Pride and Prejudice

Not a review of the book, rather a review of the feelings, a diary entry, and boarder line rant.


It's not you it's me?

It's not the women, it's the time period?

I'm breaking up with this book because it makes me feel bad. It makes me feel ignorant, like a bad feminist, guilty, a little angry, annoyed, and made me argue with myself.

I couldn't get past the nature of the characters, such boy crazy, manipulative, frivolous, flat, say nothing bunch. ‘Great minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events, and small minds discuss people.' I had assumed Austin to be a great mind, but her story comes off as delivered through that of the small and average minded.

I understand that women of the time were confined in socioeconomic/legal/cultural/etc. ways. but I can't accept them. I struggle to sympathize for them, I find myself strongly disliking them. Even with Elizabeth I find myself rolling my eyes at her, trying to imagine why walking three miles is hard. And that is a crux of the entire book. Because her not being able to get home conveniently for days moves the plot along.
I walk three miles in less than an hour (carrying a bag and usually a conversation). “But she wears petticoats, you wear jeans; and countryside is rough, you have sidewalks” says a dissenting voice. And the argument in my head goes on, meanwhile the audiobook keeps playing. Also they keep saying that Elizabeth walked there alone, but she had company for a good part of the way, and she doesn't correct them.

Oh also the believe that a woman has to change a man and/or manipulate him into marriage goes against my core beliefs.

I must have read this wrong, missed the point, or am just not compatible with this book.