Last week there was a girl in my class nagging about how there was a guy she liked who was a little bit reluctant to get "more serious," as she put it. While I was trying to solve some dopey discrete mathematics problems a couple of rows behind her, she kept disclosing all the details of her solution to everyone who was willing to pay attention: "So I said: 'Hey, man! There are other guys I like as well, so we either start a relationship now, or it's over.'"
For a reason unknown to me my abdominal muscles start contracting a little in situations like those, so I've been getting a lot of workout without visiting the gym lately. Moreover, it makes me sad to learn there are people starting relationships knowing that they're only marginally better then the rest. For the past year or so I've been feeling exceedingly confused about situations alike because they didn't make sense to me. Allow me to elaborate with another example.
There is an internet company named Avid Life Media, whose mission it is to hook up like-minded individuals. What this like-mindedness entails is told by their various 'brands', or websites. They host CougarLife, a community for 'sexy, older women' looking for 'ambitions, young men', they also provide the internet commune with SwapperNet 'the most authentic swingers community'. Swing, I thought it had something to do with a dance from the late 40s of the last century, but this website isn't targeted at fervent dancers. Instead, it's aimed at couples and individuals who are looking for multi-way intercourse. And then there is Avid Life's flagship, Ashley Madison: a dating service for married individuals who are actively looking to pursue an affair.
I was vexed.
All my life I'd grown up believing that Love was something profound, honest and romantic and now, all of a sudden, enormous dating communities emerge that have nothing profound and honest about them. And at the same time there are also crazy individuals and companies claiming that their operations are related to Love but I completely fail to see the link. Feeling completely alienated from the modern approach to romance I thought: "I don't want to be part of this circus anymore, lets call it a day."
Fortunately I got about reading 'Pride and Prejudice' before making any drastic decisions.
What happens in Austen's novel on the romantic level is completely different from the contemporary situation, at least, that's what it seems like if you consider the instances I described above. Mister Bingley and Jane meet a couple of times and then get separated for a long while and they crave for each other (though in a very non-physical way) and in the end they meet again, finally declare their love for each other and get married. It's even more stretched with Mister Darcy and Elizabeth for they despise each other at first and leaded by their pride and prejudice they continue to do so (in word, not in thought) for a considerable while and at the end all their romantic scruples lead them to the other's hand.
To me, 'Pride and Prejudice' presents us with a unique vision of what the core of Love is like, the kind of Love you write about with a capital 'L'. It's not directly related to any interaction on the physical level, yet it's on a much more emotional basis. This core of Love never changes, hence we can still comprehend and relate to what Austen, George Elliot and Shakespeare had to say on the subject. The cloud that surrounds it changes through the years, though. Fueled by people's unhappiness with their current situations instances as mentioned above come into existence.
The striking fact I observe is that while you already may have found Love, the profound kind, you'll never know for sure. And this unknowing, this uncertainty, is able to put you out of reach of what you already had.
I'm very happy to have gotten around reading a 1813 novel which seemed a little dusty and boring at first.
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