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wickmitz · 3 months ago

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SEDGEWICK SABLE & MITZI MAY : an overall study, part two . part one .

discussing their individual characters, their relationship, their respective scenes, and a plethora of details found in-between.

now that we’re here at the second part of this analysis, we’ve finally reached wick once again in the narrative! in grindstone there are a few things to note, like wick’s haggard state, tired from the events of last night and curing his hangover with more giggle water -- working away on finances he needs to present to the investors before the start of the week. lacy is also there at his house, slaving away on a variety of things we hear more about in sneakthief. it’s noted today is potentially one of her days off, but the workload is potentially a little behind and big enough that she’s decided to lend an extra pair of hands even when she shouldn’t have to. they are busy at work in grindstone, hence the title! there is hardly any time for extra activities that don’t involve wick chained to his desk and slaving away, with him already in poor working condition ; he claims he can’t see a thing he’s writing despite having his reading glasses on, and not only disrupts his time but lacy’s in an attempt to ‘find’ them. he’s very much out of it and whatever work he’s doing will probably need some revisions at best, yet wick’s job is put on hold again when lacy asks if he’s expecting company, a comment which spurs him into hurriedly changing and telling her to stall mitzi at the door. again, we have wick confirming that him and mitzi indeed made ‘last minute plans’ to meet up today, even though he and lacy acknowledge that he has no real time for this. despite that, wick greets her warmly after he’s dressed, also adorned with a fond smile while hovering a hand over the small of her back when ushering her into the foyer so he may fetch the car for their outing. nothing seems too amiss here, though things begin changing come balderdash, where wick noticeably begins crumbling as a character for the first time.

to start off, i think people are rather generous with wick’s character overall. his flaws are limited to readers, to where the most common ‘bad’ traits talked about when referring to his character is : alcoholic ( not a trait ), hypocrite ( accurate! ), and he’s too kind or oblivious. while the latter two can still be something the character can have too much of or lead to genuinely bad traits, this is still an extremely small inspection overall, one that almost shies away from a harsher read. this can be attributed to how little we see of wick, but there are things we can infer via his scenes with mitzi as well as church’s words all the way back in caveat … words which come into play here. during the comic page balderdash, rocky is desperately trying to ward off wick from his beloved miss m, getting rather physical in the meantime -- he’s still seething after the events of last night and in his attempts to thwart wick from helping mitzi further, he decides to lean into the public shared narrative that this widow is dangerous and got her husband killed. we see how strong wick’s faith in mitzi is during this page ever so briefly, looking almost amused at rocky’s words while maintaining an aura of confidence when dismissing these rumors. he says, “i’ve known her a while, rocky. whether out of class or kindness, she wouldn’t harm a fly.” what wick clearly hasn’t considered, however, is what rocky implies next, which is the idea that wick’s paramour could’ve hired someone else to do the dirty work for her … an idea that very quickly disturbs him and shakes his view on mitzi and, perhaps, the lackadaisy, even when he tries verbally dismissing all this as a joke.

despite his dismissal, it’s rather obvious that rocky’s words stay with wick. throughout the date, wick is stuck in a state of doubting things that he’s never entertained before, with no way of discerning what’s appropriate to fret about and what’s not, and this is in no small part because of the verbiage rocky was using. wick thinks he’s doubting mitzi, that he potentially doesn’t know her as well as he thought or that he has a reason to be afraid of her, due to rocky’s claim that she’s dangerous and his insistence on throwing the carnage and consequences of rumrunning onto mitzi as a person. however, his true feelings are rather far from that. while it’s true that wick is riddled with doubt after rocky’s attempt at driving him and mitzi apart, i find it prudent to clarify here that his love for mitzi outweighs those doubts in large measure. wick’s sudden and unfounded fear doesn’t drive him to isolate himself from mitzi, and thus some part of him does still believe that she isn’t a cruel person and that she wouldn’t try to harm him. there’s no reason why he would think otherwise apart from rocky’s unsettling and instigating threats. wick’s fears are both similar and dissimilar to the ones zib voices in blood-money. while zib is worried about the corrupting influence of the life mitzi is leading, wick is more so afraid of the life itself. wick still views mitzi as every bit the charming, funny, and impeccably elegant woman he fell for, but he is now forced to wonder if he would ever be harmed because of her presence in his life. in essence, rather than questioning mitzi as a person, he is worried about the danger inherent in the life she leads and how that danger might directly impact him. unfortunately, though wick seems to at least subconsciously trust mitzi, his doubts stick around like intrusive thoughts, presenting a constant what-if that wick can’t shake, and it’s these very thoughts that continue to make the business-meeting-turned-date as awkward as it is.

now, it’s rather interesting how much the notion of mitzi hiring rocky to kill her husband shakes wick up due to how normal this sort of method is within gangster lifestyles ; with us even seeing atlas absent or abstaining from mordecai and viktor’s violent work ethic, his hands physically clean despite how its his order causing all this destruction and death. asa does the same! they have workers for a reason, ‘faithful operatives’ as rocky so lovingly calls them, and these men are utilized with complete efficiency. it’s not insane to think that mitzi hired another to kill atlas, and besides rocky’s bumbling incompetence, it’s not strange to consider him a likely man for such a job due to his utmost loyalty to miss m over anyone else, including atlas. yet wick acts as though this hasn’t ever crossed his mind, wholeheartedly believing that mitzi would have to kill atlas herself in order to get the job done, something he’s sure she doesn’t have the heart nor the guts to do. he is visibly shaken the rest of the date, one more distraction piled on his plate high, so suddenly paranoid through the haze of perpetual tiredness that he even snaps at mitzi over something as simple as the word bunny. for the first time, i believe wick is thoroughly beginning to question his part in all of this and is starting to reexamine these once harmless aspects now that the inherent danger has been shoved in his face so earnestly. while a part of this is naivety ( he’s far away from the criminal underbelly after all, as rich and comfortable as he is, a lackadaisy patron and nothing more ) i’d also point out that another aspect of it is a sense of subconscious invincibility. perhaps he is too content in his status and wealth and how well he’s been doing to even consider he’s hardly exempt from consequences, much less the side effects of hanging around criminals or dangerous establishments.

it seems rather strange and far-fetched of a claim, but think of church’s warning to him back at the start of the comic ; “you’ve done well lately … but don’t imagine it means you and your reputation are invincible.” it’s easy to dismiss church’s words due to how mean he often is, how overly critical, but he arguably knows wick better than the readers do, so i think it’s pertinent to take his words and to consider them. he’s also not wrong. everything church says in caveat is the god’s honest truth and wick, to some degree, knows this! it’s why he’ll practically regurgitate church’s advice in mephistopheles when rejecting mitzi and explaining why he must reject her proposal. so then why wouldn’t church’s read on wick be somewhat accurate as well? i think wick’s biggest flaw is that he’s too easily caught up in emotional throes while also struggling to think of every tiny detail, an issue that may or may not have to do with how excessive exposure to alcohol has affected his short term memory. he doesn’t bat an eye at the ruffians or violent gangsters who hang around the lackadaisy because they aren’t currently threatening wick himself, and he won’t dwell on it too hard that these men have to procure their hooch somehow, and that it’s said to be a bad business. if it’s not affecting wick and his enjoyment of the establishment ( or the woman he’s eyeing ) then it is not something he concerns himself with or feels the active threat of. has a simple mindset that sort of functions like : well, mitzi wouldn’t be able to kill someone with her bare hands! she’d loathe to get blood on her lavish garments, doesn’t have the coldness inside to see the life leave a man’s eyes! much less her husband’s! it’s ludicrous. imagine knowing the lady and thinking her capable of that, when she looks and acts as she does! …

