No, that isn’t one of my misleading provocative titles. I’m not going to be all clever and then reveal that I, like every woman my age, think Darcy is just the most wonderful thing ever. He’s not. He’s kind of awful.
If you haven’t read Pride and Prejudice–or at least seen the BBC movie–you might just want to skip down a few paragraphs.
I’ve had this conversation more times than I can remember. It usually goes something like this:
Any Twenty-something Girl: Oh, I love Mr. Darcy!
Me: Really?
ATG: Yes, he’s just so perfect.
Me: But he’s arrogant and condescending and really quite awful.
ATG: No, he’s not!
Me: Yes, he is. For the entire first half of the book, he does absolutely nothing to recommend himself.
ATG: But then he loves Lizzie and she brings out what’s good in him and because of her, he becomes this amazing guy!
This is the part where I start spluttering. Now, all you P&P lovers out there, I don’t mean to say that Darcy should be dismissed entirely. I appreciate that he helps Lydia and I respect the way that his servants and his sister love him. I think it’s fair to say that deep down he is a decent guy.
But.
I have a real problem with his being the standard to which every man is held (in some circles) as I think he’s a fairly pathetic standard. He’s arrogant, unkind, and insensitive until he’s got some reason not to be. Certainly he’s very good to Lizzie once he falls in love with her–well, after his proposal, which is so insensitive as to be cruel. But a man’s character is defined not just by how he treats those he admires but even more by how he treats those he despises–and Darcy despises most people, so we’ve got plenty of evidence as to his character.
Now I’m not saying he can’t change. I absolutely believe that we can, by God’s grace, defeat our vices and grow in virtue. God, I hope we can–the idea of being as loud, emotional, and attention-seeking at 40 as I was at 14 kind of makes me want to die.
But I can’t sit back and watch women use Darcy as an excuse to date losers. Oh, they may not make the argument that their stoner boyfriends are just as misunderstood as Darcy, but there’s an attitude that women are already inclined to have that Lizzie and Darcy just encourage: I know the real Fitzwilliam and I can help him to be the great guy that only I can see.
I’ve watched more women make this mistake. They date guys who booze or cheat or sulk or lie or whatever but they really believe that the glimpses of good they see are their boyfriend’s real self. And if they can love him enough to draw that real self out, then not only do they get an awesome guy, but they also get to be his savior!
I’m going to be real with you, ladies. If your friends think he’s a jerk and your family thinks he’s a jerk and his friends think he’s a jerk and his family thinks he’s a jerk, you’re not finding the heart of gold beneath the rough exterior. You’re being fooled by a jerk. Or, more often, you’re fooling yourself because you just really want him to be great.
It’s been my experience that most guys will be as good as you require. Men are hunters by nature; they’re built to chase down the mammoth and they’ll fight until they’ve killed it. Forget chastity here (okay, never forget chastity, but you get my point), but I’m not talking about keeping your clothes on so that he’ll marry you. I’m just talking about character, about the way a man will do anything to win the heart of the woman he loves. If you’re interested in a Darcy and you try to date him so that he reforms, he’s just going to congratulate himself on having captured his prize and see how far he can coast before you freak out about how awful he is.
If, on the other hand, you hold out like Lizzie, he may just surprise you, as Darcy, to his credit, ends up doing. See, you’re incredible. You really are–you’re beautiful and captivating and absolutely worth fighting for. You were born a princess, living protected atop a high tower.
But high towers get lonely. And you might look out the window and see, for example, a farm boy covered in muck. And maybe you two make eye contact across the distance that separates you. And you begin to think how handsome he is under the caked-on manure. And how he has such sensitive eyes when he bothers to look up at you. And really, how unreasonable of your parents to demand that you marry someone of consequence–they just don’t understand!
So you sigh and you pine and you wait, but he’s just mucking around with the pigs. And at this point, you have to make a choice. Most Darcy-lovers of my acquaintance are inclined to rip up their fancy bedsheets, make a rope, and climb down to the sty, after which they are chafed and muddy and in the company of a man who now has no reason to improve his station in life, his object being achieved.
A wiser princess waits in her tower, knowing that her farmer will either move on (in which case he was never worthy of her love), or he will fight. If he deserves her, he will wash off the muck, train as a knight, slay the dragon, scale the tower, and take her in his arms. He will either stay filthy or be transformed, based entirely on what she expects of him.
