Valentine's Day: Jane Austen's Possibly Sarcastic Love Life; Still a Better Love Story than Becoming Jane
We hope your Valentine's Day was full all the good mythistorical aspects of romance; like slaying a dragon or refusing a demigod or undermining Spartan power. Hashtag Phineas and Ferb, Hashtag Ferb is playing Jojen Reed. Hashtag Where's Summer? And if you spent it in the fashion of Achilles or Emily Dickinson, in the epic pursuit of solitary pining, you're certainly in good company.
To make an extremely broad claim that I can't support at all, but which I, in good faith, believe to be the case (plus tvtropes says so): most writing, particularly in the coming-of-age genre and its sprawl, is autobiographical. At the very least, we tend to assume it is; this is the paradigm which George Lucas in Love, and the knock-off, Shakespeare in Love, took to an extreme. So it is safe to say that if Lindsay Ellis called Pride and Prejudice the ur modern romantic comedy, we can assume Jane Austen's own experiences with love are some of the most influential on the modern romantic tradition.
"Jackpot. Whaaaatttt!" (Lydia Bennet,The Lizzie Bennet Diaries).
Much like The North, the modern romantic tradition remembers.
The problem with Becoming Jane is that it doesn't pitch itself as being basically the same concept as George Lucas in Love, etc, in that it is a fictionalized version of Jane Austen's life and experience with the guiding premise of their being the basis for her writing. While that's true, it isn't quite as literal as Becoming Jane would have you believe (though they did take care to insert a number of quotes from her biographies and letters). Besides, who could possibly have as much bad in his "bad-boy bank" (Harmony, Angel) as FitzWilliam Darcy?
Most of what we actually know about Jane Austen has been filtered through her sister and bff, Cassandra. Just as John Adams and Thomas Jefferson had a falling out before their eventual heartwarming reconciliation (coming later on), and much like that episode of Boy Meets World where Cory and Shawn fight about potentially splitting up after high school, Jane and Cassandra eventually had a falling out. It's been suggested that this is why Cassandra burnt or censored a great deal of their correspondence. Of course, it could just be that, as sisters, they had things they wanted to keep between them. Since it happened after their reconciliation and Jane's death, and since novels of the time depict sisters burning one another's letters in mourning, this latter idea seems a bit more parsimonious. Either way, the upshot is that Jane Austen's first biography "A Memoir of Janes Austen" was written by her nephew, James Edward Austen-Leigh (son of her oldest brother, James Austen) "in the spirit of censorship as well a communication" (Austen-Leigh, 1871, "A Memoir of Jane Austen", xxi).
"If Cassandra's head had been going to be cut off, Jane would insist on having hers cut off too" (Austen-Leigh, 1871, "A Memoir of Jane Austen", ch. 1). Jane also grew up a fangirl of Mary Queen of Scots, whose romanticized life was to her what arguing about Harry/Ginny vrs. Harry/Draco ships on schnoogle was in 2004. She referred to her has a "bewitching princess," (ibid) and to King Charles Stuart I, the decapitated loser of the English Civil Wars (sometimes called the martyr king) as "amiable monarch." (ibid). It is worth noting that "amiable" at the time, and in Jane Austen's own parlance, meant, essentially, attractive by dint of good manners, wit and breeding, for example, it is the primary adjective attached to George Wickham, as in "A young man, too, like you, whose very countenance may vouch for your being amiable" (Elizabeth Bennet, Pride and Prejudice, ch. 16) or "it was not in her nature to question the veracity of a young man of such amiable appearance as Wickham" (Pride and Prejudice, ch. 17).
Jane Austen drawn by Cassandra Austen
Most of Jane Austen's books involve a young woman of modest status among the landed gentry falling in love with someone and having to overcome an obstacle or misunderstanding, often involving one or both parties in fact being in love with other people, before successfully winning her man. Usually you can tell who is good and who is bad by virtue of how snarky they are, or at least, who we are supposed to like and dislike. Two of her heroines (Elizabeth Bennet and Emma Woodhouse) have been modernized (as Lizzie Bennet and Cher Horowitz), in the Lizzie Bennet Diaries and Clueless (respectively), and the same pair and others are echoed throughout the genre, in Angela Chase and Daria, Newland Archer and Edward Cullen.
