A review of The Other Bennet Sister

The Perrins go to London

We had a great time in London over the weekend. When the right wing people say that ‘nothing works’ anymore or that London is over I am always very sceptical. I know what you will say, oh Laura you are only there for a few days and you are in the touristy spots, what do you know? But this isn’t true. We were staying with friends in the east which is not a tourist hot spot. Sure, you must keep your wits about you but there is life in that city yet.

For instance and this always kills me. I know from my phone that I landed at Gatwick airport at 13:14. I arrived in Victoria station at 14:17. That is an hour from the plane to the centre of London. Yes everything aligned. We landed, got off the plane and as it was Gatwick no one checked our passports coming from Ireland. We all know why… The fast train arrived immediately and that was that. That is a pretty good transport system if you ask me.

I travelled with Emma (11) and John (4). I truly believe they learn more on these few days than weeks in school. John loves the trains, which are very whizzy. He has to walk much more than at home. And most of all they have to be patient. They must wait in line at the airport, they must wait for the next train. They have to wait.

We also went to Emmet’s Garden in Kent on Saturday. We missed the bluebells by a week but it was still wonderful. And I caught up with a lot of friends who joined me and the children for lunch.

One of the many things I miss not living in England is BBC iPlayer. (We have BBC but not iPlayer). Our dear friends had made the effort to record The Other Bennet Sister, a series based on Janice Hadlow’s 2020 bestseller of the same name. It centres on Mary Bennet, the nerdy sister in Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice. The friend I met on Friday said you won’t like it. I took great offence to this, demanding to know why. Anyway, sure enough, we didn’t like it.

The idea of retelling Pride and Prejudice through the eyes of one of the other sisters certainly is clever and has its possibilities. But if this is the stuff the BBC are churning out these days then I am not missing much. First, it is extremely difficult to watch other actresses play Jane and Elizabeth if you have seen the original Pride and Prejudice as many times as I have. Emma has also seen it.

(Houses of Parliament. Still impressive.)

As for the two actors who play Bingley and Mr Darcy (but don’t get any lines), I just don’t know where to start. It seems that all actors after Colin Firth believe that playing Mr Darcy means looking angry the entire time. But that is not his character. Mr Darcy is not angry, he is haughty and prideful. Do we see the distinction?

We (myself and Emma) also had serious quibbles with Mrs Bennet (played by Ruth Jones). Mrs Bennet (as I have written about previously) is a much misunderstood character. Even the original BBC P&P did not do her justice, making her out to be silly and frivolous, obsessed with marrying off her daughters. But at least in that series she was not mean and unkind to her daughter Mary. This is not how Jane Austen painted her character either.

How many times do I have to say it? If your financial security and day-to-day comfort was entirely dependent on your husband not dying you’d be a bit stressed out too. Goodness these days you can’t swing a cat before some wealthy westerner informs you about how ‘stressed’ they are and how they suffer from anxiety.

Mr and Mrs Bennet lived at Longbourn which was entailed. When Mr Bennet died this meant the entire estate passed to the odious cousin Mr Collins. Mrs Bennet and her five daughters would be left homeless. I’d be pretty stressed if I thought I and my four children would be left destitute and living off the goodwill of relatives should – God forbid – anything happen to my husband. If you want to know what that looks like, read Sense and Sensibility.

Not only was Mrs Bennet living with the Sword of Damocles hanging over her head but she knew that she had to marry off her five daughters. Therefore, she schemes, plans and hatches introductions so her daughters (especially Jane the eldest and a rare beauty and Elizabeth with her fine eyes and wit) can meet wealthy men. That was the responsible and caring thing for a mother in her position to do. As for the father, he was the neglectful and always to be found in the library.

In the latest BBC series Mrs Bennet delivers sharp put-downs to Mary and often criticises her appearance. I do not believe that this is fair to Mrs Bennet or indeed any mother of many children. That’s not how we role. Emma agreed with me on this and was sufficiently outraged on my behalf.

By the third episode, all four of the sisters are married. A reminder – that is Jane to Mr Bingley, Elizabeth to filth rich Mr Darcy, Lydia and her patched up elopement with bad boy, Wickham and I can’t be sure what they did with Kitty.

Sure enough soon after, Mr Bennet drops dead. Mrs Bennet is distraught but Jane offers to take her in, as would have been the custom at the time. But for some reason, spoiler alert, we are to believe that neither Jane nor Elizabeth, who is now living in the big pile of bricks Pemberley in Derbyshire would not have offered to have taken Mary. Instead Mary was sent to London as a governess. What nonsense is this?

(Elizabeth explains she is of the same class Mr Darcy.)

No, Mary would not have been sent off to work as a governess. Let us remind ourselves that Jane Eyre was a governess and she came from an orphanage. Jane Fairfax is also an orphan in Emma and almost forced to become a governess. Her only family is Miss Bates and they live in genteel poverty.

Mary Bennet is not an orphan. In fact she is the daughter of a gentleman. Indeed, Elizabeth’s retort to Lady Catherine de Bourgh, the aunt of Mr Darcy and the wealthy widow of Sir Lewis de Bourgh of Rosings Park, is that she is suitable to marry Mr Darcy because “he is a gentleman and I am am a gentleman’s daughter, so far we are equals.” The Bennet girls - all five - are according to Elizabeth at least of the same class as Mr Darcy if somewhat poor.

Therefore I think it is highly unlikely that Mary (daughter of a gentlemen) would be packed off to be a lowly governess, a role usually taken up by well-educated orphans who do not have two older sisters married to filthy rich aristocrats.

I understand you can take liberties but you can’t take the mick. Are we really to accept the idea that Elizabeth Bennet who was always kind and compassionate would leave her sister to go to London and not at least offer her a place at Pemberley? Neither myself nor Emma accepted this so we stopped watching at this point (with apologies to our dear hosts.)

If the BBC wants to do a spin off series of P&P I would have preferred to see Lydia have her own story. Given Wickham was a rouge with a gambling habit I reckon he would have continued to run up a few debts and would have met some sort of ‘accident.’

Lydia was absolutely the type of woman who would have lined up some other sucker to take care of her. A sort of Bess of Hardwick, of Hardwick Hall, Derbyshire who married four times. She, like Scarlet O’Hara, was a survivor. There would have been plenty of space for Lydia to mature and also scheme. This, I could get onboard with.

Instead we get Mary in some totally unbelievable story line. Give me strength. I’ll be keeping an eye out instead for Lydia, the maneater, Goes Wild in Derbyshire. At least that would be believable.

Lydia dreams of ‘a whole camp full of soldiers.’ Expertly delivered it is quite possibly my favourite line in TV.