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It’s strange how various things can come together to get you thinking along a new track.I had read something about Edmund Burke and his extreme conservative views that believed traditon and the status quo was a natural way of existence. Burke believed in continuity. He thought that we are born into a class and that is where we should remain.He had a particular anti view of the enlightenment that was taking over the world.
Recently too I have been listening again to some of my favourite punk music from the 1970s. I’ve been reading up about the philosophy of punk. In a mad moment I Googled ,”Jane Austen and punk rock.” Why not? Wild thoughts come to all of us.
Reading a definition of Punk Rock you can begin to see Jane Austen in that light.
Punk Rock is a group of varied social and political beliefs associated with the punk subculture and punk rock. It is primarily concerned with concepts such as mutual aid against selling out hierarchy, white supremacy, authoritarianism, eugenics, class and classism, gender equality, anti-homophobia, racial equality, animal rights, free-thought and non-conformity.
These ideas are similar to those Burke and Austen dealt with. Burke didn’t want change. Jane Austen in a subtle way by revealing the realities of people and relationships made the 18th century reader reflect and reflection is always the first step to change.
Autumn de Wilde
Surprisingly. there are T shirts with a punk rock version of a Jane Austen portrait on the front. I also came across an interview with Autumn deWilde who produced the recent film version of ,”Emma,” with Anya Taylor Joy who starred as Emma, Mia Goth who played Harriet Smith and Jonny Flynn as Mr Knightly. You can’t get much more rock and roll than those. Autumn de Wilde is quoted as saying,
“Emma is such a lead singer, man! And you’re like, ‘Oh god, you’re such a jerk – but I am obsessed with you’.
She said: “I think Jane Austen has punk DNA. They weren’t even allowed to be funny in that time period.
“Women weren’t allowed to be funny or witty in that time period and God, was she funny.
“She created the first female anti-hero… I could be wrong about that but it seems pretty legendary to have created a character like that.
“I think women are very punk rock - we have to hide a lot - we’re not allowed to say we have periods in public. Somehow we’re still not OK with that.
Speaking about her own background in bringing this story to life, there was a sense, for de Wilde, that doing something almost unexpected was the essence of “punk rock.”
(Daiy Express interview.)
Were Elizabeth and Darcy the punk rockers of their era? Elizabeth stood up to Darcy’s pomposity, his pride and his prejudice. In many ways by writing about those two Jane Austent was putting her own life, livelihood and. future happiness on the line. Autumn de Wilde would agree that is a punk attitude without a doubt.
Some of those listed points about punk rock you can apply to Jane Austen. I would say however, Jane Austen does not blatantly express her political or social views. Her family and the society she lived in would have more than just disapproved. Jane would have been roundly censured and maybe never published again if she had complained overtly.
Recently I have been reading Helena Kelly’s, ”Jane Austen The Secret Radical.”
She refocuses our views of Jane Austen. She didn’t just live in a country village shut off from the wider world nationally and internationally. Kelly argues that Jane’s writing often is a response to the wider world politically, socially and philosophically.
“Jane was born five years after the poet William Wordsworth, the year before the American Revolution began. When the. French revolution started; she was thirteen. For almost all of her life, Britain was at war. Two of her brothers were in the navy; one joined the militia. For several years she lived in Southampton, a major naval base. It was a time of clashing armies, warring ideas, a time of censorship and state surveillance. Enclosures were remaking the landscape; European empire building was changing the world; science and technology were opening up a whole universe of new possibilities.
We’re perfectly willing to accept that writers like Wordsworth were fully engaged with everything that was happening, and to find the references in their work, even when they are veiled or allusive. But we haven’t been willing to do that with jane’s work.”
That is a great description of punk attitudes and Helena is saying why shoudn't Austen be the same?
Coincidently, before reading Helena Kelly’s book and unconnected to what Kelly wrote I wrote an article for my blog ,"London Calling," ( a punk title if ever there was) entitled ,”Understanding George Wickham.” I could see that the ,”Enlightenment,” views that were the force behind the French Revolution and the American War of Independence and along with Mary Wollstonecraft’s ideas about the equality of men and women I made an argument explaining Wickham from the point of view of mans ,”equality,” and in his case his inequality. I argued that Wickham’s personality and anti establishment actions was formed in a society that was unequal. He suffered inequality with Darcy and the upper classes. This brought disastrous consequences upon himself and others because he was formed in the class riddled society he was born into. He wanted to smash it all. The Sex Pistols lyrics come to mind.
