Duty and Desire Duty and Desire Duty and Desire is a 2004 historical Romance novel by Pamela Aidan. The second in the "Fitzwilliam Darcy, Gentleman" trilogy, the novel examines Jane Austen's "Pride and Prejudice" from the perspective of Fitzwilliam Darcy, the central male character of that novel. In relation to "Pride and Prejudice", on which the novel is based, "Duty and Desire" takes place between Darcy's initial leaving of Hertfordshire and his reappearance in "Pride"'s narrative at Rosings Park. Following on from the events of "An Assembly Such as This", the novel opens with Fitzwilliam Darcy preparing for the Christmas season with his
Pride & Prejudice (2005 film) Romantic interpretation of Austen's novel", citing as evidence Wright's attention to nature as a means to "position Elizabeth and Darcy as Romantic figures ... Wright's "Pride & Prejudice" takes as its central focus Austen's concern with exploring the nature of the Romantic self and the possibilities for women and men to achieve individual self-fulfillment within an oppressive patriarchal social and economic order." Likewise, Catherine Stewart-Beer of Oxford Brookes University called Elizabeth's presence on the Derbyshire cliff a "stunning, magical evocation of Wright's strong stylistic brand of Postmodern Romanticism", but found this less like Austen and more reminiscent of Emily Brontë's