Fitzwilliam Darcy's Accomplished Woman Spring
A response to the "get a hobby" discourse by looking at what Jane Austen's heroines did in their free time
“A woman must have a thorough knowledge of music, singing, drawing, dancing, all the modern languages, to deserve the word; and besides all this, she must possess a certain something in her air and manner of walking, the tone of her voice, her address and expressions, or the word will be but half deserved.”
Pride and Prejudice
Every time the ice begins to melt off the branch to reveal the bud, an accompanying feeling arises in me: to read regency/Victorian era novels, particularly pleasant and beautiful ones. Little Women, Pride and Prejudice, Howard’s End, and more spring to mind each spring. There is something about the style of writing about nature (likely influenced by the co-occurring transcendentalism movement’s emphasis on knowing the divine through knowing the earthly) that makes it feel that through a dose of these books each day, my vision becomes clearer to be present to the change of season.
Of all of these, Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice remains a favorite, for its rambunctious, inappropriately hot-girl-walk loving Elizabeth, and the awe-struck and curmudgeonly Mr. Darcy.
We are in the early spring again, and the ice is finally beginning to melt. We just ended Get Off Your Phone February, and in that we tried to take time off of screens to build slower routines, rituals, and hobbies. As I look towards spring and the summer it starts to remind me of, what I most want to feel is present and energized. I want to have capacity to go on long hikes or walk for hours through small coastal towns. I want to feel like I’ve worked to sever the strength of the tie screens can have on me, and to be practiced at experiencing the sensation of awkwardness, annoyance, or uncertainty that having a life well lived often entails. I want to feel things as they happen, and create more capacity to have reverie in which I’m reflecting rather than consuming.