Improper Relations? Or just good friends?

I'm writing today about my new release Improper Relations and early nineteenth century attitudes toward female friendship.

Friendships between women in the Georgian era were often expressed in passionate language in frequent letters; it was the age of feeling, of sensibility. It was also an age of advancing female literacy and leisure among the middle classes, and the absence of men--whether it was to prizefights or war--led women to seek like-minded companionship.

The Ladies of Llangollen are probably the most notorious example of passionate female friendship. In 1778, Lady Eleanor Butler and the Hon. Sarah Ponsonby eloped to live together for over fifty years of devoted bliss, enjoying literature, gardening, and a gorgeous house (which they decorated in Gothic splendor) in Llangollen, Wales. This charming portrait is of their cats in 1809 by artist Maria Taylor. They became celebrities who were visited by the likes of Wordsworth, Shelley, Byron, Wellington and Lady Caroline Lamb.

As their names suggest, they were members of the Irish aristocracy, and both women had upset their families by claiming they would never marry. Eventually they were reconciled with their families and, following interest from Princess Charlotte, received a royal pension.

So I find it extraordinary that Austen's view of female friendship is so negative. Friendship is a sometime thing and not always sincere; one of the participants at least may have an ulterior motive, despite appearances.

The progress of the friendship between Catherine and Isabella was quick as its beginning had been warm, and they passed so rapidly through every gradation of increasing tenderness that there was shortly no fresh proof of it to be given to their friends or themselves. They called each other by their Christian name, were always arm in arm when they walked, pinned up each other’s train for the dance, and were not to be divided in the set; and if a rainy morning deprived them of other enjoyments, they were still resolute in meeting in defiance of wet and dirt, and shut themselves up, to read novels together.

In Sense and Sensibility, Elinor befriends Lucy Steele to discover the nature of her engagement to Edward, and the two perform a complicate dance of suspicion and revelation. Do you really think Elizabeth Bennett will maintain her friendship with Charlotte Lucas; or rather, do you think Mrs. Darcy and Mrs. Collins will write frequent, warm letters to each other?

For Austen, true intimacy and love is between sisters, not friends.

My book, Improper Relations, which came out last week from Little Black Dress, is about a friendship between two women and the conflict caused when their loyalties to each other are challenged by new loyalties to their respective husbands. Yes, it's a romance (splutter, it has an arranged marriage and a duel! A wedding night!). I made the mistake of telling some women at a conference a few months ago that my next book was about relationships between women because they were so much more interesting and brought the table to an embarrassed silence.

Here's an excerpt, as recounted by the hero:

[Charlotte says] “She is my friend. My best friend. She knows me better than anyone in the world. When she fell in love I was lonely. I felt I had lost her and part of myself, too.”

I am silent. I have friends; I have lost friends, too, an inevitable consequence of the times in which we live and my former profession. But I have never felt incomplete without anyone—or rather, until now, I have never felt the possibility that I could feel this way. For I realize fully now what Charlotte means to me, my other half, my love, the one whom I can turn to and who knows my secret self. It has taken her confession of love for another to make me realize how deeply I love my wife, an extraordinary business to be sure.

Do you agree with my assessment of Austen's view of female friendships? Does it trouble you that Lizzie Bennett doesn't grieve for the loss of her friend? Prove me wrong, please!

I'll give a signed copy of my new book to a random commenter. Meanwhile, do visit my site and find the links to soundbites from my Regency chicklit books on the home page, enter the contest and read another excerpt from Improper Relations.