again, it’s a rather closed-minded view of the whole thing. how could you not consider she has guns for hire? that the men she surrounds herself with are indeed dangerous individuals who are more than willing to watch the life leave another’s eyes for her? he sees viktor at the bar and in the pilot even appears intimidated by his stature and scarred face, yet doesn’t think twice about what a man like that is doing there on mitzi’s paycheck? even thinks it normal to take viktor to the hospital after hearing that viktor’s been shot at the lackadaisy, not at all considering that police and doctors would pry. wick is extremely privileged and short sighted here, a little full of himself and what he can get away with -- this is the very same man who actively showed interest in a man’s wife, for crying out loud, and didn’t at all consider that someone like atlas would’ve killed him had he known wick’s intentions. this is more than just being blind or oblivious. while i love wick for his kindness and loyalty, i can also admit that he’s still a capitalist at the end of the day, and a successful one at that. him getting too big for his britches and throwing himself into scenarios without considering how this will affect him is extremely likely for his character, and is exactly what he did when agreeing to meet with mitzi the first night in lackadaisy. i believe wick was too caught up in the passion and euphoria of finally getting what he wanted, and started making promises and plans he couldn’t necessarily deliver on, not thinking at all about the logistics or the next day and instead focused on some whimsical future. he loves the lackadaisy and he adores mitzi, so why not invest in it? sure, they can discuss the details tomorrow, he has time just for her … and then reality hit him like a train twice over, leaving wick scrambling around aimlessly. he knows what he has to do but doesn’t want to actually do it, which instead makes him seem completely disinterested and wishy-washy instead.

( i also want it on record that the potential of harm or danger really scares wick when he’s made aware of its presence, at least in certain scenarios. while he can brush off the pig farmers raiding the lackadaisy and viktor’s injuries, he can’t ignore rocky’s threat or its implications because this is shoved directly into wick’s face rather unsubtly. what wick gets from the lackadaisy is mitzi, it’s some strange sense of belonging, and a break from his stressful normal life -- it’s not the awful booze he’s interested in, it’s not the thrill of being in the center of danger, it’s the mindless company and vague sense of ‘i have a seat here, right here, around all these people who don’t seem forever irritated by my presence.’ it’s also the rocks but that’s less poetic. point is, wick’s horrific loneliness and ridicule from his peers is what has him drinking at the lackadaisy instead of in the wine cellar he has at home, which means him being perfectly blind to the danger the workers there face is all the more heartbreaking. he won’t ever truly be one of them until he’s actually breached their criminal lifestyle in its entirety. he may pose with them in pictures, but he’s still an outsider in title. he can’t choose them over his business because he needs and wants his business and, clearly, the lackadaisy needs that too. he can’t sacrifice his safety but he doesn’t want to sit idly by and allow mitzi and her employees to suffer because he is still a very kind man. it all exists in extremes and is what makes wick’s arc fascinating in my eyes … his character also becomes more interesting with this in mind, more human, and that’s exactly why i adore him and mitzi ( and their relationship ) as much as i do )

though here we are, finally done with the detours and event recapping to discuss the original question : what is wick’s and mitzi’s mindset during their date? we have all the tools available and any further information i may give later should be extra elaboration at this point rather than anything new. after all, in order to understand why the date went the way it did we had to understand wick and mitzi’s individual characters and what they feel towards each other, what they think they feel, as well as how their relationship has functioned so far. and with a multitude of misconceptions cleared up too, this section hopefully seems a bit more straightforward, though i suppose we’ll wait and see. now, we’ll be discussing the pages doublet, drollery, veracity, photomajig, briar-patch, and mephistopheles … plus some of the date’s aftermath much, much later!

at the start of doublet ( and carrying into drollery ) mitzi and wick are seated in a rowboat, with wick doing the rowing while she’s situated comfortably on a pillow and enjoying the view ; typical of their gender roles during that time. wick looks almost quizzical in the first panel we see of him, though some of that tenseness appears to leave his face by the time mitzi turns to look at him … only for such a look to return when she says, ‘let’s talk business, wick.’

throughout this page and the others it becomes obvious wick very much doesn’t want to discuss business with mitzi, despite that being the purpose of their little meetup at all. he’s extremely quiet when she begins rambling on about how wrong her approach had been last night, how she should’ve just sought wick out to begin with ( an interesting thing for her to say given how reluctant she was to use him initially ). there is a wave of compliments and flattery here from mitzi, an almost buttering up, and it’s worth saying that what works a genuine smile out of wick here is mitzi saying something as simple and as romantic as liking his face. it’s undoubtedly an earnest expression, still tired but softened considerably, and wick will continue to show that what he’s most receptive to are mitzi’s advances, her small flirty remarks and gestures. but once again, when she decides to come out and say what she’s trying to discuss with wick, ‘i’d like you to be my business partner’, he quickly shuts down. his expression falls and he becomes even more quiet than before, enough so to prompt mitzi ( who’s now rowing with him ) to ask if he’s lost interest overnight. all wick can muster in response is some hesitantly worded excuses, like how he’s a little tired and that this proposal is a lot to think about. i say these are excuses because i think wick knew from the start that he was going to reject mitzi’s deal, whatever it was, because now that reality has set in he’s come to understand church’s warning as pure facts. there was never a moment during the outing where wick was even thinking about mitzi’s offer, and he does everything he can to avoid discussing it because he knows his answer.

mitzi, similarly, only wishes to discuss business with wick here -- it’s what she came over for, after all, and she’s at the end of her rope after last night’s and today’s events. she needs this deal and wick’s money, to the point where she remains almost purposefully stereotypical throughout their entire outing. gone is the more genuine bond between them that we saw in rendezvous, because now every time mitzi does a romantic action ( or a sexual one ) it’s wooden and rather fake ; it’s her feeling as though there’s no other choice and being desperate enough to stoop so low if it means wick won’t reject her business. their wants and desires are complete opposites at this point, with wick wanting this to be a date and to be with mitzi while the woman in question is avoidant of any lovesick antics until she feels like she’s losing wick. there’s definitely some manipulation happening on mitzi’s end just as much as there’s some purposeful misleading on wick’s, with both of their behaviors rubbing the other party the wrong way ; wick is still on edge due to rocky’s comment and is prone to getting upset whenever mitzi so much as jokes about it, and then we have mitzi, who’s already dealt with a similar situation today with asa, someone who dragged her to an outing she didn’t ask for and then avoided the conversation she wanted to have with him. for perhaps the first time, neither wick nor mitzi are really seeing each other anymore, they’re instead doubting one another where there had once been ironclad resolve and are too blinded by their desires to have an honest conversation about any of this. add this on top of how exhausted and stressed they both are, it’s no wonder their ‘date’ was doomed from the start.

i also want it on record that mitzi is being extremely open and upfront here about what she wants from wick from the first page. she didn’t waste any time before making her intentions with him clear! this isn’t me dismissing her more manipulative behavior during the date, but she certainly doesn’t use wick to the extent some people act like she does. rather than asking him to be an investor, she tells wick she wants him to be her business partner who would get 40% of the revenue and a 40% say in her decisions regarding the lackadaisy. it doesn’t seem like much, but given how little wick actually needs this money back, it’s a rather generous offer all around, with it almost being half and half. while she’s still undoubtedly using him, there is still a level of respect here, i think, some kind of : well, if i have to use wick, let me at least make the terms as good as they can be. some fans act as though mitzi deceived wick from the start when i’ve more than proved she’s mostly been completely transparent with him outside of a few select situations, which happen to be moments where her desperation turns her impulsive and wholly selfish, as seen briefly in rendezvous and whenever she flirts with wick during their outing. an impulsive instinct that will only worsen come sneakthief, when mitzi is utterly humiliated, angry, and at the very end of her already thinned rope. to me, it’s important to understand that her reasons for her actions during this arc are understandable and, perhaps, a bit sympathetic -- but that and the fact that what she does is wrong can coexist. wick is in a similar boat, where i mostly want to present him through a neutral lens so we can understand that he’s also done some wrong himself and is hardly a perfect victim, but that these wrongdoings still don’t dismiss the fact he shouldn’t have been stolen from or had his affections used. but i’ve gotten a little ahead of myself, so let’s dive back into doublet and drollery.

