picking up crumbs

He is doing his best not to ruin this family bonding moment.

Spent today thinking about what Miss Lemon was doing before she started working for Poirot…

And I’d like to think that she was working for some company director who was a major asshole a stickler for things being done his way and he probably kept getting on Miss Lemon for filing things in the way she does because it’s ‘a waste of time’ and she could ‘better spend her time perfecting the correspondence’ and bullshit like that

And one day this short little private detective with a curly moustache and a great little accent walks through the door and starts flustering the company director by asking him a whole bunch of questions that he can’t answer

but then Miss Lemon speaks up from behind them. Because she actually can answer those questions. Because she has the receipts filed away. In triplicate. Cross-referenced by category.

And Poirot is probably super impressed by the way she just opens a few drawers and gives him all the papers he needs.

Anyway later. The company director gets arrested and charged with murdering his business partner. And then Poirot offers Miss Lemon a job as his secretary

Print available on my INPRNT.

Jane’s eyes were wide with dismay, uncomforted by the mirth sparkling in those of her sister. “Oh my dear Lizzy,” she exclaimed. “Surely that was not what he said. I cannot believe it of him; so very genteel a man, and Mr Bingley spoke so highly of him.”

“Did he?” returned Elizabeth, in high glee. “But I have not done! For Mr Darcy had not done at that time, but went on to say that he was in no humour to give consequence to young ladies who are slighted by other men!”

“Nay, Lizzy!” Jane protested, very near real distress. “It cannot be so. Is it not possible for you to have misheard him? There was such a crowd that evening, and the violins played with such spirit.”

Elizabeth shook her head and said with affected reproach: “You wish me to doubt my own senses, which is very ungenerous of you. And may I say, very misguided too, for if you go on as you are, you will be forced to deny the same credit to what I overhead Mr Bingley say about you.”

A touch of heightened colour came into Jane’s cheeks. “Whatever could Mr Bingley have had to say about me?”

“Something far better worth listening to than what his friend had to say,” Elizabeth said archly. “And certainly more astute, for I heard him declare that you were the most beautiful creature he ever beheld.”

A flush of deep crimson passed over Jane’s features and for a moment she was unable to meet even the gaze of her favourite sister. Elizabeth waited, smiling in sisterly pride and keen enjoyment, until Jane began modestly:

“If he truly did say such a thing, I am sure—”

“You may depend upon it that he did,” Elizabeth interrupted her in high spirits. “I heard every word. Shall I give you the whole exchange? Except I shall not do Mr Bingley justice, I am sure. He said first that he had never met with so many pleasant girls in his life as he had that evening, to which Mr Darcy replied: You are dancing with the only handsome girl in the room—there, Jane, now you must believe me, for I would not have allowed him to say anything so near the truth if I had been inventing—and then Mr Bingley returned: Oh, she is the most beautiful creature I ever beheld!”

“You take delight in confusing me,” Jane protested, looking as red as her roses.

The song "In-Between" from Lerner and Lowe's Paint Your Wagon could be rewritten with new lyrics to be about her.

*She's not very rich or of high status compared to others in her circle: that fact is an essential plot point, especially for how socially beneath Darcy she is. Yet she's still a member of the gentry, she is rich compared to most of England's population, and her circle also includes people of lower status than hers.

*She's not outstandingly beautiful: her own future love interest dismisses her looks as just "tolerable" at first. But neither is she plain: other characters consider her very pretty, as does Darcy eventually.

*She's in her early 20s, so she's more mature than Austen's teenage heroines, yet not approaching spinsterhood either.

*There are several characters who don't like her and aren't very nice to her, yet she's no outcast, but is well-liked in general.

*She's her father's favorite daughter, but her mother's least favorite daughter, so she has some experience of being both "the golden child" and "the black sheep" in her family.

*She's not a perfect refined lady, but neither is she a tomboy.

*She's not conservative about manners: her liveliness, playfulness, and willingness to speak her mind are some of her defining traits. Yet she's not so liberal as to ignore basic decorum: on the contrary, she's second only to Jane as the most polite member of her family, and sometimes she judges other people's character too much by their social graces.

*She's prickly, judgmental, and outspoken – obviously not the traditional sweet, innocent heroine type like her sister Jane. Yet she's not mean either, but has a strong undercurrent of sweetness, caring, and (as mentioned) politeness to her character.

*In her relationship with her emotions, she's neither an Elinor Dashwood nor a Marianne Dashwood: she's not reserved or stoic, but neither does she let passion control her.

*Compared to her ultra-pragmatic friend Charlotte, she's a romantic. But compared to her tender-hearted sister Jane, she's very down-to-earth and practical.

*She's willing to question certain social norms (e.g. mercenary marriages) and to criticize the bad behavior of people who outrank her in status. Yet she's not a total revolutionary, but knows when the most practical choice is to play by society's rules (e.g. reluctantly accepting Lydia and Wickham's marriage as necessary).

*We get a strong sense of her physicality: she loves to go for long walks, she's a fast runner, she blushes, etc. Yet she's not just a strong physical presence, but is also a very intellectual, thoughtful heroine.

*She's not always right, but not always wrong either. She learns from Darcy, but he also learns from her.

*By the end of the novel, she grows and changes in important ways: she becomes humbler, more considerate, and a better judge of character. But in equally important ways, she stays the same: she never loses her wit, liveliness, courage, or fundamental self-respect.

