Location and Love
Pride and Prejudice and Social Distance
Romance is often at its very core about proximity, and the intimacy that comes from being physically close with someone. So, what happens when you fall in love from afar? When instead of conversations built on the foundations of eye contact and other social cues, you're charmed by someone through letters and pictures? This distance inevitably changes the process of falling in love, even if it doesn't change the end result. In Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, a lot of the relationship growth between Elizabeth and Darcy (or at least, Elizabeth learning that Darcy is someone who she could fall in love with) occurs when the two are not together.
Pride and Prejudice is one of Jane Austen’s most popular novels, following the love (and sometimes hate) story of the proud Mr. Darcy and the fiercely independent Elizabeth Bennet, who is prejudiced against the former. This story is above all about miscommunication. Funnily enough, the miscommunications that led to our main conflict in the text happen face to face, rather than through letters as one would expect.
Although many of the estates in Pride and Prejudice are fictional, scholars have figured out rough approximations of where they would be. Below is a map by Patrick Wilson laying out all the locations in the novel.
As you can see from the above map, the distance between Longbourn and Pemberley is far from insignificant. Especially considering the limitations of travel in the 1800s, which were even more intensive for women of the period who couldn't move around without a chaperone, space is a sizable obstacle. However, despite this physical distance (and the social distance) between Elizabeth and Darcy, the two still manage to fall in love.
Almost every single time that Darcy and Elizabeth are put in a room together, they wind up misunderstanding something that the other person said, or misreading a stray facial expression. It is only when Lizzie interacts with Darcy in the abstract, whether that be seeing a painting of him, reading a letter from him, or hearing about him from someone else's perspective, like from his servant Mrs. Reynolds, that she begins to fall for him.
When Elizabeth visits Pemberly with her aunt and uncle shortly after turning down Darcy's marriage proposal, she is horrified at the idea that Darcy might be there at the time, seeing her at his home acting like a tourist in the house that she just denied sharing with him. She asks around and finds that he isn't there, letting her breathe a sigh of relief and be able to relax and look around her.
Chatsworth House in Derbyshire is commonly thought to have been Austen's inspiration for the fictional Pemberley estate, and is where the scenes set at Pemberley were shot in the 2005 film adaptation.
When she's been separated from Darcy the physical, she is left to think about and reckon with Darcy the metaphysical. Darcy is not in Derbyshire, but her idea of him is, and is growing more and more complex as she sees the versions of him that exist at Pemberly; namely his portrait and Mrs. Reynold's glowing review of him. It is only when Elizabeth is not eye to eye with the real Darcy that she is able to have the emotional distance that is necessary for her to reconsider the hard stance she's taken on who Darcy is and whether she wants anything to do with him.
“There was certainly at this moment, in Elizabeth's mind, a more gentle sensation towards the original than she had ever felt at the height of their acquaintance. The commendation bestowed on him by Mrs. Reynolds was of no trifling nature... Every idea that had been brought forward by the housekeeper was favorable to his character, and as she stood before the canvas on which he was represented, and fixed his eyes upon herself, she thought of his regard with a deeper sentiment of gratitude than it had ever raised before; she remembered its warmth, and softened its impropriety of expression”
Also important in this equation is the fact that shortly before Elizabeth arrives at Pemberly, she has received and pored over a letter from Darcy. This letter is the beginning of the turn that Elizabeth takes from hating Darcy to falling in love with him, and what allows her to take in what Mrs. Reynolds has to say, to look at the portrait with understanding and empathy. It is the first time that Elizabeth has had the chance to really and truly listen to anything Darcy has to say and has been able to re-read his words, to marinate in his point.
When you see someone without really seeing them (like admiring them in a painting or reading what they wrote you in a letter), you can believe whatever you want about them. You set the tone and the framework of the conversation, because in many ways it is a one-way conversation. If they had spoken in person, and Darcy had delivered his diatribe to her face, there would’ve been no ignoring some of the tone that Darcy may have intended in the letter, tone that she had so often heard and disliked from him, and Elizabeth might never have been able to forgive him, much less fall in love with him. This distance allows for a certain fantasy to be created, the ability to believe something about the other person or ignore a flaw that can’t be ignored or overlooked in an in-person interaction.
Although academics aren't sure what place Longbourn is based off of, the 2005 film adaptation used Groombridge Place as the set for scenes there. PHOTOGRAPH: iStockphoto © thejack
The moment that solidifies the future of Elizabeth and Darcy's relationship actually occurs when half of the party isn't even there. When Darcy hears second hand of the discussion between Lady Catherine de Bourgh and Elizabeth (which takes place at Longbourn while Darcy is at Pemberly) wherein Elizabeth refuses to promise Lady Catherine that she won't marry her nephew, it gives him the hope that he needs to come to Longbourn and offer Elizabeth his hand in marriage.
There are two major moving parts to this moment; Elizabeth having realized that she does in fact love Darcy and telling Lady Catherine that, and Darcy hearing about this interaction and being willing to put his pride at risk again after being so intensely refused during his first proposal. Both of these happen when Darcy and Elizabeth are nowhere near each other. In fact, just prior to this scene the two had been in the same room for a dinner when Bingley comes to propose to Jane, and because of the complete and utter lack of communication between them in person, both of them leave the interaction more sure than ever that the other doesn't share their feelings. In equal parts shyness, insecurity, and pride, it is only when the two are apart and interacting with the concepts of one another rather than the real thing that they can come to any sort of understanding.
Location is a huge theme in Pride and Prejudice. The movement from estate to estate and town to town is what moves the plot along, and our characters travel through huge spreads of England to be together with friends or family. With all this in mind, the idea of location as being not a way to be together, but to be apart and to sit with oneself and have a moment to collect, is a novel one. It stands out as a different way of connecting with someone, and is a significant part of the development of the relationship between Elizabeth and Darcy.