The Pride and Prejudice AU Craze!

So, looking back on our conversation of the novel and the way it seems to permeate popular culture even if some of us (myself included) had not actually read it before I started to think that maybe I had read it before and then it came to me: The Pride and Prejudice AU craze:

For those of you still confused by this term, AU is an abbreviation of Alternate Universe. In Fanfiction terms, you take your fandom and place them in a different setting, like the future, or the Middle Ages or even more popular the Pride and Prejudice era.

So why do fans care enough about this book/era/idea to transplate their ships there?

I honestly have no idea.

Realistically, it's not a lovey-dovey romance story, filled with all of the picnics and promises girls are supposed to dream of and boys are supposed to inherently offer.

But, as can be seen, fandoms, particularly well-established ones have their examples of this AU:

Supernatural: Destiel

Glee: Klaine

 Merlin: Merthur

 BBC Sherlock: Johnlock

Teen Wolf: Sterek

 Naruto: Sasukura

This is just the bare bones of what I could find given ten minutes and a basic Google search but there's so much more Fanfiction, fanvideos and fan appreciation for this period that ones has to wonder why it is.

One way to look at it is that Lizzie and Darcy offer a more combative, fighting relationship that heightens sexual tension and allows our favorite character to duke it out with sarcasm and dance cards. It might also be the edge of titillation we get from seeing our beloved couples: most of whom are in a homosexual relationship, profess their love in a time where it means naught but danger and death.

Neither of those reasons really mean anything though. A Regency area romance, deemed trashy dollar books by polite/upper society, has all of that and more (actual sex) in a much faster read.

So yes I have to do proclaim that I am still not OK with this. Austen told a story with interesting people in a not so interesting time and yet still remains.

In the end, it's probably all of the English majors finding an outlet for their degrees while they work menial jobs to support themselves. "I may not have any valuable skills to offer society but I sure know my Austen!"