It is a truth universally acknowledged that anyone who loves Pride and Prejudice writes at least one bland piece of writing that starts with the words ‘it is a truth universally acknowledged’ and feels smug about it. It’s the kind of thing doing which has no import whatsoever, except for people like me to keep their impostor syndrome at bay by making intellectual references to Victorian writers. And to express our undying admiration for Jane Austen.
(NOTE: My smart-ass writer husband just told me that Austen is not Victorian because Queen Victoria came after her. So I’m evidently not as clever as I like to feel while making classical literature references. As an act of kindness, please remind me never to mention in public that I studied history in high school.)
Now, coming back to Austen. I have obviously considered other ways to declare my love for her, a somewhat less sophisticated one being my decision to name my dog Mr Darcy. A dog I don’t have yet. A dog I’m likely to never get because I wouldn’t know what to do with it when I leave for work. And also because my husband refuses to be party to any cleaning of poop and pee, which is a problem because that’s the part I had decided to delegate to him in my pet-parenting plan.
By the way, his refusal to tend to refuse is also one of the reasons we have decided not to have a baby. But our respective mothers would never let us hear the end of it if they come to know it’s the potty we worry about, so we never tell them the real reason. We talk instead about the fact that our landlord just dug a deeper borewell to find water, that oxygen bars are a legit business, and that Umar Khalid is still in jail while genocidal fascists smoke their bidis at the corner panwaadi.
By now, we’ve made every possible argument about the world going to the dogs instead of telling them that diapers stink. But that argument would never stand a chance with two determined women who insist they are being cheated, nay deprived, of their chance to experience grandmotherhood. And with both our younger brothers still enjoying their debauched bachelor lives, the saga continues (I know what you’re thinking, but no, I’m not going to suggest to anyone, least of all our very Indian mothers, that their sons don’t necessarily have to wed to be able to father children).
But, I digress. When I told my brother that I’d like to name my (imaginary) dog Mr Darcy, he asked me if it signalled my deep affection for this hypothetical dog or a pseudo-feminist ploy to insult men by naming a dog after a beloved male character. What a strange question to ask an Austen devotee! Because it is also a truth universally acknowledged that for any Austen fan with half a brain and quarter of a heart, Mr Darcy can be critiqued and questioned, but never hated. Just ask those of us who still miss that Orkut community called ‘Where’s My Darcy?’.
PS: The mention of Orkut has perhaps piqued your curiosity about my age. Suffice it to say, I’m old enough to have had a major teenage crush on Rahul Dravid, worn plastic tattoo jewellery and declared Enrique to be my favorite singer. I have greys on my head but not so many that I can demand senior citizen benefits. Yet, not so few that no older lady has never addressed me as behenji.
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