Jane Bennet's despair over (spoiler alert) Bingley's departure was probably inspired by the inability of Cassandra's love interest, a young clergyman, to afford to marry her immediately, and who died before he could earn his fortune. This event affected both Austen sisters profoundly (memoir of Jane Austen). Jane's first biographer, her nephew, glosses over the Tom Lefroy story, giving it the quality of forbiddenness which sells so well. Instead he protests that "in no circumstance of her life was there any similarity between herself and her heroine in 'Mansfield Park.' She did not indeed pass through life without being the object of warm affection." (Austen-Leigh, 1871, "A Memoir of Jane Austen"ch. 1)
He goes on to refer in glowing terms to an otherwise deserving young man who lacked only "the subtle power of touching her heart" (ibid). Here he is probably referring to the brother of one of her best friends, whose proposal she rejected after a day of consideration (probably the model for Mr. Collins; he was a plain-looking childhood acquaintance whose hand would be very practical, but not particularly inspiring) (Nokes, 1997, "Jane Austen: A Life"). James Edward Austen-Leigh alludes to a brief love, which Cassandra would speak of after Jane's death, but what he describes is a brief encounter "at some seaside place" with a "gentleman whose charm of person, mind, and manners was such that Cassandra thought him worthy to possess and likely to win her sister's love" (Austen-Leigh, 1871, "A Memoir of Jane Austen" ch 1) but there is no indication that Jane had yet begun to return this potential suitor's affections.
This dude has recently been suggested to be the Reverend Samuel Blackall (Norman, 2009, "Jane Austen: An Unrequited Love"), who, in all fairness, has a pretty cool name. However, the only mentions we know Jane ever to have made of him explicitly state that she had no feelings for him and anticipated that their "indifference will become mutual" with separation. Later she mentions him again, casually, when he becomes married. She seems to regard him with slightly sarcastic affection, wishing him a wife "of a silent turn and rather ignorant, but naturally intelligent and wishing to learn, fond of cold veal pies, green tea in the afternoon, and a green window blind at night" (Sailor Brothers). Whether this sarcastic affection is sufficient to indicate frustrated love or merely snarky condescension (either would be prominent within Miss Austen's emotional toolkit) is up to the reader to decide: Dr. Andrew Norman proposes the theory that this love (which, by the way, took place after Pride and Prejudice was written and published) was her great one, using only the three letters we have, quoted in parts above, as evidence. Other critics have disagreed (Parrill, 2009, "An Imaginary Romance: Book Review: Jane Austen: an Unrequited Love").
Quoted below is at least the overwhelming majority of we know Jane said about him, so you can decide for yourself:
Of seeing Blackall say: " I am very sorry to hear of Mrs. Austen's illness. It would give me particular pleasure to have an opportunity of improving my acquaintance with that family-with a hope of creating to myself a nearer interest. But at present I cannot indulge any expectation of it."
Jane writes: "This is rational enough; there is less love and more sense in it than sometimes appeared before, and I am very well satisfied. It will all go on exceedingly well, and decline away in a very reasonable manner. There seems no likelihood of his coming into Hampshire this Christmas, and it is therefore most probable that our indifference will soon be mutual, unless his regard, which appeared to spring from knowing nothing of me at first, is best supported by never seeing me" (Saturday, November 17, 1798, to Cassandra). The same letter goes on to say: "I have had some ragout veal, and I mean to have some haricot mutton to-morrow. We are to kill a pig soon. There is to be a ball at Basingstoke next Thursday" (ibid) It doesn't have the ring of deprived love.
Years later, she wrote her brother:
"I wonder whether you happened to see Mr. Blackall's marriage in the papers last January. We did. He was married at Clifton to a Miss Lewis, whose father had been late of Antigua. I should very much like to know what sort of a woman she is. He was a piece of perfection--noisy perfection--himself, which I always recollect with regard. We had noticed a few months before his succeeding to a College living, the very living which we recollected his talking of, and wishing for; an exceeding good one, Great Cadbury in Somersetshire. I could wish Miss Lewis to be of a silent turn and..." (as above) (Chawton, July 3rd, 1813, to Frank Austen)
Before she received her only known proposal (from Harris Bigg-Wither), as a recent debutante of twenty years, she met Tom Lefroy. The basic biography in Becoming Jane was right; he was a hotshot young lawyer looking to make his name and fortune in Ireland under the patronage of a rather controlling uncle (Nokes, 1997, "Jane Austen: A Life").
*I couldn't find any early illustrations that were quite as broody/smouldery as this one. So sue me. Except please don't, because I don't own this image or any other in this post.
They met at what she described as "an exceeding good ball" (Steventon, Saturday, January 9th, Letter to Cassandra).
