Pride & Prejudice Part 2 - Jane Austen - Classic Literature

Volume 2 of Pride and Prejudice delivers the most talked-about proposal in English literature and Darcy somehow manages to insult the woman he's proposing to while doing it. In this episode of Side Quest Book Club, Shiara, Slava, and Jonathan break down Charlotte's calculated decision to marry Mr. Collins, Jane's disappointing trip to London, Darcy's awkward courtship strategy, and the moment Elizabeth finally learns the full truth about Wickham.

Plus: a hot take on Bridgerton that may cost us some subscribers.

Next week we will finish the book with a special guest.

Subscribe so you don't miss it.

0:00 Intro & Volume 2 Overview
2:52 Regency Marriage Markets: Age, Heirs & Power
9:26 "Being Out" in Society Explained
13:19 Boys vs. Girls: A Different Coming-of-Age
18:08 Jane in London: A Friendship Revealed as Fake
18:23 Rosings Park: Darcy's Awkward Courtship
25:52 Marrying for Love Was Radical
30:25 Darcy Proposes And Gets Rejected
39:10 Darcy's Letter, Wickham's Truth & The Road to Pemberley

ABOUT THE BOOK
When Elizabeth Bennet first meets eligible bachelor Fitzwilliam Darcy, she thinks him arrogant and conceited; he is indifferent to her good looks and lively mind. When she later discovers that Darcy has involved himself in the troubled relationship between his friend Bingley and her beloved sister Jane, she is determined to dislike him more than ever. In the sparkling comedy of manners that follows, Jane Austen shows us the folly of judging by first impressions. She superbly evokes the friendships, gossip, and snobberies of provincial middle-class life. This Penguin Classics edition, based on Austen's first edition, contains the original Penguin Classics introduction by Tony Tanner and an updated introduction and notes by Viven Jones.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jane Austen was born in 1775 in the small Hampshire village of Steventon, where her father was a Church of England clergyman. The household was large, creative, and deeply literary. This childhood shaped everything she would become as a writer. She began writing seriously as a teenager and spent the following decades crafting some of the most beloved novels in English, publishing them anonymously, identified only as "A Lady."

She accepted a marriage proposal once but changed her mind the following day. She never married. In 1809, she settled into a cottage in Chawton, Hampshire — offered by her brother Edward — where she spent her most productive years, writing, revising, and publishing all six of her major novels. 

In 1817, she fell ill, moved to Winchester to be closer to her doctor, and died on July 18 of that year at just 41 years old. The world didn't learn her name until after she was gone. Today, she is considered one of the most famous and influential writers in English literature, celebrated for her elegant style, dry humor, and timeless explorations of love, reputation, and what it meant to be a woman with a mind of her own. 

More info here:  https://janeaustens.house/jane-austen/jane-austen-a-life/

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Reading is the ultimate side quest. Side Quest is a casual book club podcast full of literary adventures. Join Slava and Jonathan as they discuss the books they are reading, life, history, belief systems, and more. Explore world-building, characters, and story development, and share some laughs along the way.

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What is The Side Quest Book Club Podcast?

If you’re a reader looking for something deeper or an indie author working on your book, The Side Quest Book Club is for you. We skip the usual book reviews and ratings. Each episode turns fun side quests into real lessons, so you’ll leave not just entertained, but with a better understanding of why storytelling matters.

(0:00 - 0:08)
If I had a dollar every time someone fell in love, but didn't do anything about it, I'd be a rich man. Are you talking about yourself? Yes. Wait, no.

(0:08 - 0:39)
Before me, of course. You'd have one gold coin. Welcome back to the SideQuest Book Club podcast.

I'm Chiara, and today we'll be diving into volume two of Pride and Prejudice. This section gives us questionable marriage choices, London disappointments, awkward encounters with Mr. Darcy, and one of the most memorable proposals in all of literature. Let's get into it.

(0:39 - 0:57)
He proposes at the end? Are you kidding me? Are you joking? You're joking. What book have I been reading? What are you reading? What was that, Pride and Prejudice, zombies edition? Justin. Justin.

Why did I call you Justin? Oh my gosh. Justin. Is that your power move? All right, calm down here, Justin.

(0:57 - 1:19)
Justin, if the Jane and Jane the Cut Mother of Pearl- If the Jane Eyre isn't locked in the attic- If the Pride and Prejudice version that you're reading has Darcy bare-chested and a stallion behind him, you're reading the wrong freaking book, brother. The wrong version. I've wondered when the women were going to come into the book.

(1:20 - 1:35)
That's not what I meant by stallion, but okay. So let's get into where we ended last episode. We're starting volume two.

(1:36 - 1:56)
The most significant event starting volume two is Charlotte accepts Mr. Collins. So Mr. Collins has made a proposal to Lizzie. Lizzie absolutely rejects him because he's a pretentious, and so she says no.

(1:56 - 2:27)
No. Why not? It's a no for me, darling. Charlotte, her very, very good friend who lives in the neighborhood, decides to take this opportunity to get herself a man, okay? Is it bad, Charlotte? Yeah, because she is- I don't remember if they tell us how old she is, but we know that she's already a spinster.

