#sanditon 2x3

[growingstronglikeahighgardenrose]

“My heart always timidly hides itself behind my mind. I set out to bring down stars from the sky, then, for fear of ridicule, I stop and pick little flowers of eloquence.” ― Edmond Rostand, Cyrano de Bergerac

“I could not be happy with a man whose taste did not in every point coincide with my own. He must enter in all my feelings; the same books, the same music must charm us both.” ― Jane Austen, Sense and Sensibility

"I ne’er was struck before that hour with love so sudden and so sweet... Will you not finish the verse for me?"

― Alison Heywood, Sanditon

“How obvious it is now--the gift you gave him. All those letters, they were you... All those beautiful powerful words, they were you!.. The voice from the shadows, that was you... You always loved me!” ― Edmond Rostand, Cyrano de Bergerac

“I ne’er was struck before that hour With love so sudden and so sweet, Her face it bloomed like a sweet flower And stole my heart away complete. My face turned pale as deadly pale, My legs refused to walk away, And when she looked, what could I ail? My life and all seemed turned to clay.

And then my blood rushed to my face And took my eyesight quite away, The trees and bushes round the place Seemed midnight at noonday. I could not see a single thing, Words from my eyes did start— They spoke as chords do from the string, And blood burnt round my heart.

Are flowers the winter’s choice? Is love’s bed always snow? She seemed to hear my silent voice, Not love’s appeals to know. I never saw so sweet a face As that I stood before. My heart has left its dwelling-place And can return no more.”

- John Clare

[aadmelioraa]

Georgiana Lambe x Charles Lockhart, 1.8k, rated M

Georgiana returns to Charles Lockhart's studio alone—so that he may paint her, of course. No other reason.

Lockhart continues to watch her, and Georgiana finds she does not mind, for she has grown used to his eyes on her. He does not leer the way that some men do. Indeed, he has never raked his eyes over her body, nor attempted to brush against her skin or her hair. When he looks at her, it is with a peculiar kind of regard. He appears to find her fortune a curious attribute, but hardly the most interesting thing about her. She is not used to being seen this way. Perhaps she does not mind it, but she is not sure if she likes it either. It is unsettling in its singularity.

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[growingstronglikeahighgardenrose]

Will Charlotte get a choice?

Is Colonel Lennox even a real contender or is he a liar whose backstory will come back to bite him? Spoilers up ahead, obviously.

Lennox, I admit, makes a dashing first impression. He's charming, he's funny, he's got abbs, he shows genuine interest in Charlotte and says he admires some spunk and independence in a woman, and he has quite good game.

Obviously both Charlotte's potential suitors, Lennox and Colbourne, have some history. Even with each other. The actors admitted in the interviews that Lennox and Colbourne had a - and I quote - "spicy" relationship.

So what's going on? Here's what we know:

Lennox encourages Tom to gamble

Lennox trusts Edward (not a good look)

Lennox is a war hero

Lennox "does not have that pleasure" of a wife and child, or so he tells Charlotte, Georgiana and Alison

Colbourne is a conservative recluse who has lived on the outskirts of Sanditon for "some years"

Colbourne had a wife who died under mysterious circumstances

Colbourne daughter Leonora looks to be younger than 10, probably 7-8. He also looks after his brother/sister's daughter Augusta, who says she's been living in the "prison" that is Colbourne's house for a few years

Colbourne says something about "trust me miss heywood, I know what happens when a woman falls wrong of society's expectations" which gives us the idea that Colbourne knows a particularly sad story about a woman who didn't adhere to the rules of society and paid the price.

In episode 3 Lennox accuses Colbourne of stealing his wife

Lennox and Colbourne have their real first showdown at Lady D's garden party in episode 4 (according to episode descriptions) where they will shoot arrows

According to the episode 5 description, he and Colbourne will fight about Charlotte

Okay, Sanditon, from its very first season, has always used plot points and story beats from the finished Jane Austen novels. So let's play "who is it" with the characters and plot points, and try and guess how the story might turn out from there. My apologies beforehand but I avoid Mansfield Park like the plague so if there's parallel's from that book, I can't see them.

A character that's associated with gambling, getting a poor girl pregnant and having no qualms with dropping her, and having an unhappy marriage is Willoughby from Sense and Sensibility. Willoughby loathes Colonel Brandon, whom he calls old and boring and accuses of making excuses to skip out on fun gatherings. So we have a rogue calling an honourable man who is busy with cleaning up Willoughby's mistakes (i.e. helping Eliza after she was impregnated by Willoughby) bad names.

Wickham is a very charming military man who wasted his inheritance on gambling and big expenses and now has to be in the army to have some form of income. He talks very well of himself and very poorly of Mr. Darcy, whom he accuses of cheating him out of his inheritance. So we have a character accusing another character of something they didn't do.

We have an honourable military man in the shape of naval captain Frederick Wentworth, he is handsome, charming, well off and is straightforward about looking for someone to marry. He holds grudges towards those who go against his convinctions. This could be the case if Lennox is an honourable man.