doublet ends with mitzi cooing at wick in an almost teasing but fond tone, calling him a ‘poor bunny,’ a comment so unremarkable that she’s not at all anticipating wick to react rather aggressively. he’s sort of accusatory and defensive, as though bristling from the mere title alone. we quickly find out in the next page ( and from his mumbling before his outburst ) that he’s still unable to shake rocky’s threats from balderdash, to the point of internalizing the confusing metaphor he was given, which wick hardly understands but is still reactive towards. he’s tired and stressed and on top of that he’s suddenly nervous for his life, it’s little wonder why he’s so jumpy. mitzi, in turn, expresses utter confusion at his question and, when wick explains that rocky insinuated he killed atlas because she wanted him to, she begins making light of the situation … much to wick’s dismay. to her, it’s just not something to take seriously! and she repeatedly pokes fun at the mere idea, going back and forth between ‘i’m kidding!’s and ‘or am i?’s until relenting entirely, going on to tease wick for believing she’d do something so awful and for taking rocky’s words as something to be worried about. drollery is a deceptively important page, as it’s a great demonstration of how little wick and mitzi are understanding each other. it makes complete sense for mitzi to make light of the situation and to be unable to understand why wick is so afraid, considering that rocky idolizes her and therefore has never threatened her or even done so much as to appear annoyed around her. in stark contrast, wick’s emotional state here is frazzled and fraught, and he’s in desperate need of some sort of comfort. he seems to get that comfort when mitzi teases him about believing rocky, only for fear to take over once again when mitzi casually mentions, ‘rocky’s name is definitely not on my murderers-for-hire roster,’ implying that she still has one even if rocky himself isn’t on it. wick is noticeably so shocked or frightened that he stops rowing, and then there’s a brief timeskip before we see the pair again in veracity.

what i find most prudent to talk about during this page is the discussion of atlas may between the pair, with wick asking two rather wise questions ; if the talk about mitzi’s part in her husband’s death is false and, if so, why not speak up on it? her answer is rather similar both times, saying she didn’t kill atlas because she loved him, and that she doesn’t like discussing the circumstances surrounding his death due to how fresh it all still is. she begins fiddling with her necklace, a telltale sign that her late husband is on her mind, before offering something rather interesting.

as we know it, mitzi is a rather reserved and private person, and that goes tenfold for anything involving atlas post mortem, an aspect of her character that’s even referenced in this very page! so for this to even be offered, albeit hesitantly, is fascinating on many levels and can be read through two lenses. either this is a genuine offer from mitzi or a fake one in an attempt to garner wick into her corner, with the promise of a solved mystery in his pocket. both are completely valid interpretations of this scene given where mitzi’s currently at, and i won’t dismiss either one. however, i personally view her words here as an honest invitation, one she’s extremely reluctant to give but is willing to let it be out there regardless. she’s not promising that wick will get this information, it’s merely a possibility ; if such a question truly weighs on him so heavily, then perhaps she can find it in herself to someday tell him about atlas. i think mitzi is more than willing to give wick that sort of honesty in return if he decides to help her out -- which, in a way, is a blend of the two options i brought up earlier. i just don’t see why she’d bring this rather sensitive and personal wound up to wick at all unless she was serious about it, given how avoidant she usually is with this subject.

one aspect of lackadaisy that i rarely see brought up is the tangible theme of grief. mitzi is often interpreted without her grief being a factor, or her grief being a small obstacle that she simply needs to ‘get over’. this is hardly how grief works, especially not when a loss is sudden and violent, as atlas’ death unquestionably was. this is to say nothing of the horrific circumstances that followed mitzi afterwards -- while previously, she was a wealthy socialite, sheltered from harm and the particularly gruesome details of her husband’s work, she is now forced to wear shoes that are far too big and bloody for her to fill. i find it prudent to digress and harp on this a bit, as it’s hardly ever mentioned in the lackadaisy fandom that it can be incredibly difficult for a grieving person to hear the name of their lost loved one, especially when you’re someone as reluctant to share your feelings as mitzi is. hell, mordecai just hearing atlas’ name once was enough for him to flee the luncheon and squirrel himself away in mitzi’s car. and not only has atlas been brought up twice today already, he’s been used as a tool to threaten mitzi’s life. while wick could hardly know that his discussion of the rumors surrounding atlas’ death might have a serious impact on mitzi considering the context of what happened that day, he certainly belatedly realizes that his words have the very real capacity for hurting mitzi -- he just doesn’t realize how much. with this in mind, there is undoubtedly something to be said about how mitzi offers to talk to wick about atlas at all, with us being able to read into this as a testament to their previous closeness or miss may’s rising and almost animalistic desperation. wick’s response to this is rather telling too, with him immediately rejecting her offer due to mitzi not ‘owing’ him such an explanation and apologizing for bringing atlas’s death up at all, as well as expressing that he’s duly ashamed of himself for it. while this puts a damper on their outing ( and gives wick another excuse to try and avoid mitzi’s desired topic by ending things early ) there’s no denying that even when they’re on relatively strained terms, a glimmer of respect and care for each other keeps shining through. it’s either that or wick just has impeccable manners and an innate understanding that bringing up a widow’s murdered husband during what’s supposed to be a date isn’t a wise move. or, like always, it’s probably a mix of the two. this fondness and affection towards one another, as subconscious as it may be, is highlighted once again in photomajig! a page which i won’t talk about too much, but one that’s integral nonetheless.

realizing things aren’t going the way she wants them to go, mitzi spies an opportunity to prolong and ‘fix’ things when seeing a photo booth, one which she drags a curious wick to with a renewed smile upon her face. for the first three-ish photos, wick seems rather apprehensive about this situation, likely still feeling their earlier talk in its awful entirety ; only for mitzi to physically tug and pull at him in an attempt to help him loosen up, going as far as to pinch his cheeks into a poor facsimile of a smile for the camera. after this, wick gives more of an attempt during the next two pictures, mimicking mitzi’s pose both times and seeming to find himself having fun despite circumstances. there’s a noticeable shift in the photos where the two not only appear to be enjoying themselves, but are actively enjoying one another’s company. for a couple shots it’s almost like the current despairing state surrounding them disappears entirely as they silently fawn over each other and indulge in some harmless fun, with these three specific pictures being prime examples of this.

there’s no denying that wick is visibly smitten with mitzi here once he loosens up, burdened with an overwhelming attraction his face can barely hide once the date begins feeling like an actual date. mitzi’s more subtle, though there’s a lightness to her expressions that feel less forced and sad, actively engaging in ridiculous poses and naturally falling into more loving gestures without much orchestrated affections on her end. you can see what they could perhaps be like as a genuine couple if they could allow themselves such a future ; happy and silly and capturing memories to always keep … and this brief insight makes what happens at the end much more devastating, where we see mitzi ( who has, maybe, remembered herself and her goal ) throw this away to force herself onto wick again with a bruising force, attempting to take advantage of his good mood so they can talk about her business proposal again. just like that the moments are gone, as are their more honest feelings, and although wick still dodges the topic yet again ( which, as previously stated, he shouldn’t be doing given the true purpose of this outing ) he retains a more playful attitude than before. joking that he was planning on running away from mitzi until he begins looking rather smug and adoring while teasing her ‘ruthless’ strategy, and how it doesn’t leave him in an advantageous negotiating position. the page ends with them realizing they’ve cultivated an audience with their antics as wick laments he’d hate to disrupt them with business talk -- a sarcastic remark undoubtedly, but further drives my previous points home nonetheless.