She's in her mid to late 20s, which is considered a spinster, and she's got no money. Yeah, basically. And she's got no prospects.

(2:27 - 3:48)
And the clergy's settling like they do. She doesn't have a ton of money. She's not very good looking.

We find this out at some point in the book. I think Mrs. Bennett points this out. Poor Charlotte, she's not even really pretty.

Anyway, so- What does it say about Leah Slava in the Bible? She had weak eyes? What does that mean? If I may interject here, and I understand that in this time period, you wanted to get them early because of the childbearing thing, right? But maybe I'm overthinking this, but let's say you marry a woman at 19, and you're Darcy or a Darcy-esque guy. So you marry somebody at 19, versus somebody at 22. Besides the obvious stuff, which in itself is ridiculous, what the hell's the difference? And by obvious stuff, I mean, okay, childbearing years- Shortened lifespan? They didn't live that short back then.

It wasn't like they died at 30. This is not the prehistoric era. I can't pronounce worse today.

(3:50 - 5:10)
That's right. This is not the prehistoric era. T-Rex just comes down.

I think we got a new version of Pride and Prejudice. So culturally, let me rephrase the question more succinctly. Culturally, what the hell's the difference? Fine, so at 22, she's already three years into giving him kids or not giving him kids.

At 22, she's already older than the other people in the pool of women. But no, that's practically what they considered scientifically. But culturally, the culture, tradition dictates that you should marry before, let's just say 22, because Lizzie at 21 is an old Spencer apparently.

Any insight into what the cultural tradition behind that is besides just stuff that I called obvious? Yeah, the childbearing aspect. Yeah, having as many children. So if you had money, you wanted an heir to your estate.

And back then, it had to be a boy. So you wanted as many opportunities to have as many boys as possible so that your eldest was a boy, which sometimes didn't happen. So that you don't have a Mr. Collins aspect where you're getting kicked out.

(5:10 - 5:24)
You don't have a Mr. Collins situation where now none of the girls can inherit, so it gets passed down to whoever the nearest man is. That does answer my question. I was trying to dig for more, but I think that that is it.

(5:25 - 7:19)
At the end of the day, it was that. I think that there are other aspects that go beyond just childbearing. I think that the whole idea of like the influence that a husband has over their wife and getting them at a young age means that you have more influence because they're malleable at a younger age.

There it is. Because men, it's not like these guys weren't like 22 getting married. Mr. Darcy, we actually don't really know his age, but we can assume based on his wealth and the kind of life that he lives that he's probably at least eight or more years older than her.

He's probably in his 30s, and she is in her early 20s. She's only 21. We find that out in Volume 2 when she's at Lady Catherine de Bourgh's house and she's like, hey, how old are you? She's like, well, you wouldn't believe me if I told you that I'm only 21 years old.

Lady de Bourgh is just shocked that she's so young and so opinionated. I think that that's also one of the reasons why Darcy likes her so much. Darcy, he's got to be in late 20s, early to mid 30s.

There's at least a 10 year age difference. Guys can impregnate women for as long as they're alive and able, but women can't bear children for very long. Not to mention that women, that people, there were the issues of the mortality rate of women when they were giving birth and then becoming sick.

(7:20 - 8:13)
Jane Austen herself succumbs to this. We don't actually know what she died from, but they assume that some sort of cancer and she died at like, I don't know, 41 or something, relatively young. It's not uncommon for the time.

I think that plays a part in that. Women were like, what do you call that? An arm piece. You wanted the trophy wife, the young and beautiful wife.

Eye candy. Eye candy. Eye candy.

I think that that was part of the allure as well. Back then it was called visual confections. For a second, I was like, really? I don't remember anything about this and any of my Jane Austen analysis stuff.

(8:15 - 8:43)
Carry on. Yeah. But yeah, it's kind of gross.

It's kind of gross, right? It's like, definitely it's pervy. It's pervy, but that's how it was. That's how it was.

And young ladies that were 15, there was, so, and Mrs. Bennett sort of alludes to this. She thinks it's a compliment for a girl of 15 to be proposed to because, wow, she's so young. She was able to get a husband so quickly.

(8:43 - 12:09)
And she talks about this in the first volume. If you remember in the Netherfield ball, before all the Bingley's leave and go back to London, she's like, well, Jane almost got married. There was an officer that was interested in her when she was 15.

It's a point of pride for her, but she was only 15 and that was still considered very young to get married, but not inappropriate. So girls could marry at that age, assuming that they were out in society, which I don't know if we've talked about that, but there was a period. We have a little bit, right? Yeah.

So there's a period of like, let's call it incubation, right? They're a little girl and then they- It's like a chicken sitting on eggs. Like a chicken. Yeah, no, seriously.

There's a period where they are being taught to run a home, how to be a lady. They have to learn how to sew and how to play the piano and learn different languages and have a conversation and all these things. And so then you get to an age where you are allowed to be seen out in public, always with a chaperone.

Now it means that you are out in the market. You are looking for a husband and men can court you. Before that age, young girls were not allowed to be at evening parties or balls or anything like that.