Colbourne can, as far as the Austen spectrum goes, be compared to Mr. "I don't like public gatherings" Darcy who is bad at expressing himself and is accused by Willoughby of "stealing" something. Colbourne can also be compared to Colonel Brandon in that he's an older, quiet man who is at present taking care of a child that's not his own (Augusta, and perhaps, ...) and tries to stay away from the drama. Just like Brandon there was a tragic woman in his past who suffered the consequences of not adhering to society. Brandon was in love with his unfortunate woman, perhaps Colbourne was as well... Perhaps the woman he was speaking of was his wife.

In all cases this much is clear: the first person who accuses the other of being bad, is usually the person who has the most dirty laundry. Lennox can also already be compared with more of Austen's rakes than her heroes. The precedents set by Austen don't look great for Lennox. Everything depends on...

The wife: this will be the big drama point in the backstory of our male heroes. Did Colbourne steal the wife? Such an accusation would drive Charlotte away from Colbourne, but would it be true? And if it's true, are there circumstances in which that would be acceptable?

To answer that question, let's look at the cheaters of Jane Austen:

A lot of cheating in Mansfield Park, all bad. They get their comeuppance and it's not forgiven

Lucy Steele does not cheat on Edward Ferrars when they're married, but they were engaged when she switched brothers and decided to marry Robert Ferrars instead. Breaking an engagement was very scandalous. If you were engaged, you were as good as married, it would warrant someone saying "you stole my wife". It would also cause a woman to fall from grace and not be welcome in polite society. And well, Colbourne is quite a recluse. Could that be because he and his wife had quite a shameful elopement?

Eliza Brandon was unhappily married to Colonel Brandon's brother and started cheating. His brother divorced her and she was left pregnant and penniless, ending up in the poorhouse before being rescued by Brandon. I think the chance is very slim the showrunners would have one of the people pursuing Charlotte be an actual adulterer. Most watchers would find that quite unforgiveable, but what if Colbourne was the Christopher Brandon in this story? What if Colbourne was in love with Lennox's wife before and during when they were wed? What if, once Lennox divorced his wife, Colbourne saved her and her baby from the poorhouse and married her so the baby could have his name? A very sweet thought, but I doubt Lennox would then say Colbourne stole his wife.

As to non-cheating but still quite unfortunate women who were "stolen":

Georgiana Darcy was seduced and was almost married to Wickham so he had access to her wealth. Colbourne is wealthy. Was that money acquired through marrying the woman Lennox wanted? Orrr did Lennox try to marry a wealthy woman for her dowry, but did Colbourne prevent them from eloping?

Eliza Brandon the second was seduced by Willoughby, made pregnant, and left behind, thinking WIlloughby would come back to marry her once he had found some money. Could Lennox have left the woman Colbourne stole in such a state? Did Colbourne, like Brandon, sweep in and rescue her and bring her to his estate? Perhaps the Eliza 1 and Eliza 2 stories were merged for Colbourne: what if Colbourne loved Eliza, but Lennox seduced her, engaged her, but compromised her honour before going off to fight at Waterloo, promising her that once he was a war hero he would be able to marry her? Colbourne, hating what Lennox did to the woman he loved, could quit the army, pick her up, marry her and pass the child off as his own. Leonora is around 7, the Napoleontic wars raged quite heavily around the time of her birth, it could be.

How did these two men actually meet? When did the drama start? All Austen books point towards two options:

The story either starts when Colbourne swoops in and steals Lennox's fiancée or wife, the way it happened with Eliza 1 and Eliza 2

Or the Darcy-Wickham route where they went to school together/grew up together/did something together. This is the most plausible route. Why? Because Little Leonora wears a redcoat uniform. Where did she get that? The answer is so simple: from her father. Lennox and Colbourne were in the army together, before Colbourne left for dramatic reasons that probably tie in with the "stolen wife".

Conclusions:

Most hints point in the direction of Lennox and Colbourne being two friends or acquaintances who fell out so drastically about a woman (broken off engagement and marrying someone else, cheating and being divorced while pregnant, ...) that Colbourne probably left the army for it. The woman ended up living or being with Colbourne, birthed a child and she later wound up dead. Colbourne clearly loved the woman as her portrait still hangs in his home. Colbourne is clearly the richer of the two frenemies, and Lennox doesn't like him and tries to slander his reputation. That calls for Willoughby and Wickham parallels. Colbourne does his best to keep details around his marriage and himself vague for outsiders, it's clear he's protecting a secret with a certain kind of discretion, something we've only see Darcy and Colonel Brandon do. It makes me think that perhaps the marriage was a rushed affair, or perhaps the timeline of the pregnancy and the wedding didn't add up because the woman was already pregnant. Perhaps the woman's mysterious death could be a suicide because she was ostracized by society for breaking the rules. After the drama that happened with the "Stolen Wife" Colbourne tries to lead a quiet life and tries to keep his charges/children from becoming like the "stolen wife"/ tragic tale.

In any case, it gives the idea that when truth comes to light, Lennox will probably not look like the greatest guy. And that does make me feel conflicted, as it means Charlotte didn't get to choose. She just got one asshole, and one decent bloke.