Pride and Prejudice,
Jane Austen, illustrated by Wallis Mills, 1908 (first published 1813)
Throughout Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen uses interactions around card games to demonstrate characters’ intelligence, values, and socio-economic situations. In one scene, Elizabeth Bennet declines to join a game when she realises the wealthy players will be gambling for high stakes that she could not afford to risk. Her decision not to join in is mistaken for a dislike of the game by the upper class Mr Darcy, but she plays at several other points in the novel within her social circle.
British Museum curator Tom Hockenhull says that the majority of Austen’s middle class readers related to Elizabeth’s preference for games of skill with modest stakes, over the aristocracy’s reckless gambling on games of chance.
Hand-coloured frontispiece to The State Lottery, a Dream, Samuel Roberts, 1817, illustrated by George Cruickshank. Read Felicity Day on gaming and gambling in the Georgian era here.
Below, Paul Wake of Manchester Games Studies Network has provided a list of board games based on 19th-century books, including Marrying Mr Darcy, based on Pride and Prejudice:
Frank Brooks, Stephen Hand and Kevin Wilson, The Fury of Dracula (Fantasy Flight, 2015) [Bram Stoker, Dracula, 1987] Play the digital version on Steam.
Raymond Edwards, Suzanne Goldberg and Gary Grady, Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective: The Thames Murders and Other Cases (Asmodee, 1982)
Anthony J. Gallela, Eric Goldberg, Kevin Maroney and Zev Shlasinger, Tales of the Arabian Nights (Z-Man Games, 2009) [One Thousand and One Nights]
Naoki Homma, Parade (Z-Man Games, 2007) [Lewis Carroll, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, 1865]
Marc Paquien, Treasure Island (Matagot, 2018) [Robert Louis Stevenson, Treasure Island, 1883]
Erika Svanoe, Marrying Mr Darcy (Evensen Creative, 2014) [Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice, 1813]
Ignacy Trzewiczek’s Robinson Crusoe: Adventures on a Cursed Island (Portal Games, 2012) [Daniel Defoe, Robinson Crusoe, 1719] Play this game online on Tabletopia.