They had their governesses that were responsible for them or whoever took care of them. And they were sort of always behind the scenes. Once they are out, that's what they called it.

They are out. That means that they are out in society and they can accept proposals from men. A lot of times around the age of 15 to 18, you really wanted to be out there by the time you were 18 because clock starts ticking at 18 and then pretty soon 25 is there and now you're- Well, and being out in society, there was some sort of ceremony, right? Whether it was at a ball or something with Bridgerton, they have some sort of ceremony where it's like, okay, the women are presented for the season.

I don't know if that was accurate or if it's just like Netflix retelling. No, no. It is accurate.

It depended on your wealth and nobility. So if you were of noble family, then you had to be presented at court and that meant you were presented to royalty. So whoever was king or queen at the time and then they knew you were on the map and now people knew who you were and you could have suitors.

And it was also known, and there's a lot of talk about this in the book, of how much people make and how much they will inherit. Women, it's, oh, she's going to inherit 8,000 a year and men, it's like, well, he makes 10,000 a year. There's a lot of talk about that.

So money is important. That hasn't changed. That hasn't changed.

No. Another thing that hasn't changed, women who want to marry men that are a little wealthy. I mean, they've done studies on that.

(12:10 - 13:19)
It's not even true. Now, this brings up another question that's in my head. This is the one where Slava takes over, I guess.

It's more of a commentary, not a question. I'm going to phrase it as a question though. Why weren't boys presented at 15 and being married off? This is what I find interesting in modern society with the circles that I mentioned previously where, oh, she's so mature for her age.

You'll have this 27-year-old youth pastor trying to date one of his students and she's 16, 17, and she's so mature for her age. The usual horse shit that you hear. Well, he's not hanging out with her classmates going, hey guys, let's go grab a beer and watch the game.

You guys are so mature for your age. We can talk philosophy and theology and the Redskins. There seems to be this predatory nature against women in this shit.

Not seems, is. I'm just going to state it outright. It is.

(13:19 - 18:07)
There it is. Yeah. No, absolutely.

Absolutely. Yeah. I think that the coming of age for boys was different than especially, there were less rules, the lower in society you were because nobody cared.

You didn't have money. You weren't of consequence. Nobody knew who you were.

It didn't matter. You could get married at 15, at 12, whatever. It wasn't important.

You were just another poor person. The higher status you are, the more important the decisions you make. Because it was all about marrying for breeding.

You wanted to join the best families of England and create these whatever people to inherit. Super soldiers. Yeah, basically.

That was important. For men, the age of maturity was different. It looks different because you were also required to take responsibility over whatever the family business was.

You were expected to go to school. You hear Eaton, which is one of the big schools in England that has been around for over 500 years or something. That's where all the wealthy guys went.

It was a boarding school. You went there for several years. Then your father would pass on more and more responsibility until you could finally take over or until they passed away and then you were completely taking over the state and all the things that that entailed.

It was a different process and it took a lot longer. By the time men were ready to marry, a lot of times they were over the age of 25. They also had a lot more freedoms.

They could travel the world. That's another common thing. They would travel for extended amounts of time and then come back and it was seen as like this prideful thing of like, oh yeah, I've been around.

I've been around the world. I've been to all these places. Women couldn't do that.

They couldn't travel by themselves. My comment was going to be there was more investment in the physical, mental, all the things, education and progression in men. Women stay at home, learn how to peel potatoes or command the servants how to peel potatoes and wait to be banged, I guess.

That was the thing. That was it. That's why I think women leaned into these social groups where you could sit around and just gossip because you had nothing better to do.

You had help with your children if you had money. You had a governess. You had somebody who was educating your children.

Then you had some sort of caretaker who did the rest. You were just there to be the official mother, but it didn't mean that you had a relationship with your kids necessarily. That was pretty common.

I suppose it's a way of maintaining control and power by having access to those circles, those social clubs, and having the information that the other people need to know. We're having dirt on somebody. It's not just girls being girls.

Some of it is practical, political machinations like trying to protect yourself. Yeah. Lady Berg talks about Elizabeth shouldn't travel alone.

She will demand that she is traveling with someone. She's like, well, my father wants me back. Oh, okay.

He's sending a servant. Then it's okay. That's addressed clearly in volume two here.

Let's move on. We've talked about Charlotte and Mr. Collins. They get married.

They move away. Jane is super sad because Mr. Bingley is gone. There is now no hope that they will ever meet again.

She gets an invitation to go to London with her uncle and her aunt, the gardeners, who later on play a very important part in bringing Lizzie to Pemberley. That is in volume three. But Jane goes over there and she's hoping that she might be able to see Mr. Bingley.

They might be able to reconnect at minimum, see his sisters. Then she goes to visit them. There's a very uncomfortable interaction between the two sisters and Jane.

She realizes this entire friendship has been a lie. They're actually really impolite. They're not very kind.

(18:08 - 18:21)
She's like, I was totally wrong about these women. They treated me with a lot of kindness when they were in Hertfordshire. Now they don't seem to care about my friendship at all.

