Consider this (based on a conversation I had with some friends a while ago): Pride and Prejudice and Zombies for people who actually like Pride and Prejudice. LookāI tried to read Pride and Prejudice and Zombies and I got about 20 pages in before I came to the conclusion that the person who wrote it did so out of the belief that the original Pride and Prejudice was stuffy and boring. There were out of character vulgar puns. And the trailer for the movie did not convince me that I had missed anything by cutting short my reading experience. So, what Iām talking about here is this premise: the world of Pride and Prejudice, but if you die, itās highly likely, almost certain that your corpse will get up and try to eat people. But no one dies in Pride and Prejudice, you might say. In fact, few or no people die in any Jane Austen novel. This is true. But people do get sick with some regularity. Imagine the tension added to Jane getting sick after going to visit Bingley if there was the chance that she would become a zombie after she died. Becoming a zombie in an eligible bachelorās house probably would have seriously wrecked any chances of any of the living sisters ending up with him. Imagine Mr. Collins, as a minister, having the duty upon someoneās death of severing their head with a ceremonial plate or something that would prevent the corpse from rising. Obviously important, but this only makes him more self-important and obnoxious. And dangerous. For you see, in this version, Mr. Bennett, who stays in his office all the time, whose life is the only thing allowing Mrs. Bennett and her daughters to stay in the houseāMr. Bennett is definitely a zombie. He died at home, and Mrs. Bennett decided that, no way were they dealing with this, and soā¦just started faking it. Jane and Elizabeth know. The younger sisters donāt. In this universe, I think we have to go with zombies that are not any faster or stronger than the humans they were, and in fact tend to get weaker as time passes because their flesh is rotting. Andā¦hmm, okay, how about they are pretty violent upon rising, and for about a week afterward, trying to bite people and spread the infection (even though most people are carriers anyway, but getting a nasty bite from a corpse will give you other stuff that will have you die while carrying the virus). But then they calm down and basically just start sort of attempting to act like they did in life, that is, taking habitual actions with no consciousness, in a depressing and desiccated way. So Mr. Bennett is a zombie, and Mrs. Bennettās number one goal is to get her daughters married before anyone finds that out. And this, actually, makes Elizabethās refusal of Mr. Collins more frustrating for Mrs. Bennettāobviously Mr. Bennett didnāt tell Elizabeth that she could refuse Mr. Collins, because Mr. Bennett is dead, but Mrs. Bennett canāt say anything or the game would be up. Another question in this versionādoes Mr. Darcy find out about Mr. Bennett being a zombie somehow? Does Elizabeth find out that he knows and didnāt say anything and this is something that helps repair his earlier actions? Anyway, this is the Pride and Prejudice and Zombies that I was looking for.
Okay also: in the original, when Elizabeth walks through the rain all the way to bingleyās to care for Jane while sheās sick, itās a very dramatic expression of both Elizabethās love for her sister and her penchant for flamboyant rebellion, but consider, if there is a chance Jane will wake up a zombie and Elizabeth knows it, how does that change the dynamic? Elizabeth might be going to help take care of Jane, or to *take care* of Jane should things take a more morbid turnā¦by killing her zombie sister.
This works especially well if zombieism is communicable prior to death; if mr. Bennett is a zombie and only the elder Bennetts know, that means Jane has been pre-exposed and is almost certain to wake up as a zombie should she die in the Bingleysā careā which the Bingleys do not know. Elizabeth has to forge through the rain to be there in case things get ugly, because she knows that the Bingleys arenāt prepared.
And I think you pretty much HAVE to make Mr. Bennettās zombie status play a role in how and why Darcy separates Bingley from Janeāthe heavy implication behind Darcyās line about the want of propriety shown even by her father hits Elizabeth like a ton of bricks as she realizes he knowsāhe knows, and he thought Jane lying to Bingley about it was evidence that Jane didnāt love Bingleyābutābut Darcy must not have told Bingley that part of it. Bingley couldnāt keep a secret on his life; if he knew, his sister would know, and word would already be out and theyād have been ruined by nowā
And of course, not only does the fact that Darcy, who owes their family nothing, has kept and continues to keep this secret for them even after Elizabethās refusal deepen the gratitude she begins to feel for him after the letter of explanation, but it also liberates Elizabeth to fall in love with him. Because Elizabeth-who-wants-to-marry-for-love would never be happy marrying someone who didnāt know the family secret in advance. She had resigned herself to spinsterhood because she couldnāt be satisfied with having to hoodwink someone to have their hand, but also couldnāt put her family at risk by trusting someone who wasnāt bound to them by more than an engagement. (Maybe she was even tempted to confide in Wickham at one point, and hasnāt Darcyās letter proven she was absolutely right not to yield to that passing thought.) But Darcy figured it out himself, and heās kept her trust, and she could fall in love with him without guiltāif she hadnāt already turned him down.
AND THEN LYDIA HAPPENS. And Darcy realizes immediately that Mr. Bennett canāt do anything to recover herāand if Mr. Bennett doesnāt do anything about Lydia, Mr. Collins might become suspicious, or even just officously involve himself, so find out the while thing. When Darcy blames himself for not revealing Wickhamās character, itās with a much more immediate sense of urgency. Itās not that the other sistersā marriage prospects being ruined may impoverish them down the roadāit might immediately drag them all into destitution. Thatās why he rushes off to go look for Lydia himself.
