LadsLadsLads
What would the romantic heroes of some of the best-loved classics be up to if they lived in 2024? Well, let me tell you...
Mr Darcy Pride and Prejudice
Fund manager. He bought a one-bed furnished flat in Canary Wharf for during the week and finds the service charge a personal insult. He’s secretly in love with a barista who is doing a Comparative Literature Masters but he cannot think of anything witty to say and assumes she thinks he’s wanker banker. She does, but she’d shag him anyway. Constantly declines calls from his aunt to come to gallery openings and dinner parties because she always has a ‘friend whose daughter…’ he has already slept with. Pemberley is now three-quarters run by the National Trust due to excessive death duties and running costs. Someone has suggested Pemberley start their own gin distillery, to diversify their portfolio. People keep mentioning the words ‘sustainability’ and ‘rewilding’. Darcy wishes they would all just fuck off so he can wander the grounds on Saturday nights with a nine iron and a single malt.
Mr Bingley Pride and Prejudice
Also a fund manager but commutes for 1 ½ hours every day from Netherfield. The FT called him “the nicest man in finance”; women in tailoring who look in him in the eyes when they speak to him, cause him to flush involuntarily from the neck upwards. Bingley has kept full control of his house thanks to it being smaller than Pemberley and his dad ‘doing something’ with his taxes that whilst not illegal, was ethically unsound. He has two children, the eldest of which is at boarding school and the youngest cries a lot. Hosts ‘legendary’ New Year’s parties, at which he DJs by creating a Spotify playlist and plugging it into some decks; he only serves English booze. At the last one his older, married sister got shitfaced on Nyetimber and tried to dry hump Darcy. His tweakmented wife runs her own tablescaping business from one of their converted barns. She chooses his jumpers.
Angel Clare Tess of the D’Ubervilles
Works at a tech start up but justifies his foray into AI because the company is aiming for BCorp certification. Did ayahuasca on his grown-up gap year, woke up three days later with a tattoo on his thigh made up of symbols that Google Lens doesn’t recognise. He identifies as plant-based but secretly gets boners for Greggs Steak Bakes. Clare thinks that women don’t need make-up and wears natural deodorant despite sweating profusely at the spin classes run in the basement of his London office. He will write you a poem consisting entirely of Radiohead lyrics and his dating app picture looks like he’s saying the word ‘erudite’ over and over in his head. He’d swipe right on you. And your sister. Just in case.
Mr Rochester Jane Eyre
After years as a journalist, Mr Rochester now works in something he vaguely calls ‘international relations’. He is open about his ex-wife but frequently uses the words “bunny boiler”, which confuses anyone he tries to date under the age of 35. He sold his stately pile to an American investor who has turned it into a destination wellness centre. He now divides his time between a four bed Victorian house in Clapham, where his dog has its own bedroom, and a flat in the 6th Arrondisement in Paris. He thinks he would have made a great History teacher but he doesn’t like teenagers. Rochester is a member of the Garrick Club and is secretly pleased they are now allowing women in so he doesn’t have to reminisce about conflicts in the 1980s and early 90s in which he took no part. His secretary has a double first from Oxford in French and Spanish. He knows she is wasted in his office; he thinks she might be flirting with him. Someone called him ‘Don Draper’ the other day, which he pretended pissed him off.
Heathcliff Wuthering Heights
He’s training for a Hyrox. Heathcliff has as a 2.2 from Loughborough but could have got a 1st if he’d been less hungover. You hate yourself for fancying him because he is on the edge of being a bit awful. He did actually make some money out of crypto and he hates inherited wealth and nepo babies, even though he works for his dad’s law firm. He wore his head brace to school once in Year 8 and no one ever lets him forget it. Thinks everyone on The Apprentice is a complete ‘goon’ but you know if he went on it he’d get fired in week three. Thankfully has never worn skinny jeans. Will genuinely enjoy giving you the shag of your life but will instantly make you feel like you should be grateful after it.
RBF Recommends:
Such fun! (And interesting sidelights on the novels.) But no, no, no - Jane Bennett would never have tweakments...