now we approach the last stretch of this analysis, centering around wick’s rejection of mitzi and then briefly touching upon her stealing his money. briar-patch is an intricate dance between two exhausted parties, but this exhaustion is exactly what makes it so easy for them to fall into their normal styles of talking. the next time we see the pair, they’ve left the park and have since returned to wick’s home ; holed up in his wine cellar and enjoying some quality wine. it’s very interesting that wick has an entire underground room full of illicit beverages when he so often frequents the lackadaisy, though i digress. still sporting his improved mood, wick behaves rather coyly during most of briar-patch, rambling about the bottle of wine mitzi asks him about and implying he’s too socially awkward to properly entertain a lady … this is an obvious lie, and it’s one mitzi doesn’t hesitate to call out, but this doesn’t dampen his spirits any. once again looking smitten at the woman sitting in his lap, his tail seeming to curl slightly around her outstretched leg. it all paints a rather fond and romantic picture, in spite of its context.

just like mitzi with his earlier fabrication, wick sees through her attempts at getting him drunk until he acquiesces to her proposal, though doesn’t visually appear mad at mitzi for this. naturally, she denies the claim -- a little tipsy and not at all a good liar, instead resorting to a minor guilt trip -- ‘i’m starting to worry you’re leading me on,’ -- as another way to nudge wick into her desired direction. i’m sure wick knows what mitzi is getting at when she claims he’s leading her on, but he chooses to ignore her true meaning by saying that he couldn’t be leading her on because he’s been eyeing mitzi since she was married to atlas. and mitzi admits to knowing about his interest … making a slight remark that she’s surprised atlas didn’t have him killed for it. we see more evidence of wick’s avoidance towards the topic of murderers for hire in his very clear statement of ‘…that’s comforting. anyway’. wick goes on to immediately dismiss the very real danger he was in and confess that he ‘couldn’t help’ being attracted to mitzi. this highlights one of wick’s other flaws ; his belief that he is unable to resist his impulses and that this somehow absolves him of the consequences of his actions. he could very easily have gotten over his initial attraction to mitzi instead of constantly mooning over her and feeding his interest. he could also have thought through mitzi’s invitation and decided against sacrificing his investors and their reputations for his own gain. this flaw can be tied into his alcoholism as well, where we see that wick has poor impulse control yet again when, after just being scolded by his secretary for drinking, he then pours hooch into his coffee when her back is turned, not even waiting for her to leave the room. all of this is to say that wick has a penchant for ignoring the consequences of his impulsive decisions and struggles heavily with the awkwardness involved in taking accountability for them.

we then move onto the next page where lacy interrupts the two, asking if wick could drive her home since bix, wick’s driver, isn’t outside anymore. wick, who admits to essentially forgetting about her presence, promises he’ll be up in a second to take her home -- and it’s that scene which marks the end of the date. wick was more than content to drag this on as long as possible, having been all but relaxed and cozy earlier, in a manner of undress with mitzi ( who had taken her heels off ) and filling the air with meaningless conversation. these aren’t the actions of a man who is eager to push the lady out the door, but rather someone who enjoys this reality too much to do the right thing and end it ; to save them both the now wasted time because they both have businesses to run, and can’t afford pleasantries like dates that last hours … or, in mitzi’s case, this was never what she wanted at all with this meeting, and wick knew that deep down and purposefully withheld from addressing the topic until the end was near, and then there wasn’t much else he could do except finally come clean. his face falls and scrunches, initially turned away from his company before he begins to let her down, fidgeting by scrubbing his neck and avoiding her gaze again by looking into his wine glass. i think paying attention to wick’s body language is always important, because his tone and how he speaks is rather glib in nature.

wick is a character who doesn’t really speak emotionally with his voice ; perpetually stuck in a stuffy but charming sort of tone as seen in the pilot ( even when he’s noticeably angry at rocky’s implications of dynamite and machinery ) as well as here, where his words are so casual sounding that it’s hard not to view them as apathetic. starting his rejection with a polite but seemingly uncaring, “uh, i was saying … i’d love for this to work out … but, uh …” he sounds like he’s talking to a stranger, almost, someone who came up to him on the street with a business proposition rather than with a girl who he cares for and selfishly kept the entire evening once he could manage it. even his verbal hesitation can be viewed as indifference. he carries this normal air afterwards too, able to seem unfazed during sneakthief and chauffeur ; propped with a casualness to him and his words that make it hard to comprehend that the situation is as bad as it is. as mentioned above, wick is rather short-sighted and tends not to think through the finer points of things. he has a notable talent for dismissing schools of thought that aren’t immediately pertinent, and i’d argue that he has a penchant for self-soothing, burying his problems in fine wines and expensive toys. it’s not outside the realm of possibility that wick would immediately fall back into his glib, carefree tone, trying to soothe himself with the normalcy of bantering with lacy. it’s probably fairly easy to write wick off as never being too interested in mitzi because of this, but given the rest of his character ( along with the brief faltering we see in his expression here and there ) that’s likely not at all true. honestly, i believe he’s even less likely to consider the true consequences of what’s transpired, considering that he a.) completely dismisses lacy’s assertion that mitzi had been rifling through her things and threatening her with dismemberment, b.) is so tired he is hallucinating a duck and therefore can’t drive straight, and c.) is definitely drunk, having seemingly polished off two bottles with mitzi over the course of the date.

sedgewick sable, for all intents and purposes, is a businessman and a capitalist after all. and while he’s leagues better than his peers in terms of kindness, passion, and humbleness, there’s still no denying that he’s still a man made of money who has to spend hours of his day rubbing elbows with blue blood types. he may be an outlier, but he’s secured investors for a reason and isn’t new to the social games that are a part of that environment. can’t be, when he can act so confident and ‘better than’ when such displays are needed from him. i understand the narrative of wick being ‘socially inept’ or ‘socially awkward’, because he is to a degree, though i think some people have the habit of erasing him of any competency entirely. during quarryman, caveat, and quacksalver, wick does well when holding his own and is able to keep an almost smug look about him even when faced with ridicule or critique from his wealthy peers ; never letting their insults or boredom stick, and behaving as if he’s amused by their comments at best.

i don’t think wick truly feels unbothered by these events nor do i believe his constant pleasant tone is always genuine. there’s a case to be made here about masking : the practice of concealing or suppressing aspects of one's ( potentially ) neurodivergent traits or conditions, in order to fit in with the norms of the workplace or society. it may be a ruse, but it’s a damn good one, to the point where it’s potentially taken over how he speaks entirely. and it’d make sense given the themes surrounding wick’s character already, but i’ll just leave that there for now. what matters in the context of him rejecting mitzi and his behavior thereafter is that wick has a really bad habit of coming across as uncaring on occasion, something not only the reader could be fooled by, but mitzi as well ; in her already sensitive state, still angry and hurting from asa’s imposed lunch as well as last night’s many humiliating events. despite this, the actual wording of wick’s confession, as distant as it may seem, is rather purposeful in my eyes, because he says : “i’d love for this to work out, but, uh … not if it’s contingent on a business partnership.” here, wick makes it clear that he’s not rejecting a romantic relationship with mitzi, merely the business proposal itself. if she wanted to date him without the business part, than wick would be more than willing to indulge her -- and even during the rejection itself, he never comes across as mad or angry at her in particular, expressions-wise. just rather saddened about things, a little shameful, but he seems to hold little issue with mitzi even though he’s still uncertain of her motives.