(18:23 - 20:17)
So that happens. Then Lizzie gets an invitation to go to Rosings Park and stay with Charlotte and Collins, Mr. Collins. This is really important because while she's there, Mr. Darcy shows up to visit his aunt.

He stays there for a few weeks. He's there with his cousin, Colonel Fitzwilliam. This is really the juiciest part of the book because there are a lot of interactions with Mr. Darcy and Lizzie.

It's more awkward than ever before. He's popping in at the house that she's staying and sits there sometimes in silence, not knowing what to say to her. Just staring at her.

She's just like, what's going on? Then he'll ask these random questions about whether or not she would like to continue living in the neighborhood that she grew up in. None of this makes any sense. Then she goes on these walks at Rosings because the state is beautiful and she loves going on walks.

We know this. She keeps bumping into Mr. Darcy. She even hints at some point, bumping into Mr. Darcy.

She keeps hinting that she likes to walk alone. This is her favorite. Thinking that maybe he just will avoid her and the opposite happens.

Instead, he sees her and instead of walking the other direction, he joins her and they just walk in silence. He's a real flirt. He's a real flirt.

I love Mr. Darcy. He really knows what he's getting into here with his, I'm doing well with this gal. This is what I'm doing.

(20:17 - 21:14)
He's really trying. He's not doing a good job, but he's really trying. Lizzie points something out.

When they first interact at Rosings Park, she's playing the piano. Do you guys remember the part where she's playing music for them? Mr. Darcy walks up and she's like, oh, do you mean to scare me by coming over here and give me all this attention? He's I couldn't scare you even if I tried and blah, blah. Then she says, you could interact with people better.

He's like, well, I don't have the ability to do that. It's just not a strength thing. She says, well, maybe you should just practice.

Then what you realize later on is, oh, he's practicing with her and he's not doing a good job. It's awkward as hell. Well, she's also a little bit prejudiced against him because of all the crap she's heard.

(21:15 - 22:22)
Even though he's trying, a different person, well, not a different person, Elizabeth, without the prejudice or without the gossip that's in her head, probably could have been like, oh, okay, he's trying. What do you know? Maybe he's cute, but because she's prejudiced against him, she's like, oh, I imagine she probably didn't do that. But I imagine her being like, what the hell is this dude doing? Walking alone.

I like walking alone. And this is where the women in the Victorian and Gregorian Georgian era. Baroque era.

This is the Baroque era. That's a smart joke if you know music. I don't.

I don't know music. So that doesn't make sense to me. And I really, I have to be honest.

Okay. I actually, I don't like any of the characters in this book. I love this book, but I hate all of them except for Mr. George.

(22:22 - 22:34)
That's a shocker. He's the only person. Yes, I know.

I haven't talked about that yet. He's the only genuine person in this whole book. He's the only person being a hundred percent himself.

(22:34 - 23:09)
Even Lizzie has these airs of like, one of the Bingley sisters alludes to this. Actually, she doesn't allude to it. She straight up says, you know, she's got this like air of like conceited independence.

And she's absolutely right. She's absolutely right. Lizzie has no reason to be as opinionated as she is.

The only reason why she can be is because she has parents that didn't smack her every time she shared her opinion. Well, yeah, I mean, we've seen her father. She didn't have a Latin mother, obviously.

(23:10 - 24:09)
We've seen her father. He probably won't even stand up to take care of that. So no, of course not.

And well, Lizzie's his favorite and they're so much alike and whatever. And so she just feels like entitled to having an opinion. And I don't know why, to be quite honest.

I have no idea why. Is it possible that it's just Jane Austen just using her as a mouthpiece? Oh, of course. Just like a little puppet? Yeah, absolutely.

Absolutely. Well, in order to make this character interesting, you have to like love her and sort of hate her at the same time. But she is presenting a really interesting idea that was new back then.

And that's you don't have to marry someone you don't like just because you need money. You can marry for love. That was revolutionary at the time.

No women were doing that. How's that working out for people today? Don't answer that question. Slava? I don't know.

(24:14 - 24:42)
Sure. We don't need to talk about that right now. No, I was going to say I've been married for 20 years and we love each other.

We enjoy each other. I even like my wife, which is better than loving her, I think. Because you can love some shitty people, but you don't like them.

I actually like my wife. And I'm sure we married for love. Love was there.

We found each other attractive. We loved each other. We do love each other.

(24:42 - 25:34)
But we have a practical kind of relationship, too. It is a partnership, if you will. And it doesn't involve an estate or inheritances.

But there is a practicality to it, too. We're both in the same industry. We're both in the same kind of path in life.

And for her specifically, she was like, well, if you're not in this world that I'm in, I'm not interested. But I was in that world. But she was just making a statement like, I wouldn't be marrying you if we weren't in the same world.

So there's a practicality to marriage, too. Yeah, there's absolutely a practicality to marriage. Yes, I'm married for practical reasons, too.

I'm married for money. Right, babe? Me. I'm the money.

(25:40 - 26:56)
I've got at least one... Money first, love after. I've got at least one coin with my name on it. I won't let her have it.

It's mine. If I had a dollar, right? Just one dollar. Every time I saw someone falling in love, but doing nothing about it, I would be a rich, rich man.