Austen describes the warts of society. The Bennet sisters struggles to find suitors, the ineffectiveness of the Bennet mother and father, Lady de Bourgh's aristocratic rigid views and Mr Collins smarmy. oily personality seeping around the social rules of the time in Pride and Prejudice. Emma's terrible put down of Miss Bates and Mr Knightly's rebuke and the need for secrecy in the relationship between Jane Fairfax and Frank Churchill. You can feel Jane Austen itching to show the absurdity of the need for that secrecy.The way Anne Elliot has to negotiate life with her terrible father and sister in Persuasion. The awful treatment of the Dashwood sisters and mother by their half brother when he inherits their estate in Sense and Sensibility.The plight of Fanny Price a poor inconsequential young girl and the Bertram family in Mansfield Park and of course Catherine Moreland and Henry Tilney and the Thorpes in Northanger Abbey. Jane Austen is saying, this is how they are, this is how they treat each other, this is how they behave.Often it’s not very nice. Austen’s strong female characters usually come through though and are often triumphant. This strength of character is definitely a punk rock trait.
So does this all add up to jane Austen being a punk? She doesn’t change society. I would argue she is more for organic change.What she describes in her novels is not sudden change,its not revolution she is arguing for. She would have been guillotined (metaphorically of course, in Britain) if she had asked for revolution no doubt. Her revolt is a more organic approach. She is a realist not a bomber or assassin. From her family loyalties and the socialisation she went through she doesn’t want a French Revolution or an American War of independence. The Austen family would most definitely not approved.
Did punk rock itself change society drastically? What it did do was make us all think and look at our world with the blinkers taken off. That’s Jane Austen in a nutshell. Punk Rock with its clothes, record deals , Tv appearances and so forth was drawn into the mainstream of society. It became another acceptable important art genre. Without a doubt that describes Jane Austen today, films, spin off novels, ball reenactments, dressing up. She is definitely part of main stream society now. She is a commodity like punk has become a tourist attraction in Camden lock in north London. What punk rock did was make it more acceptable in a democratic society to complain about things which seemed sacred and needed complaining about, often with an angry snarl admittedly and with a studded forehead and a safety pin through the nose. If being aware makes us change then punk rock helped. Being aware is how Jane Austen helped develop society from her house in a country village in the 18th century.
No matter how much the Sex Pistols wanted anarchy they weren’t really advocating it. Jane shows a disgust for Lady Catherine de Bourgh , Mr Collins and the John Thorpes of her world but she didn’t ,”execute,” them. So Jane Austen is a punk rocker. She makes us aware of what life, family, community the class system was really like. When you turn attention to things and examine them you begin to ask questions, you are, Punk Rock.
THE CLASH , a band at the forefront of the Punk Rock movement in Britain were
“formed in 1976 in the vanguard of british Punk. The Clash would soon become the most iconic band of their era, a symbol of the intelligent protest and stylish rebellion in the turbulent years of the late 70’s and early 60’s.”
A quotation from the Website dedicated to The Clash. https://www.theclash.com/biography/
We could almost say that Jane Austen’s novels are
“ ……a symbol of the intelligent protest and stylish rebellion in the turbulent years of the late ,(1700s and early 1800s.)
Here are some of the lyrics from, “Hate and War,” by The Clash.
Hate and war…
I have the will to survive
I cheat if I can’t win
If someone kicks me out
I kick my way back in
An’ if I get aggression
I give it to them two time back
Everyday it’s just the same
With hate an’ war on my back
Hate and war- I hate all the English
Hate and war- I hate all the politeness
Hate and war- I hate all the cops
Straight out of the mouth of George Wickham.
References:
PUNK ROCK: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Punk_rock
THE CLASH Lyrics; https://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/clash/hateandwar.html
Kelly Helena : Jane Austen The Secret Radical. (2016) ICON BOOKS LIMITED
The novels of Jane Austen.
Edmund Burk: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/burke/
Mary Wolstonecroft: https://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/empire_seapower/wollstonecraft_01.shtml
