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kitcat1
Upstart Joined: 04 Jun 2009 Posts: 8 Location: Philadelphia PA	Posted: Wed Mar 23, 2011 8:10 pm    Post subject: letters and courting   In my story, I have a girl being courted by a viscount. However, since they didn't meet until near the end of the season, he's not ready to propose and she wouldn't be sure she'd want to say yes, as they don't know each other that well yet. I was planning to have them exchange letters over the summer (not love letters, just daily life and like/dislikes) and then at the end of the summer he'd visit their country house with his mother and sister. I just read on a Jane Austen website that correspondence between a unmarried man and woman was a big no-no, and would only be allowed once an engagement was announced. So how is my couple supposed to get to know one another? Should they wait until the next season in London and continue there? Would he still do the country house visit? By the end of the season, they known each other about 5 weeks.
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KalenHughes
Viscountess of the Manor Joined: 20 Sep 2006 Posts: 1100	Posted: Thu Mar 24, 2011 1:57 pm    Post subject:   Letters would be considered far too intimate. If he was seen as a real potential suitor, her family would be TRIPPING over themselves to invite him to visit and get him locked down before his infatuation could wear off. Depending on where they live, they could invite him for all kinds of summer entertainment. There are various kinds of shooting, cubbing (training of young fox hounds before the season), fishing. And if he’s interested, he could get his mother to invite them to the family estate for the same sort of thing. _________________ -Kalen w/a Isobel Carr Ripe for Pleasure, May 2011 Book 1: The League of Second Sons www.isobelcarr.com
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kitcat1
Upstart Joined: 04 Jun 2009 Posts: 8 Location: Philadelphia PA	Posted: Thu Mar 24, 2011 7:16 pm    Post subject:   Thanks! Would the viscount's Mother come to the girl's family estate? Or would she just wait until the girl and her family come to their estate? (The mother didn't meet the girl in London.) Would they invite just her and her parents or would her younger 17 year old twin siblings also get to come. Her younger sister is to have her coming out the next season after she turns 18. Since the Viscount's father is dead, could he invited the girl and her family or must the invitation come from his mother?
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Candice
Queen of the Board Joined: 14 Sep 2006 Posts: 2731 Location: Minneapolis, MN	Posted: Fri Mar 25, 2011 7:31 am    Post subject:   kitcat1 wrote: Thanks! Would the viscount's Mother come to the girl's family estate? Or would she just wait until the girl and her family come to their estate? (The mother didn't meet the girl in London.) Would they invite just her and her parents or would her younger 17 year old twin siblings also get to come. Her younger sister is to have her coming out the next season after she turns 18. Since the Viscount's father is dead, could he invited the girl and her family or must the invitation come from his mother? The invitation to a house party should come from the hostess of the party, in this case his mother. I doubt she would invite the younger siblings. Children would likely only be invited to a house party when they knew the family and perhaps the children of the family. If your heroine's family is hosting a house party, they can get away with only inviting the viscount and not his mother (unless she is known to the heroine's mother and they WANT to invite her). But he should not be the only single young man invited. The mother would have to plan a party as an entertainment for "young people" and invite others from her daughter's circle of friends. It might be clear to everyone involved that the whole thing is for the benefit of throwing her daughter and the viscount together, but at least on the surface the group party looks innocent enough. _________________
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