Right? And so this gets me to Mr. Darcy, who's a pansy. And he feels caught up in his feels. And he wasn't willing to address with Elizabeth about how he was feeling.

And he's like, I finally need to do it. And he feels this... I'm going to just use it. He feels an ejaculation of emotion.

Right? I don't know what book you're reading. Either you don't know what book you're reading, or you're not reading the same book Ciara and I are reading. This is the second time you've attacked Darcy.

And then the other time you attacked his freaking servant inheritance douche that you thought was trying to... Oh, in the first episode? Yeah. Yeah, because you had misread it that he was lying that he's going to inherit all of Darcy's money. And now you're saying that Darcy's not... As a modern citizen, that is the way that it read.

(26:57 - 27:06)
I am not an expert. Which version did you buy? Did you buy the 1860 version or whatever the hell this was published? Darcy has a lot of hair. He's on a horse.

(27:08 - 27:58)
And it's like blowing in the wind. A big bulge. Yeah, there's a bulge.

Okay. That's the wrong one. Yeah.

That's the wrong one. So if you had a dollar for every time Darcy does what in this book? Falls in love. No, if I had a dollar every time someone fell in love, but didn't do anything about it, I'd be a rich man.

That's what I said. Are you talking about yourself? Yes. Wait, no.

Before me, of course. Yeah, he'd have one gold coin. Well, listen, like Darcy... Okay, so we have to set this up.

I get what you're saying, Jonathan, but first of all, in world, Darcy doesn't care. He's rich, he's hot, and he's ambivalent about certain things. The social norms that everybody seems to adhere to, he's like, kill me.

(27:58 - 28:08)
The Elon Musk of his times. Yeah, you have him being a little bit awkward, just as we just discussed. So he's not sitting around pining for Elizabeth.

(28:08 - 28:40)
He eventually decides he likes her, and then he pursues her, and he's awkward about it. But he's not cowardly and just pining in the corner. So being awkward and forceful, for lack of a better term, awkward and prudent is different than being rich, kind of ambivalent, and then, but I secretly love her.

That's not what he's doing. No, no, no, no, no. And he doesn't need to try that hard if he doesn't want to.

(28:40 - 29:13)
Right. He could have the attention of any woman. That he doesn't have to try hard at all.

He doesn't have to try very hard. He's got money. He's good looking.

Ms. Bingley is obviously interested in him, would love to marry Mr. Darcy, and he would barely have to propose, and she would jump at the opportunity. She's going for his coin purse. But Lizzie makes him work hard.

She's like, you all actually don't know how to interact with people. You need to practice. And he's like, oh, okay, so I'm going to practice on you, and then I'm going to ask you to marry me.

(29:13 - 30:07)
After probably like four walks. So we've gone on four walks together, so I think it's about time. Yeah, I think it's time.

We got really serious, and you have my baby. Courtships were short back then. They were short because- You'd get scurvy by the afternoon.

You had to. You could die by sunset. No, they were short back then.

You didn't have months and months to date. And I think that there's somewhere in the book where maybe even Charlotte says something to the effect of like, it's better to have the shortest courtship possible. So you know as little about- She did say that.

She did. As little as about the person that you're marrying, and you just go for it. Yeah, she said something like- She said something like that, right? You want to know as little about their flaws as possible.

(30:08 - 30:17)
Yeah, there is. And I was like, that's a real... Okay. All right, Charlotte.

You're just trying to get hitched. She's a very practical lady. Okay, cool.

(30:17 - 30:25)
She's a very practical lady. She didn't give him an ultimatum, but it was pretty close. Ultimatum? I hardly know.

(30:25 - 30:43)
So let's talk about Darcy's proposal. So good. So this last portion of the second volume is just wonderful, right? If you're reading this for the first time- And I am.

(30:43 - 30:59)
You don't see this coming. You don't see this coming. Although Charlotte does say to Lizzie on multiple occasions, he must be in love with you because he's acting so odd, and he's like seeking you out.

(31:00 - 31:08)
And she's like, no, that's not possible. Not possible. But he proposes, and the proposal is interesting.

(31:08 - 31:23)
Yes, he confesses his love for her, but he's also like, against all reasoning, I have come to the conclusion that I love you, even though you are inferior by birth. He did say that. I liked that part.

(31:23 - 31:34)
Your family is a mess. You don't have money, but I still love you, so I've gotta have you. And she's just like, that's not a proposal.

(31:35 - 31:40)
So, but it is fulfillment of the first line. Yeah. Pull out the first line again.

(31:40 - 31:51)
Yeah. That's true. That's true.

That's a good point. Simple writing. I feel like we've overcomplicated it in today's authorship.

(31:51 - 31:57)
Well, I've confused you at least twice. Okay. When I want your opinion, I'll unmute your mic, okay? Cool.

(32:00 - 32:15)
Yeah. Let's see. Jane says, it is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife.

(32:16 - 32:26)
And you know what happened to Mr. Darcy? He didn't know he had feelings before he met Elizabeth. He was just bored with everyone, probably. Well, it's tough to be rich.