Now there are plenty of holy, God-fearing men out there who will fight to be good men regardless of what is expected of them. But there are many more–even really good guys–who will only fight to be good as long as it is demanded of them, ideally by a beautiful woman. But you can’t be a harpy or a nag, dating or–God forbid–marrying a mess of a boy and then insisting that he change. Even worldly wisdom knows that you can’t change somebody else.
He can change himself, though. And if you refuse to compromise your values and your standards, a man who truly loves you will fight to become the kind of man who deserves you. A man who won’t fight for you never could have deserved you.
Now a reasonable woman can’t be uncompromising on non-essentials. You can’t refuse to date a man because he doesn’t play the guitar or have curly hair or play football. But if he drinks too much or uses vulgar language or belittles your family or demeans you (ahem–Darcy!), you can’t save him. You can only make yourself miserable trying.
Look, I know that Darcy’s shy and socially awkward. And maybe you can convince me that his tremendous vices are really just a consequence of that. Or perhaps that he loves Lizzie so much that he reforms himself entirely in order to be worthy of her. And I’ll admit that I shriek and giggle as much as anyone every time they get together. I suppose I don’t really hate him (the reformed him, anyway) so much as I hate the way women ignore his flaws and cling to the idea that they can change a jerk into a charming gentleman of 10,000 a year.
After years of hearing Austen distorted to excuse imprudent attachments (read: moronic crushes that will only end badly), I had to say this to all the lovely ladies dating scumbags and thinking they can save them like Lizzie saves Darcy: he’s already got a savior and it’s not you. If he really deserves you, he’ll fight to be a man who’s worthy of you. So stay up in your tower, princess, and watch him become the man you know he can be. And if he stays in the pigsty, count your blessings that you didn’t climb down to him. You never could have turned him into your knight in shining armor.
As a married women, I totally agree. This part was great:
“And if you refuse to compromise your values and your standards, a man who truly loves you will fight to become the kind of man who deserves you. A man who won’t fight for you never could have deserved you.”
Oh, and the look in the picture above that Darcy gives her when she rescues his sister at the piano—Wow! That is how you want to be looked upon, girls. It is possible and chastity is key to generating that level of admiration.
I, as a single twentysomething woman (and ND alum – loved the post on ND’s Catholicity, to which some of my facebook friends linked and ultimately led me here), still defend Mr. Darcy. He is, in the first half of the book, arrogant and condescending and all too willing to censure Lizzie’s family. However, he absolutely does change. Some of this is indeed through increased knowledge of his character, but in some ways he actually makes the decision to change. He treats her father with respect, along with changing his opinion on Jane and Mr. Bingley’s union. He is kind and welcoming to her aunt and uncle. While he doesn’t do more than tolerate the others in the family, what a difference that is from the beginning.
I agree that the goodness of Mr. Darcy is a pathetic excuse to keep dating a man in real life who is unworthy. But I think that using him as an excuse is more a willful misinterpretation on the part of the reader. He is a man who, after being rejected by a woman, works on improving himself to make himself worthy. He did write the letter to her about the whole Willoughby situation, but the compliments on behalf of his servants could not have been by his design. Lizzie was not meant to know that he helped Lydia. He was a different person when he welcomed her aunt and uncle to his home, which was meant to show that his behavior was markedly different because he worked to make himself more deserving of her. The part that those who want to “change” their boyfriends forget is that the change must come from within. No one can change another person. Lizzie doesn’t save Darcy – she rejects him, washes her hands of him, and then encounters him later after he has, through the grace of God, saved himself. The changes he had made to himself were acutely obvious, and Lizzie would have been at fault for being unwilling to recognize them. Her aunt and uncle even said that, though they had not met him before, he was very different from the picture that had been painted, and that they clearly approved of his character after interacting with him. They would not have done this if he had, indeed, remained the disagreeable character.
From my perspective, Darcy is the exact opposite of an excuse to date losers. And is still my fictional crush. Which is why I clearly put way too much time into this response 🙂 I have very much enjoyed reading through your blog today – your perspective on being a young Catholic woman is so well-articulated and a joy to read!
Well argued, Andrea. I definitely think the book can be read that way, although it seems to me that Austen leaves some room for interpretation. He definitely becomes the kind of guy I can approve of, I just find that most women who love Mr. Darcy aren’t looking at him the way you are. Glad you’re enjoying the blog–go Irish!
