Get it off your chest, get it off my desk

Episode 25: Show and Tell - Pride and Prejudice, out now!

Mar 01, 2024

Is it even a lit class if you never study Jane Austen? This week, we’re really putting the AP in AP Taylor Swift by drawing lyrical parallels to classic British novel Pride & Prejudice. Our song choices may surprise you, but we hope you’ll find we all make compelling cases for each of our show & tell songs. Spanning Taylor’s entire discography, we start with “I’m Only Me when I’m With You,” jump into “Haunted,” and finally end with “Lavender Haze,” thinking through how these songs represent different parts of the novel, different characters, and even different relationships.

👀 Sneak Peek

🛍️ Shop With Us! Active Discount Codes

As we grow, we are so excited to announce new partnerships! This section moving forward will be reserved for any active discount codes that are available to our listeners.

🔉Libro.fm - Support your local bookstore while listening to great audiobooks.

Code: APTS
Offer: Get a free audiobook when you start a new membership (you must use this link!)
Receive 2 audiobook credits for $14.99 USD with your first month of membership. Credits can be used on your choice of more than 450,000 audiobooks on Libro.fm.

Code: APTS30
Offer: 30% off specific audiobooks in the AP Taylor Swift playlist.

✨ Krowned Krystals - Make the whole place shimmer with the best rhinestones

Code: APTS
Offer: 10% off your order when you use the link above

🎒Extra credit this week - brought to you by Maansi

How Jane Austen & Taylor Swift amplify the female experience in their works

In so many conversations about Taylor’s lyrics, we inevitably find ourselves venturing into the world of feminism. As one of the most successful female artists the world has ever seen (indeed one of the most successful artists period!), Taylor Swift has a track record for shattering glass ceilings and painstakingly documenting her journey through her lyrics. It’s undeniable that she gives a voice to the female experience and pushes society to reflect on feminist issues through her art. In this way, she’s not dissimilar to other prominent female figures who have come before her, such as Jane Austen.

Share AP Taylor Swift

Reading Pride & Prejudice today, it can be too easy to question what exactly Jane Austen did for women. In her own day, she was what we would consider to be conservative. She wrote an entire novel about four girls and their marriage prospects— how forward-thinking was she really? Can we truly consider her to have pushed the boundaries of the female experience? While Jane Austen is perhaps not the most radical of feminists, she undoubtedly played an important role in amplifying the female experience in her own society. And though she lived at a time when marriage was “a truth universally acknowledged,” one way she did this very successfully was by establishing and setting a new standard for the ideal husband.

In Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen flawlessly captured society’s expectations of a suitable husband through Mr. Bingley: She points out the flaws in society’s expectations through Bingley’s flaws, provides an answer to those flaws through Mr. Darcy by filling the gaps where Mr. Bingley falls short, and ultimately pushes society to reconsider what they expect from the ideal husband.

Austen establishes Bingley as the ideal husband by societal standards early on the novel. He is praised, initially by Mrs. Bennet for his great fortune, but also by side characters like Sir William and Lady Lucas, for being “quite young, wonderfully handsome, extremely agreeable,” and fond of dancing, signaling that he checks all of society’s boxes for being a suitable husband (Austen 11). He also shines when compared to the characters of Mr. Collins and Mr. Wickham, the other suitors in the novel. Mr. Collins has a reasonable proposal, but is characterized as so absurd that there is never a doubt in the reader’s mind that Lizzy will reject his proposal. Mr. Wickham, though initially described as being “far beyond” the other officers in “countenance, air, and walk,” turns out to be a completely unrespectable man with little fortune (Austen 75). Mr. Bingley, however, is consistently the most sought after suitor for Jane throughout the novel. Upon her engagement, Jane exclaims, “I am certainly the most fortunate creature that ever existed!” and the Bennets are “speedily pronounced to be the luckiest family in the world,” (Austen 330-331). These statements show that Bennet family has accomplished something great by securing a marriage with Mr. Bingley, their society’s ideal husband.

