An adaption of Mr Darcy and Elizabeth Bennett’s first meeting in Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice
Mr Bingley: Once again I am blown away by the wonderous joys that life can bestow when one revels in good company! Every young lady and noble man I have met this evening has surpassed my wildest expectations in beauty, good humour and learning! I must control the urge to let excitement overtake my refined demeanour, yet dancing remains a superb outlet to express such passionate good mood! If only Darcy could experience the same highs as I do in company such as this, or indeed in any company. He seems content to live his life as
Mrs Bennet: the proudest, most disagreeable man in the world! Lurking like a phantom on the fringes of the hall, eyeing everyone with poorly masked disdain. A gentleman indeed! He certainly has nothing in the way of looks. Not like that charming Mr Bingley. Rich, well-bred and as handsome as can be ever imagined! He is the stark opposite of Mr Darcy, whom I despised the moment I set eyes on him! As for Mr Darcy’s rumoured wealth, well, let’s just say I have heard mutterings from numerous reputable sources that denounce such claims as outrageous and unfounded drivel! Still, even if the man were as moneyed as the King, I would not have him consorting with my beautiful Jane, or Elizabeth, or even Mary! Wealth and aristocratic airs don’t impress me! Lord knows even lumpy Mr Lucas would be better suited for my girls than that miserable man! Look how Lizzy sits there with no offer of dance from Mr Darcy. The poor girl is abandoned in cruel isolation, putting on a brave smile to mask her
Elizabeth Bennet: giddy happiness and joy! It’s delightful to see Jane with such a look on her face! Mr Bingley lights up something in her eyes, and she in his. It is to be expected: my sister is the handsomest woman of all amongst these rich and noble guests. It must be an affront to their status; a middle-class Hertfordshire girl besting all their pampered daughters for the affections of Mr Bingley, a gentleman to his very bones. The expression on the faces of Mr and Mrs King as Bingley stole Jane for a second dance makes me wish to break down in laughter! Though I’ll wager any such egregious breach of social convention as that would scandalise my company and be mercilessly punished by mother! So, I am compelled to control myself and laugh only within, which I have become very proficient in over the years.
If the high and mighty of the English upper class do not wish to be the subject of ridicule, then why do they live their lives in such an amusing fashion? I have seen poorer shows of comedy at paid venues than I have here for free right in front of me! Mr Darcy is the main comic attraction of the evening. Stony–faced, uncompromising and unfunny in every aspect, which is ironically the exact trait that makes him such a killer jape! All style and pretence with no true substance, simultaneously the most moneyed man in the room and the one most undeserving of it. He is but a walking cliché of a rich man, the kind that the poor parody, that the rich bitterly compete with, the kind of man disliked by Prince and pauper alike. Is there but a true friend in the world for that sallow Mr Darcy?
Oh… This joke has somehow made me sad. Bah! It should affect me not. I mustn’t let sympathy cloud my memory of his black nature, which was revealed in his most gentlemanly description of me as “merely tolerable”. When I was in ear shot, no less!
Perhaps I wish him to be more underneath… perhaps the virtuous and innocent side of my character is warping my estimation of him… but I saw a spark in Darcy’s eyes when he glanced at me, just for a moment. No, don’t be foolish, Lizzy! I know what he thinks of me! I heard his slight, and it affects me not. I am projecting life onto a dead thing, heart and humanity onto a grimacing statue. He can be nothing more than what he is now, which is a
Mr Darcy: blundering fool with an obsession for castrating his dignity through the medium of crude dance, with undeserving and plain young women of meagre social standing. I call Mr Bingley a friend at my own peril, and it is a shame that his potential to be a formidable gentleman is betrayed by such bouts of foolish flailing as he has displayed throughout the evening. Of course, he is popular in an environment such as this, just as a fool is popular amongst children. I will never understand how a man of such good consequence and breeding as Mr Bingley can happily engage in such activities without the slightest regard for the status of his cohorts. Such actions in mediocre company do not befit a gentleman of the aristocracy.
It seems Hertfordshire has very little to offer in the way of good company. Earlier in the night, Mr Bingley directed me to a Ms Elizabeth Bennet, in hopes that her beauty might distract me from the rest of her tiresome brood. It is of no consequence whether I do or do not think favourably of Miss Bennet. It is in the nature of this rigid (and rightfully so) class system under which we prosper. I have often wondered how the middle and lower classes consolidate their own self-worth with the knowledge that they, and all the people they are affiliated with, are defined by their society solely on the basis of their mediocrity. And yet, regardless of this, there are numerous examples in this party alone of those of lower standing acting as if they were as entitled to all the worldly offerings as befits the Royal Family itself! I confess that such braying, strong, colloquial personalities such as these causes me some degree of angst and dismay. I myself could only imagine being a meek and grateful servant in the same situation as they.
As for Miss Elizabeth I see nothing distinguishing in way of her beauty, and she is considerably outshined by her sister in this regard. This is not to say she doesn’t have other virtues of course: I took note of the lady’s smile when entering the room. And her eyes, it cannot be denied, have a certain degree of humour and warmth to them. Her humour is not restricted to her eyes of course: she seems quite content to laugh with the other guests openly, though only at times where it is properly appropriate to do so. It is clear that Elizabeth has a joyful disposition, tempered by a good sense that I cannot imagine she learned from her appalling mother. Such behaviours raise Ms Bennet in my approximation. First impressions can after all be misleading. However, it matters not. I am forever condemned a brute in her eyes after my slight. It was a thoughtless miscalculation I admit, though one born as much from cowardice as from hubris.
I do not blame Ms Elizabeth for harbouring ill feeling. However, were I to respond, I would implore that she recognises that she herself is not a perfect creation. I, in my estate with my wealth and status, am perhaps equally as flawed as that polished young lady. I with my pride, and she with her prejudice, so embedded are they in our beings, made our controversy tonight an inevitable consequence of two forces destined to clash. And yet our faults and virtues, so firmly opposed, have somehow bred an attraction within me towards her, an inexplicable link transcending status and reason. I am drawn, it seems, to her orbit. The extent of this connection (which, I admit may only be a passing fancy) is such that the only critical words that have impacted upon me this evening have been hers. Could it be possible such a bond be formed so instantaneously? This is a passion I have not felt before… indeed for many long years I have felt very little at all.
It is an odd thing to be riddled and tricked by one’s own heart. The notion that all the nonsense of life, the agonies of labour and the petty quarrels of possession, can be burned away by the dizzying highs of romance is a frivolous one. Whichever sham poet first laid the notion that love is the great simplifier in life should be stripped of acclaim and denounced as a fool.
And yet… perhaps such a sentiment has some nobility to it too. Love, it shouldn’t be forgotten, is rarely a rational endeavour, and obeys no time-scale but that of its own. Perhaps behind the fanciful drivel of the hopeless romantic lie certain fundamental mysteries which we are still yet to understand? Like how the right woman’s eyes can level the most powerful of men, or how the faint promise of love can make even a mighty civilisation seem like a hollow joke.
I wish it was in me to find such a joke funny. Perhaps Elizabeth would get some joy out of it? If only it were something that could be properly expressed. I have the curious sense that she would somehow understand, however. And in her understanding, maybe her eyes would once again light up with laughter? Would they smile, and laugh, and dance the Waltz of joy, even with me scowling under their bright, bright gaze?