A World of Worrying

“Poor Mr. Woodhouse was silent from consternation.” -- Chapter 15 Emma

There’s weather, then there’s worrying. And the world of Mr. Woodhouse is filled with worry.

In Austen’s Emma, the father is an elderly man reduced to his worries. Worrying about the weather. Worrying about health — his and everyone’s around him. And worrying about travel, both far and near.

In today’s world Mr. Woodhouse might be termed anxious. Indeed, his anxiety for everything and everyone around him reminds me of my late father, who worried about time — constantly checking his watch (even though he was chronically early for every appointment); the location of his wallet — patting his pants pocket multiple times after leaving the house; and, once he did, making sure he knew the whereabouts of his house keys. I cannot describe his consternation as we sat in a taxicab one winter’s day wondering whether we’d be late for a train from Penn Station.

One of the delightful features of listening to Austen on audio books is that you begin to feel the creeping claustrophobia of being in a room with an incessant worrier, such as Mr. Woodhouse. I walk while listening to Austen and whole city blocks can be measured by the amount of time taken to feel the fretting of Mr. Woodhouse on, say, a carriage ride in the snow, swimming in the sea, or the particular evil of eating cake.

The Return of Rain

Anyone who has spent any time in England knows about rain. And that particular damp chill that my late mother-in-law once referred to as “raw.”

In Austen, someone, always a female, sits inside looking out a window. At the rain, the clouds, the mud. The impossibility of going out.

We’ve experienced a drought – the first in a long time – and the days have been brilliantly sunny and mild. But this morning, as I walked the dog, it rained all day and it was raw. As well as grey.

Grey is very Austen – there is even a Miss Grey who mucks up the works for Marianne is Sense and Sensibility– and I once wrote an essay called “Getting Used to Grey,” about the seasonal shift in New York from the bright sun of the fall to the blanket of gloom that descends on the region around Thanksgiving, not to leave us until May.

This is the season of being inside, of tea and books, of distractions that take us away from the weather, which is certainly a character in much of Austen. An easy nemesis to many plans, it drives her heroines indoors, relegating them to endless games of whist or piquet or performances on the pianoforte. Indeed, there must be university shelves filled with weather as subject in the novels of Austen.

I am once more getting used to grey, battling my own tendency to stay indoors, and argue the impossibility of going out. Thank goodness dogs needs walking, errands need running, and bodies need exercise.

‘Tis the season of grey. And the return of rain.

Chaos and Comfort

It is always most evident that in times of great chaos a need arises for the utmost of comforts.

For some, it’s sports. For others, TV. For me, Austen suffices.

I have read most of her novels but am now listening to the most excellent Rosamund Pike on Audible. In order of publication, the glorious Sense and Sensibility, then the brilliant Pride and Prejudice.

I cannot describe how many hours my household spent watching the A&E P&P released in the 1990s, replete with the screeching Mrs. Bennett, and the ass-kissing Mr. Collins. But it is the extraordinary Anna Chancellor, who plays Caroline Bingley, that is most memorable, certainly for all the wonderful parts she has played over the years, but mostly for her “Duckface” moniker, aptly named by Hugh Grant in Four Weddings and a Funeral.

Why Duckface now? Because there is a marvelous scene where Caroline critiques Darcy’s handwriting, as he attempts to write a letter to his sister. She is all desperation, for of course she dreams of Darcy for herself.

Mr. Darcy was writing, and Miss Bingley, seated near him, was watching the progress of his letter and repeatedly calling off his attention by messages to his sister. Mr. Hurst and Mr. Bingley were at piquet, and Mrs. Hurst was observing their game.

Elizabeth took up some needlework, and was sufficiently amused in attending to what passed between Darcy and his companion. The perpetual commendations of the lady, either on his handwriting, or on the evenness of his lines, or on the length of his letter, with the perfect unconcern with which her praises were received, formed a curious dialogue, and was exactly in union with her opinion of each.

"How delighted Miss Darcy will be to receive such a letter!"

He made no answer.

"You write uncommonly fast."

"You are mistaken. I write rather slowly."

"How many letters you must have occasion to write in the course of a year! Letters of business, too! How odious I should think them!"

"It is fortunate, then, that they fall to my lot instead of yours."

"Pray tell your sister that I long to see her."

"I have already told her so once, by your desire."

"I am afraid you do not like your pen. Let me mend it for you. I mend pens remarkably well."

"Thank you—but I always mend my own."

"How can you contrive to write so even?"

He was silent.

I’m reminded of the woman in my cursive handwriting seminar this summer, who spoke of her Mexican fathers and uncles and their extraordinary handwriting. “It was such a source of pride!” she said.

Indeed, in our time it is hard to picture how one would comment on the typing of another. What would one say?

“You type with such speed?”