It’s fair to say that Caroline Bingley, Pride and Prejudice’s quintessential mean girl, is not one of Jane Austen’s most sympathetic characters. As she schemes to outmaneuver Elizabeth Bennet in the competition for Mr. Darcy’s affections (not to mention his big estate), Miss Bingley reveals herself to be arrogant, snobbish, manipulative, and petty.
But what would she be like as the heroine of her own story? Might her problematic personality, so annoying in a drawing room, fit her for a role that Jane Austen never imagined?
We’ll explore that question at our next JASNA-New Jersey meeting, when we discuss Miss Caroline Bingley, Private Investigator, by Kelly Gardiner and Sharmini Kumar, a new novel that puts Miss Bingley on the trail of a murderer. Our meeting will take place over Zoom on October 18 at 2 pm (US Eastern).
The book, which was published earlier this year, is a cozy mystery that sends Caroline Bingley and Georgiana Darcy into the seedier precincts of Regency London, where their hunt for a missing maidservant forces them to reckon with the human cost of England’s imperial adventures in India.
Gardiner is an Australian academic and author who has published historical novels for both adults and children. Kumar is a physician, playwright, and stage director who heads up 24 Carrot Productions, a theater company in Melbourne, Australia. Since 2018, Kumar has co-produced AustenCon, an annual Austen festival held in Melbourne and online.
JASNA-NJ officer Catherine Monte will interview the authors at next week’s JASNA Annual General Meeting in Baltimore, and excerpts from that interview will be played during the October 18 meeting.
Attendance at the discussion is free, but you must register to receive a Zoom link. To do so, please email us at: jasnanewjersey AT gmail DOT com.
Jane Austen Society of North America - New Jersey Region 