Well, I do have to contend on one thing here. I think it is very possible that his attempt to help Wickham and not tell Lizzy could have actually been by design. I thought it very possible to be a psychological ploy (and the entire time I kept thinking Darcy was trying to use psychology to his advantage). When you tell a child to “not” do something, what’s the very first thing they do? So by telling Lydia to absolutely never tell Lizzy, it’s pretty obvious she will, isn’t it? This is actually perfectly illustrated with the last interaction between Lady Catherine & Lizzy, Lady Catherine tells Lizzy to never marry Darcy, which she promptly does immediately following (It’s more about the haste once this encounter happens more so than the fact that she does it).
Finally, an article about Mr. Darcy worthy of reading. I have a couple girls in the youth group I help out at that adore Mr. Darcy…and I want vomit every time I hear it. I have always contended that Bingley is the far superior gentlemen in this particular Austen book. I do contend on one thing though–it seems that nobody really mentions the double standard here–Mr. Darcy loves Elizabeth Bennett for who she is–without trying to change her. But Elizabeth Bennett loves Mr. Darcy for someone he supposedly became in a year. I hate to break it to you, but character cannot improve that dramatically that fast. It takes much more time and effort than that. Besides this, there is no expectation of Lizzie to change. While Darcy spends all his time changing himself to something he’s not–Lizzie does nothing to improve her behavior. So when Darcy does not stop his interest, I actually LOST respect for Darcy as a man, as I started thinking he could do better. I really don’t see Elizabeth as the perfect woman–I think she is far too judgmental, presumptuous, and lazy, and really not deserving of a man of such reformed character.
Totally agree! Elizabeth rejected Darcy for his flaws and only when he becames a perfect man she accepted him. And Darcy loved her with her flaws and virtues.
The value of a thing is directly proportional to the effort invested and the nearness to perfection it is. If you want a good mate or a good relationship, you have to get your hands dirty and put in some work. Women are gifted in their ability to perceive a man’s character. As it is, as it could be,and as he means it to be, and a good woman will hone a man into something greater than he even knows he could become apart from her. You will encounter heart ache and failure, but in the end, when it comes to other people, I have found you almost always end up with exactly what you deserve. Of course, I am only creeping up on middle age, maybe time will prove me wrong 😀
Most dudes are accidental assholes when they are young, that is a given. I was, and with rare exception so was every friend I have ever had. I burned through a lot of great girls before I started to become a decent guy. People begin life self interested and self absorbed. It is just as common a condition for the fairer sex as well, and by the sounds of your ‘waiting in a tower’ strategy you may know something about that yourself.
You are right about one thing though: It is in the nature of man to challenge himself, the hunt is always better than the kill, that is the very reason why once a guy has laid low your tower and absconded with you, he will lose interest and either become complacent and allow his affections to cool or see his interests move on to something greater unless you can help realize the ultimate challenge is to subdue his own base nature. Women should not see themselves as trophies to be won, but teammates to be valued. There is nothing so satisfying as being in love with someone who sees the world through the same eyes, meets it with the same values, and loves what you love with the same passion.
Its been a couple years since you wrote this, I hope time has been kind to you and that you have grown. If not, just a word of advice: The embers of youth will die, sex will lose its significance and as you grow older you will find yourself increasingly more isolated. If you help a man become the sort of person you look forward to growing old with, he will become indispensably dear to him by the time you get there.
Agreed.
I’ve written this response in my mind a half dozen times; I hope it comes across as respectful and becomes the start of s dialogue.
While I heartily agree that no woman can “save” a man, and that dating a man such as Mr Darcy appears to be is unreasonable, your accusations against Darcy do not all have the same merit. Darcy was the product of an overbearing society which Jane Austen endeavored to chastise through her works. He would have said such things about Elizabeth because society told him they were such; indeed he says,and later shows, himself to be quite above such ideas. The character of Mr Darcy is oft repeated in other Regency Era literature; as a commentary about society in general and not a character with faults which he cannot overcome quickly.
Mr Darcy also shows that he is better than his society because he changes. Not from Hope to win Elizabeth, but because he sees the correctness in her rebuff. The novel shows this change much better than any movie I have seen, and is one of the most beautiful transformations to be seen. He not only rights the wrongs done by himself but he prevents more destruction of the family name by taking care of Elizabeth’s sister, Lydia. These were done for love, but not in a demand that love be returned. This makes him a man worth waiting for indeed.
