A Year Without Summer: A Variation on Pride and Prejudice
This variation of Pride and Prejudice begins in the fall of 1815 with celebrations of Wellington’s victory at Waterloo. The Bennet family recognizes that the winter is very cold but nothing prepares them for the ‘year without a summer’ that follows. Frost and cool temperatures every month of the growing season reduce harvests of important grains, vegetables, and fruits. Their England is dependent upon locally grown foodstuffs and the people are unable to bring in food stuffs from other parts of the world–in fact other parts of the world would not have had surpluses of food to send. Horse and oxen-drawn wagons could only move produce so far in any single day.
With some good luck, Mr. Darcy and Miss Bennet separate after the Ball at Netherfield on excellent terms. Through happenstance, the couple meet at Hunsford at Easter during the cold spring, fall in love and become engaged. However, as the families and tenants struggle to harvest diminished harvests of grains and hay, the Bennet and Darcy families struggle to remain hopeful. The poor harvests do not prevent the marriage of Elizabeth and Fitzwilliam, and they travel from London to Pemberley for the lean winter that affects the inhabitants of manor houses and farmhouses.
In Hertfordshire, Charles Bingley must deal with Caroline and his aunt from Scarborough, and Jane must rally her family as they discover how much they miss Elizabeth’s humour and wit. But in spring 1817, the weather makes all of England a green and bountiful land once again, and Jane and Charles find their way toward the happily-ever-after they deserve.