(32:26 - 32:30)
I'm trying to find his proposal. And he needed a little brat to wake him up. All right.

(32:31 - 32:42)
Because Lizzie's a brat. She is. So, what chapter is this proposal in? It's like 33? There's no such thing.

(32:42 - 32:51)
What are you talking about? There's no such thing as 33. So, it's like a 60 chapter book. No, it's not the way it's broken up in the book.

(32:51 - 32:56)
You're looking at the audible chapters. Yeah. The audible chapters are different.

(32:57 - 33:02)
Still could be 33. Oh, it's where he says, in vain I have struggled. It will not do.

(33:03 - 33:12)
My feelings will not be repressed. You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you. Yeah.

That's it. That's where it starts. That's where it starts.

(33:12 - 33:29)
In spite of her deeply rooted dislike, she could not be insensible to the compliment of such a man's affection. And though her intentions did not vary for an instant, she was at first sorry for the pain he was to receive. She knew.

(33:29 - 33:52)
She knew from the moment that he opened his mouth. He's like, nope, this isn't happening. Well, remember, what we haven't talked about is that his cousin, Colonel Fitzwilliam, shares with her the extent of his involvement in separating her sister Jane and Mr. Bingley and preventing them from getting married.

(33:53 - 33:58)
Yes. And so now she's riled up. She's pissed because she's like, I knew.

(33:58 - 34:17)
She was already suspicious, but now she knows that he's the reason why Mr. Bingley did not propose to Jane. And here's the thing. Like, do we agree? What do you guys think about this? So Mr. Darcy has observed Jane's behavior towards Mr. Bingley.

(34:18 - 34:48)
He has seen the behavior of her family. He knows that she doesn't have money, although she's very beautiful and she's got great manners and she's a sensible person, but her family is really what's preventing her from being able to marry into a good family. And Mr. Bingley is absolutely in love with her, but he says, look, I don't see any indicators that she's really that into you.

(34:50 - 35:04)
So there's a good chance you might be rejected if you propose. And then on top of that, her family's crazy and she's poor. So what do you really have here? And he convinces him.

(35:04 - 35:07)
That's what he's got here. Potential. Potential.

(35:08 - 35:12)
And we know. Yeah, some people might call it. We know that we always date and marry potential.

(35:12 - 35:24)
Right, folks? Say it for me in the back. Right, folks? All right. That's a conversation for another day.

(35:27 - 35:38)
Yeah. So what do you guys think? Like, did he do right by his friend? Do you think that he really thought Jane wasn't interested? Or was he just like, no, dude, don't go here. This family's insane.

(35:38 - 35:42)
You don't want to marry into this. It's both. It's obvious.

(35:42 - 35:56)
It's obvious that the family's poor. And like, all of those girls are unruly because of their mother and their father's lack of discipline. Yeah, that's including all of them.

(35:56 - 36:10)
That's a fact. So that is just an objective observation from society looking in. Secondarily, Elizabeth's, I guess I can call it affections.

(36:10 - 36:19)
And it being lack thereof. Right? Her affections being a negative, not a positive affection. Right? Because I don't know what other word to use.

(36:20 - 36:29)
Is also outside looking in like, hey, man, women don't act like this in society if they like you. That's how she's acting. Therefore, conclusion is this.

(36:31 - 36:38)
So that's why I think it's both. Yeah. And we know that Jane is a mild-tempered young lady.

(36:38 - 36:48)
She's not going to be super obvious in her feelings. She's actually out of all the sisters, the most reasonable, the most well-behaved. Most put together-ish.

(36:48 - 37:12)
The most put together. And yeah, so could, I don't know, is there a possibility? Did he really think that maybe she wasn't interested? I think that he was playing dumb. I think that he was just like, this family is not an appropriate connection for you to have as a man in your, you know, with your status.

(37:12 - 37:28)
And even though Jane is a great girl, like, do you really want to marry into this? Because the reality is most women, even if they hadn't liked Mr. Bingley, they would have said yes to a proposal. They wouldn't have turned him down because he was good looking. He was charming and he had money.

(37:29 - 37:35)
The same thing. Always the same thing. I found another quote that I sincerely enjoyed.

(37:36 - 37:43)
I have never desired your good opinion. And you have certainly bestowed it most unwillingly. That wasn't directed at you.

(37:44 - 37:53)
I know the segue is awkward, but that I just, as you were talking, I'm like, I even haven't highlighted it in my Kindle. Here's another one from our indie author, Jane Austen. It's just a killer.

(37:54 - 37:59)
Indie author, yes. She was ruthless. Yeah, she's mean, she's mean to him.

(37:59 - 38:10)
And he even says to her, like, why are you rejecting me this way with such little consideration? He's shocked. He's surprised. He's surprised.

(38:11 - 38:21)
She writes in that piece, you know, he like doesn't even know how to physically compose himself. He's so, you know, shocked. But I'm hot and look at my steed.

(38:21 - 38:33)
I'm like, why can't you check out this steed in that bulge? Check out this coin purse. She's like, these are the reasons why I'm not going to marry you. You destroyed my sister's life.

