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“A wildly entertaining read, complete with an ‘Are You Chasing a Darcy?’ quiz.”
Washington Post
A Library Journal Pick of the Month
A #1 Amazon bestseller in Gothic Literary Criticism
A USA Today bestseller
A Zoomer Magazine Pick of 8 Books for Valentine's Day
What if we’ve been reading Jane Austen and romantic classics all wrong? A funny, brainy, eye-opening take on how our contemporary love stories are actually pretty terrifying.
Covering cultural touchstones ranging from Twilight to Taylor Swift and from Lord Byron to The Bachelor, The Darcy Myth is a book for anyone who loves thinking deeply about literature and culture—whether they love Jane Austen or not.
You already know Mr. Darcy—at least you think you do! The brooding, rude, standoffish romantic hero of Pride and Prejudice, Darcy initially insults and ignores the witty heroine but eventually succumbs to her charms. It’s a classic enemies-to-lovers plot and one that has profoundly influenced our cultural ideas about courtship. But what if this classic isn’t just a grand romance but a horror novel about how scary love and marriage can be for women?
In The Darcy Myth, literature scholar Rachel Feder unpacks Austen’s Gothic influences and how they have led us to a romantic ideal that is halfway to being a monster story. Why is our culture so obsessed with cruel, indifferent romantic heroes, and sometimes heroines? How much of that is Darcy’s fault? And, now that we know, what do we do about it?
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Never before have I found something that goes so in-depth about not only why "the rake" characters are so beloved, but also how they re-brand themselves to fit into modern media. Women so often get written off as liking the bad-boy for some unknowable reason, but this book will have none of that. There are several reasons!
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