A free-thinking husband

While Mr. Bingley has many reasons to shine, he pales in comparison to Mr. Darcy on the matter of his independence of thought. Mr. Bingley relies heavily on his friend’s opinions and is incapable of making a key decision about his own future by himself. He and Jane are getting along splendidly when, to the surprise of the Bennets, he leaves for London without any proper explanation. Darcy later reveals that “Bingley has great natural modesty, with a stronger dependence on [Darcy’s] judgement, than on his own,” (Austen 193). It is surprising that Bingley chooses to lean on others to guide him regarding his relationship, despite seemingly loving Jane. Towards the end of the novel, the only reason he ultimately accepts Jane and proposes to her is because Darcy has the chance to reexamine Jane and give Bingley his nod of approval.

This disappointing behavior is a far cry from Darcy’s attitude towards his own relationship with Elizabeth. Darcy is well aware that Lady Catherine de Bourgh, for example, strongly opposes his relationship with Elizabeth, but he cannot be bothered to care for anyone else’s opinion. Darcy’s decisiveness, steadfastness, and independence of thought, is portrayed as being superior to Bingley’s dependent nature, pushing the boundaries of what society should expect from the ideal husband.

Husbands’ attitudes towards their wives’ families

Darcy’s character also highlights Bingley’s shortcomings regarding his extension of love towards his wife’s family. Whereas Mr. Bingley loves Jane, he is unable to extend that affection to her family. In Austen’s era this may have been perfectly acceptable by societal standards, but through Mr. Darcy, Jane Austen points out that husbands can do better. When Mrs. Bennet makes a fool of herself when tempting Mr. Bingley to move to the countryside, in response, “Mr. Bingley was unaffectedly civil in his answer, and forced his younger sister to be civil also, and say what the occasion required,” (Austen 44). Here, and in later scenes when his sisters are complaining about the Bennets, Bingley does what is expected of him - he remains respectful, but does not go out of his way to defend the honor of his love’s family.

By contrast, Mr. Darcy also seems to share some of this disdain for the Bennets initially, but as he grows to care for Elizabeth, his chivalry begins to extend to her family as well. By the end of the novel, Mr. Darcy is responsible for Jane and Mr. Bingley’s relationship, and is the reason why Lydia is married off to Mr. Wickham. Mr. Darcy goes out of his way not once, but twice, to secure the happiness of Lizzy’s sisters and prevent any shame from befalling on her family. “Her heart did whisper, that he had done it for her,” (Austen 308.) Through Elizabeth’s thoughts, Austen confirms that Darcy’s concern for her family is an extension of Darcy’s love for her. Austen establishes Darcy as once again superior to Bingley in how he cares for his love’s family.

A husband with more depth

Perhaps the largest flaw with Mr. Bingley is that he is shallow, a quality which is answered only by Mr. Darcy’s complexity. Bingley and Jane fall in love almost immediately, untarnished by any pride or prejudice, and stay in love throughout the novel. Though this consistency initially seems ideal, especially by society’s standards, Mr. Bingley and Jane fell in love after very few interactions, which Jane Austen herself points out is problematic. “But though Bingley and Jane meet tolerably often, it is never for many hours together,” (Austen 23). Here, Bingley is already interested in Jane, despite their very minimal interactions and little changes by their engagement. Bingley ultimately proposes based on his shallow first impressions of Jane and the recommendations of his friends. Mr. Darcy, however, evolves and is willing to admit that his first impressions may be wrong. Through his willingness to change and reexamine the complexities of the human mind, Austen puts him in a league above Mr. Bingley once again.

Although Pride & Prejudice can feel trapped in peak regency era, full of stuffy balls that ultimately end in marriage, as a rare female author of her day, she did do something really extraordinary by pushing the boundaries and offering a female perspective on what constitutes a superior partner. She paints Mr. Bingley as the obvious choice for the ideal husband throughout the novel, yet highlights some obvious flaws in his character. By contrasting him with his dear friend, Mr. Darcy, Austen urges society to not settle, but rather to push the limits of what is truly ideal.

Similarly, Taylor Swift is often criticized for writing about her exes and her relationships. Perhaps 200 years from now, there will be those who dismiss her as being too traditional in her ideas of love. However, those of us who pay closer attention to her lyrics recognize the layers of feminist undertones and appreciate how she is capturing the female experience and pushing the boundaries of our own society.

AP Taylor Swift Podcast

Discussion about this post