it’s also worth noting that despite wick’s feelings for mitzi being ‘obvious’, it’s very likely mitzi has no clue what those feelings really are in nature. to her, it could be a physical interest and nothing more, and given how she acts around wick ( as in, being extremely touchy physically ) i think her views of his attraction veer towards more shallow waters than sickly sweet romance. something that adds further insult to injury here, and makes her rather aggressive reaction, where she essentially says this :

all the more understandable, and honestly a rather human reaction all around. people love to dismiss everything mitzi says as ‘manipulative’ or ‘fake’, but tracy herself has essentially called wick a hypocrite before too … so there’s more truth to her words here than fans are comfortable to admit. while cruel, there’s honesty to what she’s saying. wick is indeed, by definition, a hypocrite. he also has, undoubtedly, led her on throughout this entire date and did so on purpose. she has every reason to lash out at him here and to continue doing so afterwards, torn between being angry at him as well as desperately needing him in turn ; still throwing herself at wick in a last ditch attempt to save things, even though we know she regrets and loathes such actions. her shallow view of wick’s affections isn’t exactly helped when, in response to her still biting words, he calls her mephistopheles and draws attention to her curves. if you don’t know, mephistopheles is a demon who corrupts the souls of men, and in some interpretations is said to take on desirable and pleasing forms. while a rather mean remark ( something mitzi even points out ) wick’s lips are in a tiny smile, eyebrows raised as he stares at mitzi with lidded eyes … it reads more like a tease, an action that the two engage in often when talking to each other ( as can be seen here, and other such instances ), rather than being a scathing review of character like mitzi’s words previously.

still, despite mitzi’s tempting offer of the more sexual implication, wick holds his ground and stays true to his rejection. a rejection that was practically just church’s words to him word-for-word, might i add. the date ends here and they separate. but i’d be remiss to not even briefly discuss sneakthief and other events afterwards, since they’re rather major in nature. though i will only talk about these events briefly, since they’re an entirely other can of worms and this analysis is long enough as it is.

as we’ve thoroughly covered thus far, mitzi stealing a blank check from wick’s checkbook wasn’t her plan all along, nor was it even a malicious action on her end. it was pure desperation that drove her to steal, just like it was pure desperation that drove her to play the condescending, evil crime boss gig to lacy … a gig she’s scarily good at, and one she’ll probably utilize more in the future. and no, this doesn’t dismiss how awful these actions are, it merely explains them. mitzi is not some evil manipulative mastermind, she literally heard about the checkbook in lacy’s bag and instantly ( foolishly! ) stole it immediately thereafter, basically getting caught as well. mitzi doesn’t even seem to think about what she’s doing before she moves to do it, a side effect of her all consuming obsession and, again, her desperation. these are hardly the actions of a woman who’s thinking reasonably or with any level of coldness, even if her actions here are extremely selfish. still, there’s no excusing it, though mitzi tries to find some justifications for her actions in an obvious attempt to soothe her own mind and, perhaps, to make her actions more palpable to even herself. you see this in backalley, where she briefly touches upon her actions in a way she won’t ever do again.

she’s rationalizing it to herself, thinking wholeheartedly that she’ll pay it all back eventually, and that she isn’t intending to take this money without giving any of it back. this is rather shortsighted of her, since a.) she doesn’t know if she’ll be able to make this money back, enough so to be able to give it to wick, and b.) that’s hardly the issue here, when the real betrayal lies within the fact she’s done this to wick at all. like most things, mitzi’s clouded view isn’t allowing her to realize the extent of what she’s done … i don’t even think she’s understanding that by doing this, she has potentially lost wick as a friend forever. or if she has realized this, it hasn’t begun weighing on her yet -- which is understandable, given her fight with zib and his disappearance right after the fact, as well as her beloved necklace being broken. there are just other things on her mind besides wick sable! and that’s the tragedy, isn’t it? there’s no room for her to really evaluate her feelings about him or him at all when she’s so obsessed with the abstraction of her late husband and all he represents ; down to the pearls she wears of him and the bad reputation he kept. it’s still easy to justify things in this state, to talk in circles about how wick is too nice to be mad at her or send her to jail and how she’ll eventually pay him back, when there’s no clarity for her. mitzi knows what she’s doing is reprehensible but she doesn’t know how bad it all is yet, something tracy has, again, said about her before. the last we see of mitzi in the comic currently is her saying this, which isn’t the expression nor the words of someone who is feeling anything but awful, though has found company and comfort in it despite the pain :

and we’ve now reached the end of this analysis! i want to give an immense thank you to anyone who’s sat through and read all of this from beginning to end given its length! and i also want to say that i understand some of the things covered here are a bit vague when compared to other parts, so if anyone has further questions or wishes to discuss this further, please feel free to do so! i view this project as an overall analysis rather than one that’s extremely specific to certain topics, so because of that ( and for your sanity and mine ) there were things i was curt with on purpose. trust me when i say that there’s not one aspect of these characters or their relationship that i haven’t given immense thought to, or analyzed. similarly, to reiterate my earlier disclaimers, everything i’ve said here is said with neutral evaluation at best and with some bias at worst, a bias that pertains to both wick and mitzi. i adore them both equally and i don’t want my words here to be twisted as me saying one of them deserves ‘better’ than the other, because frankly i care very little for that argument. at the end of the day, they’re two extremely human characters : flawed and intense and existing in multiple extremes, good and bad, and that’s exactly why their relationship fascinates me. i’m not here to play the moral police on fictional characters who are actively in a morally ambiguous work, i’m here to merely observe them and hopefully give them justice in my readings of their dynamic and respective complex characters … especially since i don’t think the fandom has done a good job of that for either of them!

though this is still just my opinion and analysis of the text that’s been given to us, so to each their own. i feel like i have so much more to say or elaborate upon, but this is a nice little place to leave it for now, so again, thank you all … and thank you tracy butler for squeezing my brain for thousands of words worth of braincells that has went into studying her comic like the bible <3 and then actually writing those thoughts down like some insane person!

#my posts.#lackadaisy analysis.#lackadaisy #mitzi may #sedgewick sable #character analysis #tracy j butler #major credit goes to user @churchwick btw! they helped edit these monsters so be sure to check them out as well!#also wow this beast is done. oh my god. i’ve spent an entire month on this !! like. STRAIGHT #if i reblog this ten times over the course of this month no one said anything this is my new baby and you will see it eventually!!!#but in all seriousness again i cannot thank anyone reading this enough! you’re some real ones if you’ve made it this far!!#uh. i don’t know what else to say??? so im gonna leave it at that but. yeah!! wow. i hope everyone enjoys this feast #love you wick and mitzi respectively!! here’s 15k words of love for YOU!

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taradactyls · 1 month ago

Text

The research that went into the Chapter 40 journey from London to Pemberley, as promised. With photos, maps, and a tangent or two!

I wanted to sprinkle in a few names of real places into Elizabeth’s journey, similarly to Pride and Prejudice, but for that I had to do some research. In the book she and the Gardiners take a scenic route further to the west, whereas this needs to be more direct, so I couldn’t copy those references. Unfortunately, we don’t know the way that they returned from Pemberley after Lydia’s elopement, because most of that would be the same (reversed) as what I needed.

So, I set out to find out what would be plausible.

‘Aw, the author did a little bit of research, that’s nice,’ you might think.

No. I did an excessive amount of research. Of the ‘it has consumed my entire soul and I need to know this information even though it’s barely relevant’ variety. When the toddlers went to bed and I was too tired to write, I did this. For weeks. It was basically the only time I could devote to this story, as the illnesses going around prevented me having time to actually write.