It is my hope that this has been respectfully conveyed, and that I shall be able to have further discussion on the matter. I would be happy to support my argument further with quotes from the novel and other sources.
Sources: I am a student of History and Literature; I have studied the Regency Era and its Novels as a part of my Bachelors
That’s true, but it’s unfair Darcy had to change his flaws and not Elizabeth. He became a better person and not Elizabeth. I ask you, what Elizabeth did for Darcy? What she did for his wellness? Absolutely nothing! That’s the point! It’s not an equal relationship
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PD: I’m Spanish and I study English and French Literature in my university and I have arguments too. ?
The point most people miss in Pride and Prejudice is that Darcy undergoes all the change himself. Elizabeth makes zero effort to change him or to make him a better person. She staightaway tells him he’s awful and she doesn’t want him and HE BACKS OFF. He apologizes for wasting her time and BACKS OFF.
Mr. Darcy is not some rich,anti social douchebag who magically transforms into a caring and understanding fellow magically when he meets the right girl. He’s a shy,introverted man, who slowly falls for an intelligent woman and is rejected rudely by her. He understands what he did wrong and makes a conscious effort to change himself. He then meets that woman again through a chance encounter and tries to get to know her better. He spends time with her and her family. He never makes her feel uncomfortable.
He then proposes to her, in the absence of any witness and without any declaration of sorts giving her full freedom to reject him again and not suffer any consequences for it(unlike Mr. Collins). He proposes to her again only because he knows her better now and Elizabeth’s conversation with his aunt gave him hope that her feelings may have changed. He would never have proposed again if he thought her feelings to remain the same. And then he vows to remain silent on the matter forever if she rejects him. This man from 1813 understands consent and respect in a manner men in 2018 really don’t. He just doesn’t deserve to be hated on account of people who misinterpret his character arc.
Mr. Darcy can be no one’s excuse to date assholes. Even Mrs. I-just-want-my-daughters-to-marry-rich Bennet is disapproving of him when he’s being one.
I think the idea that Elizabeth didn’t change at all herself is a little unfair. She did after all admit that she allowed her initial perceptions to be shaped by what she was told by Wickham.
Really the title refers to them both (and everyone in the book) in that they both allow their pride and prejudices to drive them rather than being open to everyone with a blank slate. Darcy’s driven from the side of putting over emphasis on his birth station and wealth; Elizabeth’s driven by her belief that she is so opened minded and fair when really she is being naive.
But ultimately I think the difference between Elizabeth and the I’ll-date-this-jerk-hoping-to-change-him is that Elizabeth didn’t date the jerk. Only once she saw repeated evidence of the true nature of his character did she give him thought as a partner. She didn’t try to change him at all, she didn’t even wait for him to change himself. She carried on with her life and it was all on him to change to be who she wanted to be with.
Darcy actually treats the people he despises pretty fairly and was doing that before he met Lizzie. Wickam, after spending all the money left to him by the late Mr Darcy, built up significant debt gambling and attempted to elope with Georgiana (15 at the time), to force Darcy to pay him off. So he prevented the elopment, but payed off the debt anyway. After this, Wickam joined the army, he couldn’t have done that having debts ‘of honour’ unsettled. So, Darcy protected his reputation twice while Wickam dragged his name through the mud, to gain the sympathy of women (told Lizzie that he had been thrown out without a cent). This is the experience that (probably) caused him to keep his guard up in regards to ‘golddiggers’. So, when the crowd at the Meryton ball begins whispering about his salary of 10.000, as soon as he walks in, of course he tenses up. Also, he is couteous to Caroline Bingley despite the fact that she is filrting with him because she wants to social climb to his level. She’s his best friend’s sister, so he is polite to her, listens to her neverendingly and almost never talks back. Finally, the catch in the novel is: he is unfairly judged by Elizabeth in the same way he unfairly judges Jane. He, after seeing the whole family in awe at Bingley’s fortune, takes Jane’s shyness for indiference and assumes she wants only his money. In the same way, Lizzie takes Darcy’s shyness for pride. You can see he is doing the right things, he tries to talk to her, but doesn’t know how, he dances with her (she likes dancing, he doesn’t). He just doesn’t know how to let his feelings show