To Cassandra, she writes:
"You scold me so much in the nice long letter which I have this moment received from you, that I am almost afraid to tell you how my Irish friend and I behaved. Imagine to yourself everything most profligate and shocking in the way of dancing and sitting down together. I can expose myself however, only once more, because he leaves the country soon after next Friday, on which day we are to have a dance at Ashe after all. He is a very gentlemanlike, good-looking, pleasant young man, I assure you. But as to our having ever met, except at the three last balls, I cannot say much; for he is so excessively laughed at about me at Ashe, that he is ashamed of coming to Steventon, and ran away when we called on Mrs. Lefroy a few days ago" (ibid).
In her affectionate but obscure way, she says of Tom: "he has but one fault, which time will, I trust, entirely remove -- it is that his morning coat is a great deal too light. He is a very great admirer of Tom Jones, and therefore wears the same coloured clothes, I imagine, which he did when he was wounded" (ibid). By time, did she mean, her own machinations? She references it again in her letter of Jan. 16th, as a kind of affectionate running gag.
With Cassandra she feigns indignation at the idea that her correspondence with Tom was not regular: "How impertinent you are to write to me about Tom, as if I had not opportunities of hearing from him myself! The last letter that I received from him was dated on Friday, 8th..." (Steventon: Thursday, January 16th, Jane Austen to Cassandra).
Again, either cynically or sarcastically: "I mean to confine myself in future to Mr. Tom Lefroy, for whom I don't care sixpence," and "At length the day is come on which I am to flirt my last with Tom Lefroy, and when you receive this it will be over. My tears flow as I write at the melancholy idea. Wm. Chute called here yesterday. I wonder what he means by being so civil. There is a report that Tom is going to be married to a Lichfield lass."
Did he make his move? All we know is that he was kept away by the intervention of his disapproving family, and left very abruptly. If Jane ever expected or received a proposal of marriage from him, or a hint of one, it must be interpreted from the following:
"I look forward with great impatience to [a party], as I rather expect to receive an offer from my friend in the course of the evening. I shall refuse him, however, unless he promises to give away his white coat" (ibid). She really did hate that coat.
The other pieces of information we have come from Jane's consultations to her niece, Fanny Knight, who might be considered a protege, at least in terms of romance. None make specific references to Jane's own love life, but she does drop such hints as:
"Oh, dear Fanny! your mistake has been one that thousands of women fall into. He was the first young man who attached himself to you. That was the charm, and most powerful it is. Among the multitudes, however, that make the same mistake with yourself, there can be few indeed who have so little reason to regret it; his character and his attachment leave you nothing to be ashamed of.
Upon the whole, what is to be done? [words omitted in Brabourne edition: "You certainly have encouraged him to such a point as to make him feel almost secure of you"] You have no inclination for any other person. His situation in life, family, friends, and, above all, his character, his uncommonly amiable mind, strict principles, just notions, good habits, all that you know so well how to value, all that is really of the first importance, everything of this nature pleads his cause most strongly. You have no doubt of his having superior abilities, he has proved it at the University; he is, I dare say, such a scholar as your agreeable, idle brothers would ill bear a comparison with.
Oh, my dear Fanny! the more I write about him, the warmer my feelings become -- the more strongly I feel the sterling worth of such a young man and the desirableness of your growing in love with him again. I recommend this most thoroughly. There are such beings in the world, perhaps one in a thousand, as the creature you and I should think perfection, where grace and spirit are united to worth, where the manners are equal to the heart and understanding, but such a person may not come in your way, or, if he does, he may not be the eldest son of a man of fortune, the near relation of your particular friend and belonging to your own county."
Jane Austen to Fanny Knight, Chawton: Friday (Nov. 18, 1814)
Tom probably would have been Jane's first love, for what it's worth, so maybe that is the experience she's drawing from in this advice.
Part of the trouble here is that we are getting all the information filtered through the real love of Jane's life, Cassandra (though not in the way the Supernatural fangirls would think), who would have had a vested interest in keeping Jane's image pristine. The sisters must've had many inside jokes and secrets: here's the beginning of one of Jane's replies to a letter her sister wrote:
The letter which I have this moment received from you this moment has diverted me beyond moderation. I could die of laughter at it, as they used to say at school. You are indeed the finest comic writer of the present age."
Jane Austen to Cassandra Austen, "Thursday, Sept. 1st, 1796"
It's not hard to imagine she would control the full picture.
So maybe the real lesson we can learn from the parallels between Jane Austen's life and works is that if you spend too much time being bitingly witty, nobody will know how you feel.
By the way, Then-Prince George (King George IV) was a fan of her novels, and arranged to meet her (and to have Emma dedicated to him, despite her personal distaste for Prinny, who, along with his boi Beau Brummel, would have been a good example of the sort of villain that pops up in her work).