For context, I had ZERO background knowledge on this topic, and my first google search was to find out where Derbyshire is in relation to London.

Luckily, there was a road that seemed the most obvious direct route! But, following it closely to see what was nearby, I saw it avoided most of the villages; which is the exact opposite of what horse drawn carriages (which need to rest and water the horses, or switch them out entirely) would do. Sure enough, the M1 is a 20th Century road. So, then I went down the rabbit hole of seeing if the A5 or anything like that has older roots (it does) but after some more research into 18/19th C roads I realised I should be looking for turnpike roads/Post roads. Whichhhhh don’t exist in that form anymore.

And that’s where the fun began.

Warning, for a VERY long post.

FINDING THE RIGHT TURNPIKE ROADS

I couldn’t find an online list of which modern roads used to be turnpike roads, because it turns out they were managed in sections by turnpike trusts. And so, one half of a road might not be one and then the other half would but perhaps broken up into three different sections managed by different trusts (or the same trust but still separately, because local management was easier, I imagine).

I mostly wanted maps though, so that wasn’t a problem. Then I started searching for maps… and searching… and searching…

Basically, I looked at a lot and met a lot of dead ends but I’ll share some of the stuff that was useful.

I found a source which is all about research into turnpike roads and has an 1830 map.

But the map doesn’t have much detail so I can’t really tell much. Still, if you want to learn about turnpike roads have a look. I tried to compare it to other maps to see if I could figure out where those roads were but it just wasn’t detailed enough for me to be sure.

Then I found this old map of English towns and roads:

Which is comprehensive and amazing except for being blurry as anything when you zoom in, but does help give me a basic idea of what existed (though doesn’t specify turnpike vs … normal? roads). And I was able to track basic paths and use other maps and google maps to help me actually read the names of places. But It’s absolutely going on my wish list (along with that map of 1804 London I’ve linked before) of things I would like to have full sized posters for if I ever have space for a study. If I start writing regency novels as an actual occupation (around when I started this fic I also began planning a P&P sequel trilogy – though something tells me this fic might end up with nearly as many words as the whole trilogy combined) I shall insist I need the maps for work.

Anyway,

I eventually stumbled onto the pot of gold!!! Maps for each county with the roads and towns clearly marked! The dates are not all there, so I can’t say it’s 100% accurate, but it feels better than my other options.

(Not posting individual images of each county because you’ll see them altogether later, but I do recommend checking them out if you find this interesting, there’s places mentioned there that get omitted in bigger maps.)

I cross referenced with this map:

To double check they’re post roads (aka they had stops every 10 miles or so to switch out horses, and I did my best to find villages that had post houses or coaching inns).

Of course, those detailed images of counties are all separate, and for my own sanity I need to see how they link up. Going back to google maps to see what counties I would need I pretty quickly noticed discrepancies between the map borders and google maps. Turns out the counties changed in 1974. So, I had to go find an old map of British counties. That was the easiest part of my research, and I used this one:

Using that, I decided to print out, with a view of physically sticking them together: Middlesex, Hertfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Bedfordshire, Northamptonshire, Warwickshire, Leicestershire and Rutland, Staffordshire, and finally Derbyshire. Because when the map you want doesn’t exist, sometimes you just have to collage together your own.

THEN, of course, it was brought forcibly to my awareness when I tried to make the different borders align, that old maps often have inaccuracies.

There were little knobbly protruding bits of counties that were claimed by both neighbours in their individual maps, and random gaps which weren’t claimed by any. Counties were too long or too wide and sometimes too just entirely distorted to make the borders fit together as they should, and then the alignment of the roads would sometimes not match the alignment of the physical characteristics and it would get even messier.

I gave up on that idea less than halfway through cutting and sticky taping them together.

But all was not lost! Husband has a photoshop account through his work! I have a very basic understanding of photoshop thanks to taking graphics in high school, another one-off lesson for a Communications elective at uni, and then experience with similar programs for digital art. My confidence thus knew no bounds and I was certain I could photoshop a suitable map together in 30mins or so!

I was half right: I absolutely made the map, but it took me a few hours one night and I went to bed late.

We must all suffer for our craft, and sometimes my craft is niche research that I refuse to simplify BECAUSE I’VE COME TOO FAR TO GIVE UP NOW AND I WILL NOT ACKNOWLEDGE SUNK COSTS FALLACY TODAY!

Here is my beauty:

(You can see I didn’t care about all the dates and names of the turnpikes, but if you do, definitely click the link above which has the counties individually. It also gives you an idea of just how the same road could be divided into multiple trusts.)

I had to warp and stretch some counties pretty drastically to make them jig-saw together enough to be useable, and when clashes between making the roads or the borders line up I prioritised the roads. Seeing them aligned was the whole point of this, after all, but if you look closely, you can see some weird spots between counties where there’s a void or overlap from not quite matching up properly.

I printed this off and did some highlighting of potential routes from London to Derby, which I figured they would probably pass through on the way to Pemberley (more on that later). I ended up with a few slight variations which are all, to the best of my knowledge, feasible options. There seemed to be mostly an obvious route with options for variation, which I labelled option a, option b, etc. (this will help you understand my notes later). If road quality, or inn quality, etc., would create a decided favourite in late winter of 1812 nothing had popped up in my research and, honestly, did I really want to open that can of worms after all the hassle just to get to this point?

I then took my highlighted routes, and kept the individual maps of the counties, and the really huge complete one of Great Britain, up on my computer so I could zoom in for greater detail, and went to Google maps. I had to do a lot of cross-referencing with the various old maps with google maps so I could figure out which roads I were meant to be following, since not only have their names often changed but the settlements along the way have considerably changed in shape too. I felt a little bit like I was doing forensic work to identify what in the old maps lined up with the modern day, especially in places like Leicester which have grown so much larger in the 200+ years since. It was very satisfying when I was able to find the roads I needed.

There were three things I determined would decide which route I went with:

Was there a village (and better yet, evidence of a coaching inn) every 10-15 miles?

Did this route remain consistent with Pemberley being 150 miles from London?

Does it have interesting places I can mention in the narrative?

I started with the first two, since they were the options which could veto pathways or mark them for further research. I figured that out by going onto google maps and using the measuring tool, and then jotting down my notes in a word document. This is what one optional path from that research looks like:

Route a)

Edgeware 9 miles

Stanmore 10-11 miles

Watford 16 miles

St Albans is 22 miles

Redbourn 27

Flamstead 30

Markyate 31

Dunstable 34-36

Hockcliffe 39 miles

a)d)

Woburn 44

Woburn Sands

Newport Pagnell 53 miles

Stoke Goldington 57

Horton 61 miles

Hackleton 62

Northampton 67 miles

a)d)e)

Chapel Brampton 72 miles

Spratton 75

Creaton 76

Thornby 79

Welford 82 miles

Husbands Bosworth 85 miles

Arnesby 91 miles

Leicester 100 miles

To Derby following a)d)e)

Mountsorrel 106 miles

Quorndon (Quorn now) 108 miles

Loughborough 110 miles

Hathern 113

Kegworth 117 miles

River Trent 120 miles (actual river, and means definitively in Derbyshire)

Shardlow 121 miles

Derby 127

I fairly quickly learn that pretty much every option I had drawn on the map could work with both the distance and requirement to change horses, so I definitely would not declare that the route I ended up choosing is *the* route Mr Darcy would travel up to Pemberley on. My choice came down to what locations I thought were cool and useful.

As a side note: during this plotting of the miles on the map and keeping track of every 10-12 miles, I was initially very surprised by something.