(38:33 - 38:42)
You destroyed Wickham's life. You're out, buster. But that's the thing is like, Jane gives us details of like his countenance changes.

(38:42 - 38:54)
He's like, oh. And this is my point that I made earlier about like Jane needs to quit the gossip or not, Jane, Elizabeth needs to quit the gossip is she doesn't have all the stories. She falls into the trap.

(38:54 - 39:02)
And so his countenance shifts when he goes, oh, those are your reasons. Okay. And he doesn't address it.

(39:02 - 39:09)
He just goes, and then he goes and puts in the work. You know, as the kids say, we let him cook. Right.

(39:10 - 39:16)
We let him cook. He wrote two full parchment papers. Two or was it three? Two, three.

(39:16 - 39:19)
I don't know. I don't remember. Full parchment papers.

(39:19 - 39:48)
He went into detail and he disclosed information that would have been highly personal that you would not want to share with just any person because it could have destroyed the reputation of his family if she decided to be more mean spirited and share some of that information about his sister and Wickham and all the things that occurred there. She almost eloped with this guy. I mean, it's bad.

(39:48 - 39:57)
And he defends himself, and I'm glad that he defends himself and doesn't just take it and then just disappear. Well, he gets cold, right? He goes away. He gets cold.

(39:57 - 40:14)
He defends himself articulately, not in the heat of the moment, which was better, which that was a good decision and defends and defends his decision to also separate Mr. Bingley and Jane. And he is not apologetic for that. He says that in the letter.

(40:14 - 40:42)
I will not apologize for this because I believe that I did this in service to a friend. And so this is an interesting thing that Jane Austen presents us with is just because we have the narrative from Elizabeth's point of view, Jane's point of view, and we want to root for them because they're the main characters, right? She goes, sometimes society doesn't view you that way because you're not that way. And it's a subtle undertone, but it's there.

(40:43 - 40:54)
Yeah. So let's all take note that the way that you're perceived outside, there could be some pride and some prejudice there. And the way you perceive others, you could be Mr. Bennett.

(40:54 - 41:00)
It's only true. And the way you perceive others is only the truth. There's no bias.

(41:01 - 41:08)
That's what Slav always tells me. My opinions of you are unbiased. Yeah.

(41:09 - 41:19)
And I am sorry to have occasionally caused you pain, Jonathan, with my correct opinions. That's a paraphrased Lizzie quote. Yes.

(41:19 - 41:26)
Yes. Well, I'll take it out on you later, I suppose. On my trusty steed.

(41:26 - 41:35)
Don't touch my coin purse. Thought I was the only one reading that book. It's on your screen.

(41:37 - 41:52)
My coin purse? Shiara, please help us. This is why we can't read these books. Next up, sense and sensibility.

(41:54 - 42:04)
The proposal that goes awry because he tells her, I have no reason to love you, but I do. You piece of shit, come here and give me a kiss. Paraphrased.

(42:05 - 42:13)
But yeah, then she was like, nope. And then we went a little bit on a few side quests after that. So wherever you want to take us next is great.

(42:14 - 42:17)
Yeah. Yeah. So we've got the letter.

(42:17 - 42:34)
He has fully defended himself, gives all the details. And we already kind of have a hint before she even goes to Rosings Park that there's something up with Mr. Wickham. Because he's giving Lizzie all kinds of attention at first.

(42:34 - 42:49)
And you think, oh, this is going to bloom into something. And then all of a sudden it just stops. And there's another young lady who has inherited a large amount of money.

(42:49 - 43:00)
And all of a sudden his attentions are directed towards her. And Jane's aunt is the one that points this out. And she's like, this seems a little suspicious.

(43:00 - 43:22)
Maybe you should create some space there. And luckily she listens to her aunt's advice and creates some space there. Um, because she does see that it is odd that he shifts his attention to somebody else who also happens to just have inherited massive amounts of money.

(43:22 - 43:31)
And now he's all of a sudden... Well, then that puts credibility towards what Mr. Darcy tells her in the letter. Right? Yes. Where it's like she doesn't... Now she's putting it together.

(43:31 - 43:35)
Yeah. She doesn't need extra evidence. It's like, oh, he's acting on that currently anyway.

(43:36 - 43:45)
Exactly. Exactly. Then at the end of the letter, he addresses the issue with her family.

(43:46 - 44:10)
And that is especially hard for Lizzie because she has to face the truth here that her family is a hot mess. And there's some shame there for her because she realizes that it's actually true that her dad doesn't know how to run this home with a bunch of women. And her mom is just always gossiping.

(44:10 - 44:27)
And the girls are always wild and flirting with boys and total chaos. And maybe we're not the main characters of this story. Elizabeth? Yeah, that's a hard pill for her to swallow.

(44:29 - 44:38)
Towards the end of volume two, she makes it home. She meets up with Jane. She tells Jane only part of the story.

(44:38 - 44:48)
She shares with her that Mr. Darcy proposed to her, but doesn't tell her about the whole thing that went down with Mr. Bingley. Yeah, nor should she. Nor should she.

(44:48 - 44:54)
She's trying to be sensitive. She knows that Jane is like still in love with this guy. There's no closure there.

