Luke Cage vs. Jane Austen
There's no real "versus" happening between Mr. Cage and Ms. Austen, but they are battling in my brain, and it's noisy.
Every night for the past month and a half, I've been recording 'Pride and Prejudice' live on YouTube, one chapter at a time, and this usually takes place either directly after or right before watching an episode of the new Luke Cage television series on Netflix.
The adjustment is jarring, to say the least.
Leaping back and forth between reading about the genteel, tongue-in-cheek interactions of upper-crust English society during the Regency, where characters are unconcerned with work other than the business of marriage and the creation of heirs to inherit unimaginable wealth and privilege, and making sport to alleviate the boredom of their limited society, then WHAM! thrown into the audio-visual explosion of modern-day Harlem, ripe with poverty, guns, violence, ambition, and people dropping the N-word like it's salt on their sentences... it's an extreme study in contrasts.
These worlds are so far apart they hardly bear relation, but they're both rich and engaging, so it's interesting to me to find points of connection between them. The only place characters like this meet is in our minds, but to draw parallels is not impossible, despite the vast chasms of time, space, and circumstance that separate them. Both tales involve romance, secret struggle, mistaken identity, foolish youth, and society in disarray.
Consider, if you will, some of the protagonists and antagonists of these pieces. We have: Luke Cage and Fitzwilliam Darcy; Elizabeth Bennet and Misty Knight; Lydia Bennet and "Chico" Diaz; George Wickham and Rafael Scarfe.
Mr. Cage is an antihero, a common figure in modern fiction as we deconstruct traditional heroic values. He's a loner, reluctant to connect with others, whose appealing features include his quiet dignity, his pride, his respect for others and his struggle to maintain good manners in a time and place where the rules of conduct are decaying. How is this so different from Mr. Darcy? Both men are cynical, adhering to high standards. Both unintentionally inflict pain and suffering on others because they choose to keep aspects of their past a secret. Both have abiding links to the men whose private vices and disregard for society's rules wreak havoc on their lives.
Both look pretty good in a wet shirt.
Similar echoes occur between the female heroines, the foolish youths, and the villains. They are all painted on a more aggressive scale in the modern production, making more extravagantly impulsive decisions, and coming to more violent ends. And of course, a 300-page novel cannot match the scope of a multi-season, multi-arc television show in the size of its cast or need for Big Bad villains (although Lady Catherine de Bourgh and Mama Mabel might have plenty to discuss). In essentials, however, the characters stand united.
Like Darcy, Luke eschews the offered companionship of the well-suited, attractive and willing lady who first approaches him for a "coffee", instead choosing the more headstrong, saucy, athletic female who teases and challenges him, but is an unsuitable social match. Misty, in turn, rejects his suit because she considers his pride and arrogance harmful to the community she loves, and holds him responsible for Pop's death.
Chico and Lydia serve the same plot-advancing purpose - silly youths who are warned that their behavior will lead to trouble, choose a quick and easy path and suffer the consequences. They are both hidden in cities, and sought with reluctance by the hero whose actions are motivated by the desire to do right, and serve the will of a failed father figure. George Wickham and Rafael Scarfe both have the appearance of goodness, masking a core of duplicity and vice; both are beloved of the heroine until she is made to see the truth of their wrongdoing.
Reworking old stories and reinventing old characters is the bread and butter of any good writer. Always interesting to ponder the many ways classics continue to echo through time.
Every night for the past month and a half, I've been recording 'Pride and Prejudice' live on YouTube, one chapter at a time, and this usually takes place either directly after or right before watching an episode of the new Luke Cage television series on Netflix.
The adjustment is jarring, to say the least.
Leaping back and forth between reading about the genteel, tongue-in-cheek interactions of upper-crust English society during the Regency, where characters are unconcerned with work other than the business of marriage and the creation of heirs to inherit unimaginable wealth and privilege, and making sport to alleviate the boredom of their limited society, then WHAM! thrown into the audio-visual explosion of modern-day Harlem, ripe with poverty, guns, violence, ambition, and people dropping the N-word like it's salt on their sentences... it's an extreme study in contrasts.
These worlds are so far apart they hardly bear relation, but they're both rich and engaging, so it's interesting to me to find points of connection between them. The only place characters like this meet is in our minds, but to draw parallels is not impossible, despite the vast chasms of time, space, and circumstance that separate them. Both tales involve romance, secret struggle, mistaken identity, foolish youth, and society in disarray.
Consider, if you will, some of the protagonists and antagonists of these pieces. We have: Luke Cage and Fitzwilliam Darcy; Elizabeth Bennet and Misty Knight; Lydia Bennet and "Chico" Diaz; George Wickham and Rafael Scarfe.
Mr. Cage is an antihero, a common figure in modern fiction as we deconstruct traditional heroic values. He's a loner, reluctant to connect with others, whose appealing features include his quiet dignity, his pride, his respect for others and his struggle to maintain good manners in a time and place where the rules of conduct are decaying. How is this so different from Mr. Darcy? Both men are cynical, adhering to high standards. Both unintentionally inflict pain and suffering on others because they choose to keep aspects of their past a secret. Both have abiding links to the men whose private vices and disregard for society's rules wreak havoc on their lives.
Both look pretty good in a wet shirt.
Similar echoes occur between the female heroines, the foolish youths, and the villains. They are all painted on a more aggressive scale in the modern production, making more extravagantly impulsive decisions, and coming to more violent ends. And of course, a 300-page novel cannot match the scope of a multi-season, multi-arc television show in the size of its cast or need for Big Bad villains (although Lady Catherine de Bourgh and Mama Mabel might have plenty to discuss). In essentials, however, the characters stand united.
Like Darcy, Luke eschews the offered companionship of the well-suited, attractive and willing lady who first approaches him for a "coffee", instead choosing the more headstrong, saucy, athletic female who teases and challenges him, but is an unsuitable social match. Misty, in turn, rejects his suit because she considers his pride and arrogance harmful to the community she loves, and holds him responsible for Pop's death.
Chico and Lydia serve the same plot-advancing purpose - silly youths who are warned that their behavior will lead to trouble, choose a quick and easy path and suffer the consequences. They are both hidden in cities, and sought with reluctance by the hero whose actions are motivated by the desire to do right, and serve the will of a failed father figure. George Wickham and Rafael Scarfe both have the appearance of goodness, masking a core of duplicity and vice; both are beloved of the heroine until she is made to see the truth of their wrongdoing.
Reworking old stories and reinventing old characters is the bread and butter of any good writer. Always interesting to ponder the many ways classics continue to echo through time.