middlemarching reblogged your post: middlemarching: I disagree. A twenty-first…
A historical drama can’t also be a critique?It can be, but I think it’s safe to say that Downton isn’t out to critique Edwardian culture, just depict it for entertainment purposes. But since our respective interpretations of the scene in question and Mary’s agency therein are pretty much diametrically opposed, there’s no point in discussing it further.
I understand not wanting to drag it out if we’re not going to agree. I do want to say one more thing just because I think it’s important, but I’m not trying to invalidate your interpretation of the show.
I do feel that Downton Abbey is intended to be a critique—and a successful critique at that—of most other aspects of the society. Just a few examples: the rigid social structure associated with the ‘upstairs’ and ‘downstairs’ becomes visibly obsolete after the beginning of the First World War, and the theme of the second season seems to focus on the clash between the desires of those who to return to pre-war living in a world where those social moors just don’t have a place anymore, and the desires of those who want to move forward towards something new.
No, you’re right, and I think the nice thing about Downton is that it works both ways — it’s 100% entertaining as a frivolous costume drama, but there’s plenty of meat for the critique-of-an-era take on the show, if that’s what a viewer is bringing to it. But even then, I still don’t think it’s wrong of Julian Fellowes to realistically depict the seduction of an upperclass woman (or, depending on your interpretation, an Edwardian date rape) as it would have likely played out at the time, just as he realistically depicts everything else — even if that means portraying something that’s complex and ambiguous, to the viewers and even to the characters themselves. It would be odd and patronizing to treat the issues surrounding women’s sexual agency with kid gloves and gravitas when everything else is handled straight on.