When there's a heroine of a well-known story whom everyone loves and considers a role model, but she's completely different from you and you know you'll never be like her, it makes sense to want to tear her down a little bit. Especially if she has flaws that her fans tend to ignore, or if there are supporting characters or other stories' heroines whom you like just as well if not better, but whom the fandoms either ignore or bash for not being like her. So it makes sense to want to write either (a) original fiction with a heroine who's more like you, with a character similar the popular heroine portrayed as more flawed, or (b) a perspective flip of the popular story that makes a different character the protagonist and frames the original heroine in a less positive light.

But sometimes, the popular heroine's flaws are already acknowledged in the original text, maybe even to excess; just because the fandom forgets them doesn't mean we should judge her more harshly than the already judgmental original author did. And maybe more importantly, sometimes in her original story, that heroine was a misfit or an underdog; maybe she was written to deconstruct an earlier concept of who "deserves" to be a heroine.

In one of the fantasy stories I write just for fun (which I might try to publish someday), I originally had a supporting character who was modeled after Jo March in Little Women. I didn't portray her very positively, because I wanted to highlight Jo's flaws that pop culture tends to overlook and to point out that other girls like her sisters are just as worthy to be heroines. But then I had second thoughts. Pop culture may sometimes overlook Jo's flaws, but Jo's creator and real-life counterpart Louisa May Alcott certainly didn't! Alcott is sometimes very self-deprecating in her portrayal of Jo! Maybe too much so. And among the Little Women fans whose favorite March sister is Amy and who passionately defend her online (a cause I support), I see them take bad faith interpretations of Jo’s character that aren’t the way I read her at all, and basically shame her for being a tomboy. I finally decided that Jo has been deconstructed enough.

So I made some changes to that character in my story and decided to model her after Elizabeth Bennet in Pride and Prejudice instead. Goodness knows, the Austen fandom has always idealized Elizabeth too much, and sometimes been nasty about other Austen heroines (e.g. Fanny Price) because they're not feisty or witty like she is. And since Elizabeth is much more ladylike then she's often remembered as being, deconstructing her a little wouldn't feel like tomboy-shaming. But now I’m having second thoughts about this choice too. In certain parts of the Austen fandom, it seems to be popular nowadays to accuse Elizabeth of being "mean" – to Darcy, to her sisters, to Charlotte, or to anyone she ever has a negative opinion about – which most of the time just isn't true. I've also been concerned about what I’ve read of Elizabeth’s portrayal in The Other Bennet Sister, and how it frames her as something of a privileged foil to her underdog sister Mary. Because I realized that the original Elizabeth is an underdog in her own right: not compared to Mary, but compared to Jane. Unlike her older sister, who is more traditional heroine material, she’s not a model of beauty, gentleness, sweetness, or good manners: she’s outspoken, sassy, and cynical, rich people talk behind her back about her unfashionable manners, she has actual flaws and character development, and even her own love interest finds her looks only “tolerable” at first. Part of Austen’s whole point in creating her might have been to make a heroine out of a girl who wouldn’t normally be one.

For a similar reason, I have misgivings about people who want to deconstruct Emma because of how “unlikable” Emma is: for example, Andrew Davies’ planned sequel with Jane Fairfax as the heroine, which he wants to do because, in his opinion, “Jane Fairfax is the real heroine of Emma.” Some Austen fans argue that this is missing the whole point, because Jane Fairfax is the girl who traditionally would be the heroine. What makes the novel unique is that a character like Emma would typically be the "mean girl," foil to the heroine, à la Caroline Bingley or Mary Crawford, but instead she is the heroine, and is made likable despite her flaws and allowed to grow and change.

Also: if you haven’t studied literature and/or studied history, you do need to become a bit of an authority on what you’re adapting, why it was written how it was in its day, and what’s been done before before you can present a “groundbreaking” or “twisted” adaptation. I’m thinking about Netflix’s Persuasion. I’m thinking about the era of Disney movies and copycat media where every female character has to comment on things like “not needing a man to save her”and in doing so flattened into less nuanced characters than their predecessors, because they were all wasting more time with the audience’s perceptions of their story than their function in it. I’m thinking about a large number of trend-chasing “feminist retellings” of women from mythologies or Shakespeare or etc. that are too often afraid of giving their protagonists flaws, that too often misrepresent the traits they had and actions they took, and too often fail to engage in why the story existed, what it said, and what’s been done before in a meaningful way.

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I read that woman’s biography (Mosaic) and her autobiography (The Autobiography of Kathryn Janeway), and listened to her later tell her own crew of various adventures like sneaking out of the house and walking miles in a thunderstorm after losing a tennis match.

woman almost died cave diving because her friends chickened out and she went with a boy instead. got a commendation for sneaking off campus because she saved an old woman’s life in the process. built a replica of da vinci’s flying machine so she could pilot it onto the roof of the dean’s office.

Kathryn Janeway is a scientist in the way Indiana Jones is an archaeologist. undoubtedly qualified, but there’s gonna be a caper about it.

rather than view her statement as an outright lie or a bad characterization by the writers, however, the funnier option is that she thinks of herself as rather introverted, withdrawn, and nerdy. That she is so deep in the trenches of her own mental landscape that she doesn’t realize that other people view her pursuit of science and diplomacy as acts of extreme charismatic recklessness.