Without fail, no matter how blank the countryside had been, there would be a village or larger town there. It really made me realise for the first time just how much English settlements along throughfares grew because of the needs of horses. It makes total sense, travel times stayed largely the same and reliant on horses or feet for thousands of years until trains, but it never occurred to me. It’s so entirely different to my own city, Brisbane (yes, the one from Bluey).

With Australia being such a recently colonised country the permanent British settlement that became Brisbane wouldn’t even come into being for more than a decade after the events of Pride and Prejudice. It would be decades more until the penal colony became big enough to warrant a proper name and municipality. Even Australia only officially became a country instead of a colony in 1901. As the best way to reach Brisbane from the other colonies (like Sydney) was by boat, consideration for horses travelling really hasn’t dictated much here. Instead of different settlements within (at least) about 10 miles of another we ended up with basically one settlement surrounded by vast amounts of farmland and nothing else the settlers considered civilisation (we all know how native peoples were viewed by colonising nations).

The fact that we didn’t have another settlement 10 miles (or really, at all,) nearby meant that that extensive farmland ended up being included as part of the Brisbane city border – which is why area-wise Brisbane is the third largest city in the world despite our population not even getting to three million. Even without traffic I could easily drive for an hour in one direction from my home and still be within Brisbane.

Looking at all these tiny English villages so reliably spaced just feels like a whole different planet to me. And crossing so many shires! From Brisbane to the top of Queensland (our state) is a 31-hour drive along direct highway. Which, for context for my American and European readers, Google Maps says is the same driving time (not distance) as London to Greece, or New York to Montana. Size wise, Queensland (which is our 2nd largest state) is 215 times the size of North Yorkshire, more than 3 times larger than France, over 100,000km2 larger than Alaska, and more than 2.6 times larger than Texas. I’ve never before really understood that Australia (and parts of the USA) don’t adhere to the old rules of human settlements and travel because our cities are crazy new.

Well, now we all know. Back to the research.

With a focus on information about the actual places near my potential routes, I returned to google maps, zoomed in real, real close, still using the measuring tool so I could keep track of every 10-15 miles, and noted every landmark and village that popped up. I was then doing lots of googling and searching Wikipedia to discover what I could about each location so I could figure out which one I preferred to use. I learnt a lot, particularly that English villages are very proud of how many Indian restaurants they have and often list it on their Wikipedia page, but I only recorded the bits I felt might be relevant to the story. Here’s an exert of my notes with that research when added to the distances:

Day 1 (more exploring allowed)

Edgeware 9 miles

Stanmore 10-11 miles

Watford 16 miles

St Albans is 22 miles

Lizzy seen before. Casually mention St Michael’s church and the ruins

They then follow the old roman road of Watling Street (to Hockcliffe?)

Redbourn 27

(important coaching station – ‘Owing to its proximity to London, Redbourn became an important coaching station in the 17th and 18th centuries, and it was known as the "Street of Inns", with at least 25 pubs and inns at its peak.’)

Talk about stopping for a meal here? Mention Dunstable might serve better, for it has the chalk escarpments?

Flamstead 30

Markyate 31

Markyate's position on Watling Street made it a coaching stop on the stagecoach routes from London to Birmingham and Holyhead, especially after the road was upgraded by Thomas Telford in the early 1800s, when it became known as the Holyhead Road. At one point Markyate had over forty inns and public houses along the main road.

Dunstable 34-36

has chalk escarpments (Chilton Hills/Dunstable Downs)

with barrows!! (though maybe too far south?)

Highest point in Bedfordshire (at the time? Pre changed borders?)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunstable_Downs

market town

priory

very ancient façade

where Henry VIII’s annulment from Catherine was delared

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunstable_Priory

They think they might as well explore here a long time because there is nothing more exciting awaiting them in their final two stops for the day

Hockcliffe 39 miles (where they leave Watling Road?)

Woburn 44

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woburn,_Bedfordshire

Near Woburn Abbey (Family seat of the Duke of Bedford) Darcy could show no inclination to see it – though Elizabeth knows she might have if she were travelling with others. As she does not much mind seeing stately homes she does not care. Could tease him about whether he’s worried that a duke’s home will make his own seem unimpressive? Mention his uncle doesn’t like John Russell, 6th Duke of Bedford due to clashing in the past in the house of Lords

During the English Civil War, the Cavaliers burned down much of the town and in 1724 a third fire destroyed much of the town, which was rebuilt in the Georgian style that remains today

important staging post on the London–Newport Pagnell–Northampton turnpike. The town had 27 inns and the first 24-hour post office outside London.

Bolded locations are where I theorised made the most sense to change the horses. I did this more casual research for multiple places, and then once I’d decided which was the most enticing for me, I had my turnpike roads from London to Derbyshire. Now I had to make it interesting.

THE LOCATIONS I CHOSE TO SHOW

First, I did the whole confirmed route again in google maps with more in-depth research. This involved a lot of google street view, as well as finding local webpages for villages and the more historical buildings. I have now virtually driven through dozens of little villages and I CANNOT believe how much history and prettiness is just right there as part of everyday life??? Australia doesn’t have history like that in our random small towns or big cities (the ancient sites we do have from 60,000+ years of aboriginal Australians living here weren’t the sort the settlers would respect or even noticed in many cases during colonisation). We have amazing things that I have travelled to see, don’t get me wrong, but of a different sort than still-habited buildings and not so ingrained into our ‘normal.’

Luckily for me the English are very proud of their buildings and natural sites and this bit of research was really easy and straightforward. I’ll just show you the locations I focused on in chapter 40 (and very slight spoilers for the start of 41, too). Everything I talk about is real (though the great house with a drive straight off the village road I mention in passing no longer survives, and other things look different), so if you want to explore the places mentioned in the fic but I don’t show here, google maps and Wikipedia will help you get started. In the order that Elizabeth and Mr Darcy explored them, we have:

The Dunstable Priory

This is exactly the view of the building that I imagine they had during their conversation about the history and impressiveness of a place. It really is VERY grand.

Other views of it:

The interior has changed since the 1800s a little, but the bones of the building are the same.

The Dunstable Downs

Those are the sorts of street view photos that made me want to use it; but honestly, I don’t think I can possibly show you enough to do it justice. See what I mean?

I like hills, and that’s a good one.

The Wikipedia page has cool information about it if you want a starting point for learning more about the barrows or stuff I didn't mention.

Hardingstone Eleanor Cross

The research told me it looked a little different in the early 1800s, which is why this photo doesn’t have the Malta Cross I mention in the chapter.

Highgate House, Creaton

That’s the view from the road, on the left is where carriages would enter and that’s the front courtyard Elizabeth walked in.

And there’s the south side of the house, with the more impressive architecture that Elizabeth mentions.

Unfortunately, it’s raining in the street view photos, so you can’t see any of the countryside that Elizabeth was looking at when Mr Darcy found her, but here’s what the view of the same is from one of those upper story windows she ponders about:

Minor Places Elizabeth Sees (in chapters 40 or 41) that I Liked

The Glimpse Elizabeth got of the Newarke Gateway:

The Cavendish Bridge as I believe it was at the time (it’s been replaced twice since):

The view of the Derwent from the centre of (the then, very new) Duffield Bridge:

St Aulkmunds Church, Duffield:

Black Rocks, which Elizabeth only saw from the road but here’s the view anyway:

At the end of all that exploring as I travelled the route I ended up with google maps looking like this:

Each of those little circles is a mark I made on the map, because I really wanted the distance to check out. And honestly, I was pretty pleased at this point. It took a lot of unexpected effort to get here, but in the end I did it, and the locations and distances worked out SO satisfyingly for me. Not that it’d be noticeably different if it didn’t, but I know.

It was great to see I was following fairly closely the path of the Eleanor crosses, because it confirmed the route I chose had historical basis. To the best of my knowledge, there is nothing glaringly implausible about this being a pathway that Mr Darcy might use and thus the sights that might be seen along the way.

