the time, only coming back to bite them later (Edmund’s involvement with Mary despite their differing goals/values, Anne’s rejection of Wentworth). They both come to their senses at the end, getting together with the one who had been Admiring Them All Along in the background.
Catherine Morland & Charles Bingley
They’re both giant people pleasers, earnest but naïve and easily lead by others. Whether it’s Darcy telling Bingley not to propose to Jane, or Catherine taking Isabella Thorpe’s abundant bad advice, they both trust their friends wholeheartedly, which leads to some misfortune for them both. Catherine and Bingley are sometimes perceived as less intelligent, but they just lack experience. They come off as younger than their peers, falling in love easily and not worrying much about the greater world and its judgements.
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