Author's Notes
Grace Macy

You should probably be at least passingly familiar with the novels "Roxana" and "Pride and Prejudice" in order to get all the little "jokes" strewn throughout.

This short story is the result of a Final Exam "challenge" in my 18th Century Novel course at Tulane University, Fall of 1999.  The setting was this: to write a short, short-story or scene from a play in which the main characters of Daniel Defoe's "Roxana" and Jane Austen's "Pride and Prejudice" are college room-mates.  The purpose of this exercise (strictly limited to one hour!!) was to show the professor that we, the students, understood the characters, their motivations, and their choices.  In creating this story to comply with those instructions, the characters of Roxana de Beleau and Elizabeth Bennet went through something of a metamorphoses -- and it was at their own direction, I swear!

First of all, I wasn't sure how I would place them together in anything but the 20th century, since the details necessary for 18th or 19th were giving me headaches [starting with but not limited to "Were colleges accepting women before the 19th century?  When did they start with dorms?" and of course, "How can I get Roxana to have the same experiences but be old enough to a) be attending university and b) be living in a dorm?"].  So I decided "to hell with it" and placed them in the 20th century, which left them able to scurry hither and yon in my imagination, putting together their backgrounds and creating alter-egos for their 18th Century counterparts.

You will note rather quickly that neither of the characters is English anymore -- that, again, is going along with what made the most sense for continuity in  essence of character and circumstances.  Roxana, for example, started off in England and spends most of the novel in Europe, so an equal amount of travel was indicated for Roxanne: from the USA to Europe.  Lizzie's problems stemmed from a patriarchal society to some degree, so I placed Elizabeta's family in a country that still had that in the 20th Century: Italy.

Roxanne Unger is a play on Roxana de Beleau ["below" = "under" = "unger"].  Elizabeta Benedetti is a play on Elizabeth Bennet.  Devon Finley is a play on Darcy.  Giuseppi Colombo is a play on Mr. Collins.  Roxana's beaus, for the most part, were never really named -- so I claim artistic priviledge in creating their counterparts.  ;-)

By the way: yes, this took me the prescribed time to write.  I type as fast as I write long-hand -- it's just waaay more legible.  ::wink::  So, one hour exactly, with occasional brief "desperately flip through the Italian-English/English-Italian dictionary" breaks.  And I apologize in advance for the somewhat foul language when it gets to Roxanne's narrative -- that girl has got a mouth like a trucker.  <g>

Okay, I'll shut up now.  Go read the story!

finis

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Taueret@aol.com

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