Of course, it’s very possibly not what Jane Austen (or someone actually living in 1812 England who has more baseline knowledge of this than me) would do. I’m confident that I did my best, but not confident that my understanding of this subject is good enough to have made me come to the right conclusions. But I am writing fiction, not history, so this level of research is sufficient for me to go on.

But now that I’ve gotten to Derbyshire, I’ve realised it’s a very big place. Derby is ‘only’ about 127 miles from London, Pemberley is 150, that’s a lot of distance that is unaccounted for.

Where would Pemberley be, based on the book’s clues and the distances possible with the research I just did?

FINDING PEMBERLEY

So, Firstly, I want to make it clear that I don’t think we will ever be able to point to a place on a map, say ‘this is where Pemberley is’ and have it work perfectly with both the book and the real world. Nor with any of the other locations which aren’t preexisting real places. As grounded in reality as Austen’s works are, they are still works of fiction, and I keep that in mind when applying real-world nuance to the locations, distances, and finances mentioned. I also generally don’t want to mess with headcanons too much, nor stray into territory where glaring errors can be made, as well as honouring that Jane Austen liked to keep locations vague.

That’s all why (in chapter 41, so very mild spoilers) I only definitively mention Duffield (5 miles North of Derby) for that last leg of the journey. Even that Black Rocks Promontory I showed you above is vaguely enough mentioned to be elsewhere. I’m happy for Pemberley to live as a place of suspended reality in my mind, but for the sake of this research I wanted to define a specific patch of Derbyshire which I would use as a vague location in my fic. Also, when it comes to research, I Have A Problem and I justified it in this case by wanting to know what was plausible just in case the only places it could be were in the south-west or north-east of Derbyshire and that might alter the pathway. This was done at the same time as a lot of the other research, but that would’ve gotten too messy to explain so I chose to detail it all here instead of interspersing it.

But how exactly to pinpoint likely locations?

Note: I am sure this is going to overlap with research others have done before me, but I have my own goals (for setting it somewhere for a fic) so I stayed away from other reasonings as I might value things differently. I’ve got to do this myself.

Luckily, Elizabeth mentions “before we left Bakewell, we understood that you were not immediately expected in the country,” (Ch. 43) so we can assume the village they discover that in, and depart from the following morning before soon reaching Pemberley and then going on to Lambton, is Bakewell. A real location!!! It’s about 22 miles north of Duffield (which checks out with the distances already measured) and puts us firmly in the peak district.

It's also just to the south-west of Chatsworth, which I calculate to be barely over 150 miles from London. Adding more credence in my mind to the idea that Jane Austen used it as her true idea of Pemberley – even though the real thing also exists in the book. But though it might be her base for Pemberley I’m not about to replace a very well known and book-canon location (though feel free to continue imagining it to be so, I don’t contradict the possibility, I even looked at Chatsworth floorplans for inspiration for describing Pemberley’s interiors) so I’m going to find what else might work.

Now, from what I could tell, Bakewell isn’t included in the modern-day ‘Chatsworth Core Estate’ (see the map on page 46).

It might not have been the case two centuries ago, but I’m going to presume it hasn’t changed, so basically, I can pick anywhere from the north-west, sweeping down west and south, until the south-east, safely without infringing upon Chatsworth. All the other, lesser-known landowners of the era we shall pretend don’t exist. I’m more going for a general area, anyway.

The Gardiners were likely travelling with considerable economy, and not changing horses every hour, so Pemberley can’t be a far distance away from there (if we want to mirror Chatsworth, 4-5 miles is best). We don’t know when they left Bakewell or arrived at Pemberley but it seems likely it was fairly early in the day, given how much time they spent there and then still drove on Lambton afterwards. So, we can look at places that are within a few hours journey from Bakewell for the Gardiners (let’s say 20 miles as an absolute maximum) and cross reference that with what is about 150 miles from London.

A brief note on the ‘150 miles’ number – the way I round numbers makes me think this is anywhere between 145-154 miles, but Jane Austen does seem to work in quarters rather than tenths, (approximately 25 miles from Meryton to London, 50 from Meryton to Rosings, 125 from Meryton to Pemberley, etc) so it might be fairer to say the distance from London is too much to be called 125 miles, but too little to be called 175. Which, assuming normal rounding of numbers, is 137-188 miles from London. For this estimation, I’m going to be sticking closer to my initial, tighter, understanding; but the possibility of the distances being broader than I interpret is worth mentioning.

Given all of those considerations, here is the area that I chose for Pemberley to be set within for the fic:

The Blue highlighted area is a general area that I think Pemberley House could be situated in, and probably Lambton too. The Estate itself can stretch beyond the borders, this is only for the house/park.

Bakewell is just above that section, and I’ve highlighted the other places mentioned in Pride and Prejudice as being part of the Northern Tour. White peak being the only option for ‘the Peak’ as far as I know. Fun fact: in my version of Pride and Prejudice (Penguins Classics 2003), and another online copy I used, Jane Austen has a spelling/consistency error by saying ‘Dovedale’ first and then ‘Dove Dale’ soon after. It’s a little comforting for me whenever I see that even my favourite author makes mistakes she misses despite all her reviews and rereads.

Anyway, there is a bit of a conflict for me with this location (as well as the location of Chatsworth, and any other places around 150 miles from London and still in the Peak District) when we take into account that Elizabeth and the Gardiners saw those highlighted places before going to Bakewell. It seems a very circuitous route, whatever order those sights are seen in. The best I can imagine is that it goes Dovedale (which I think should always be first, given the places we know they visit on their way to Derbyshire), then a more southern, partially unseen on that image, road to Matlock, followed by Chatsworth, the Peak, and turning around there and going back to Bakewell via a different road.

If Elizabeth’s trip to Derbyshire was based on the real travels of Austen or someone she knew, I don’t have knowledge of it. So, if there is a definitive pathway that’s agreed she intended to be followed that could change my deductions.

But as it is, with what I presume in mind, we might even be able to narrow down that blue area more, ruling out the most south-easterly portion because otherwise why wouldn’t they have seen Pemberley on their way to Matlock? If we were really looking for other ways to narrow it down, we might say that Dovedale and Matlock, which Elizabeth and Mr Darcy discuss at Pemberley, were the chosen subjects because they’re quite close to the house, and so that might place it in the south or south-west section of that blue area. I don’t think the latter concern does mean much: Chatsworth is also very close by but not discussed; and if Chatsworth itself is Austen’s location for Pemberley, then neither of those places are closer than the peak so the topics can’t be based on proximity. Perhaps they’re just what was seen most recently (implying an odd pathing of the Peak, Chatsworth, Matlock, Dovedale, and then way back up to Bakewell); or, as I think most likely, just mentioned to give vague specifics of the conversation and the locations chosen randomly out of all those that could be said.

And there we are.

I have a basic location for Pemberley and the journey thither that works for my fic and matches the book and the real-world as much as my knowledge of distances and turnpike roads allows. It’s not relevant enough for it to matter if you veto this idea and instil your own headcanon for Pemberley as you’re reading the fic, I certainly leave it open enough for other interpretations. But I did the research, and I must share it, because it took a lot of pain and effort to get to this point.

Thank you for sticking with me until the end, I hope you found it all interesting!

#I sometimes say 'thank you for coming to my TED talk' but this time it's not half joking #with a wee bit of tweaking this is big enough to be a TED talk #I kid you not this is over five thousand words #OF RESEARCH NOTES AND EXPLANATIONS #I cannot be stopped #at least there are pretty pictures to break up the text lol #jane austen #pride and prejudice #research #history #trying to tread water #fic:t3w

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