Neurodivergent (Headcanon) Alley: Fitzwilliam Darcy (Pride and Prejudice)

*Darcy-related spoilers.*

Let’s be real. It was only a matter of time until I came around to this one. My Jane Austen journey started with the series of Masterpiece TV movies in 2007 (shoutout to Felicity Jones and Catherine Morland!), which led to all the books and then every single adaptation I could get my hands on. Hello, special interest! I’ve always loved Mr. Darcy as a character, for his complexity and fantastic interactions with Lizzy. I used to hedge a little, feeling a hipsterish need to point out that he wasn’t necessarily my favorite Austen leading man, but let’s put that aside, shall we? It’s Darcy. Over the years, I’ve only grown more attached to the character, in all sorts of incarnations (looking at you, Fire Island!) I’ve long appreciated his introverted characterization, but I’ve more recently come to view him through an autistic lens as well.

As I’ve gone deeper into my own neurodivergent journey, hearing about other folks’ autistic headcanons has really helped me expand my view of what autism can look like, and I now recognize that kinship with plenty of characters that it never would’ve occurred to me to read as autistic. But when I first saw Darcy’s name pop up on someone’s headcanon list, my immediate thought wasn’t, “Whoa, really? Well, now that I think about it….” It was, “Well, that makes total sense.”

Let’s start with Darcy in his own words, shall we? “I certainly have not the talent which some people possess, of conversing easily with those I have never seen before. I cannot catch their tone of conversation, or appear interested in their concerns, as I often see done.” Originally, I read this line as a Big Introverted Mood, but this is also a very autistic framing. Darcy isn’t merely shy or withdrawn. He has difficulty following people’s tone or playing along with social niceties, and despite having observed other people do this successfully, he can’t figure out how to do it himself.

I don’t want to say Darcy isn’t proud, because he definitely can be. But when he’s stiff and awkward at a ball, when he refuses to dance because he doesn’t want to, when he responds flatly to Bingley’s rose-colored impression of the evening, other people take all of that as further proofness of his standoffishness. Most everyone in Meryton thinks Darcy is a snobby dud compared to Bingley, and they take his behavior purely as slights against them, not recognizing that a big portion of it stems from his social discomfort.

However, people who know Darcy well have a very different opinion of him. Bingley is maybe a bit impervious to his friend’s moods, but Darcy is the friend he brings along to Netherfield. They spend a great deal of time together, and as amiable as Bingley is, I don’t think he’d keep dragging Darcy to balls he doesn’t want to go to if they didn’t genuinely get along. And when Lizzy visits Pemberley, Darcy’s housekeeper is full of warm remarks about him and specifically notes that a lot of people have the wrong impression. I’m a person who can struggle in social situations until I really get to know someone (and even then, I’m better one-on-one or in very small groups,) and I know what it’s like to have people assume I’m stuck-up.

Darcy is bluntly honest to his own detriment—especially in this sort of drawing-room polite society, where it’s all about saying things in the “correct” or expected manner. His first proposal to Lizzy is a disaster, and not just because she’s totally blindsided by the fact that she’s into him. No, he bursts in, declaring, “You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you,” and then he proceeds to tell Lizzy about how hard he’s tried not to love her, due to her undesirable family connections. And the thing is, he thinks he’s nailing it. Yes, on a class level, it’d be unthinkable for a woman in Lizzy’s position to turn down a man of Darcy’s standing. But from his perspective, he’s also 1) being honest, which is good and 2) telling Lizzy that his love for her is strong enough to overcome his numerous misgivings about her family and status, which he thinks is flattering to her. When Lizzy flatly turns him down, he doesn’t know what to think.

(Side note: much of Darcy’s reluctance toward Lizzy is down to the Bennets’ “inferior” class, and some of it is about the boorish behavior of characters like Mrs. Bennet and Lydia. But it’s also worth mentioning that Mrs. Bennet and Lydia are like a walking sensory overload.)

Fortunately for Darcy, Lizzy clarifies her reasons, and once he understands, he writes her a long letter to add context to everything she’s heard about him. As their relationship continues to shift and deepen, he thinks he can feel that shift but remains wary. The next time he broaches the topic of love, it’s to quietly share, “My affections and wishes are unchanged, but one word from you will silence me on this subject forever,” putting the ball in Lizzy’s court. First of all, thank you, gentleman, for respecting a woman’s boundaries. But also, we see how he wants to wait for explicit confirmation that Lizzy feels the same way before he tries proposing again, having misread the situation before.

So yeah, one of the most popular romantic leads of all time can be easily read as autistic, which is pretty cool. Unfortunately, Darcy’s literary swoonworthiness doesn’t really translate to people with those traits in real life, but I still appreciate watching this heartthrob character deal with his socializing struggles and bad first impressions on the way to finding true love.