People who don’t like Tom because he isn’t action based, isn’t fighting for Mary, don’t seem to get that (in the show, I’m only talking about the series, didn’t read the book and don’t plan to) Tom and Mary are each other’s mirrors. He sees himself on the outside, as she sees herself. And just as she reconciles he must be with Anne of course, not her, he does the same regarding Mary and Ryder.
The irony and the agony is that they only want each other, but their positions outside the dominant narrative keep them from seeing they have access to one another in this way.
Ryder has access to the narratives of Austen. Being someone who has enough money they don’t have to work, make a proposal on a whim and then again, can leave for Italy on a whim and be totally fine…this is a person who has access to big actions and choices and sweeping gestures and performative narrative agency.
No one is badgering Mary for not fighting for Tom while he’s locked in this agreement with Ann. But the mirror of this with Tom invites readings of action and certain kinds of legible manhood.
I fell asleep thinking about Tom and Mary when they first had dinner together, and I think this moment (specifically the moment when they learned they both read the same author no one else cares about), when they both sort of seem to glitch, they were in love there and then. I don’t think it’s the sort of love you fight for, it’s the sort that is like encountering a fantastical being and realizing you are one and the same. It’s not part of a reasonable narrative of action. It happens to some people, often those on the outside of the story. I think they both knew there and then, and the show is the story of the relief getting back to that place.
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