(44:54 - 45:18)
And so she just decides not to bring it up. Meanwhile, one of her youngest sisters has been invited to go to Brighton and be the company of another young lady who's married. And Jane is super concerned because she's like, I've already read about how people perceive our family.

(45:18 - 45:37)
Lydia is part of the problem. This younger sister who's constantly flirting with, you know, these whoever's around. And she's like, if she is allowed to be outside of our protection, she's going to act like some wild child and embarrass all of us.

(45:37 - 45:57)
And she's already trying to make that not happen, right? She talks to her dad and she's like, listen, you can't let her go. And he's like, well, maybe she just needs an opportunity to be out in the world and make her mistakes. And so he lets her go to Brighton.

(45:57 - 46:06)
Which is also just evidence of how he as a father. Deals. Decides to deal with this household full of women.

(46:07 - 46:10)
Totally, totally unengaged. Totally unengaged. He doesn't care.

(46:10 - 46:16)
He doesn't care. Very hippie vibes. Very free.

(46:16 - 46:20)
Just let her live, dude. Bruh. Chill.

(46:20 - 46:45)
And then somewhere in the end there, just before we reach the end of the second volume, Lizzie is invited to go with her aunt and uncle to Pemberley, where Mr. Darcy lives. And she is mortified. She does not want to go anywhere close to where he lives because she's scared that they'll bump into each other after everything that happened.

(46:48 - 47:03)
But she has been told that he is not home. And back then, if you had like this large estate, they would open up their homes to the general public, like a museum. And you could walk through people's homes.

(47:04 - 47:17)
And that was just like a thing that you can do. And because the property was large, they would have these incredible gardens and just all kinds of stuff. So kind of like when we were in Portugal? Yes.

(47:18 - 47:35)
You could just walk through people's front backyards into their homes, as long as they weren't home, right? And so her aunt says, hey, this is the area that I grew up in. Let's go visit Pemberley because it's just so beautiful. Lizzie, you're going to love it.

(47:35 - 47:55)
And she's just thinking like, this sounds like a really bad idea. But she, I think, is so curious to see how he lives because she knows that she was close to becoming mistress of Pemberley, which would have been a huge deal. And she's like, okay, well, maybe I'm a little bit curious.

(47:57 - 48:07)
Curiosity killed the cat. We'll find out in Volume 3 whether or not they get together in the end. All the people who write it.

(48:07 - 48:14)
Lucer D'Arcy dies at sea. He's called to war. They need him on the front lines.

(48:15 - 48:26)
All right. Well, as we wind down here, I just have one, it's for the Bridgerton fans. And I'm going to catch some heat for this, right? So Bridgerton is ruining period piece storytelling.

(48:27 - 48:37)
All it does is it takes something that should have been excellent and throws a bunch of out-of-context sex into the mix. And it's hailed as a new classic. And this is Bullocks.

(48:37 - 48:57)
So what we should do instead is fit the narrative of the period and make it scandalous for the time like Jane Austen does in Pride and Prejudice instead of just throwing, oh, we're going to bang. I'm so peeved about this. I've lost my voice.

(48:57 - 49:01)
All right. Well, that's an opinion, Jonathan. Thanks for sharing.

(49:02 - 49:09)
You're welcome. So great. I'll save it for next week.

(49:10 - 49:26)
So that concludes this portion of our chat about Pride and Prejudice. Join us next week. We'll have a guest with us, a good friend of ours who also is a Jane Austen freak.

(49:27 - 49:35)
Freak? I'm going to tell her you said that. I'm sure she would agree with me. So join us next week.

(49:35 - 49:41)
And we're going to finish up Pride and Prejudice. Yep. And it's the last episode of season five.

(49:41 - 49:50)
So come on by before you won't hear from us. Forever. No, we're coming back for season six.

(49:50 - 49:55)
The sweet by and by. Yeah, season six is going to be exciting. We got more indie authors.

(49:55 - 50:07)
We got more books that are becoming movies. We have a couple of series that I've wanted to wrap up. And wrap up is a loose term because it's like they're not done series.

(50:08 - 50:23)
It's the King Keller Chronicles by Patrick Rothfuss and Scott Lynch with the Republic of Thieves back with Jean and Locke. It's going to be a killer season. Not to mention all of our secret indie authors that we're going to have on as well.

(50:24 - 50:33)
So stay tuned. All four of them. Did you say four of them? It's just Slava in different hats.

(50:34 - 50:45)
One of them is Slava with a clearly fake mustache. Yeah, like the mustache that Brian has and family guy when he owes Stewie money. Morning.

(50:45 - 50:50)
Good day to you, sir. Hey, wait a minute. What the hell? Buongiorno.

(50:50 - 51:04)
See you guys next time? After the summer. If you like these books and more, be sure to subscribe on YouTube to join the indie author uprising. I have a favor to ask you.

(51:04 - 51:17)
If you like what we're doing, the simplest way to support the show is to hit subscribe. In return, we'll keep leveling up and we'll listen to your feedback and read authors that you suggest. And of course, we'll take side quests along the way.

(51:17 - 51:20)
Thank you for joining us and we'll see you next time.