The Scarlet Pimpernel and Marriage

One of the fondest memories of former Brookewood seventh-graders seems to be reading Baroness Orczy's The Scarlet Pimpernel. Never one to willingly disappoint, I duly picked up the novel to read over the summer so I could read it with my new students when the school year starts. So, when my maid of honor forced me to watch The Scarlet Pimpernel on DVD, I was shocked and appalled by the shear banality of the story.

The film tells the story of an outrageous fop who secretly helps rescue French nobility from the jaws of the guillotine in the year of grace 1792. His wife, unaware of his alter-ego, unwittingly aids her ex-lover, now-French-special-agent in the discovery of her husband. The story follows the trite pattern of a super-hero movie where the beautiful, hapless heroine discovers the secret identity of her noble lover. There is, of course, a daring series of intrigues leading up to a predictable climax. Not literature.

But the film fundamentally misunderstands the novel. The novel isn't about the Scarlet Pimpernel, or Sir Percival Blakely, at all. It's about his wife, Lady Marguerite Blakely, and the couple's discovery what marriage really is.

In the novel, the audience sees inside the mind of Lady Blakely. She, too, has been taken in by the foppish facade of her aristocratic husband. She married him because he stood out as the most devoted among countless admirers. He has ceased to love her. She cannot understand why and holds him in contempt for his unintelligence.

She is so selfishly caught up in her own world that when the French agent presents her with a terrifying choice--whether to save her brother from the guillotine at the price of helping to identify the Scarlet Pimernel--she never seriously considers going to her husband for aid. She has too little respect for him as a person and a man to trust him. Only later, the dirty deed irrevocably done, does she think to speak with him about what has happened.

When she starts to speak with him, the audience finally finds out what motivates them both--what estranges them and ruins their marriage. Pride. The night they were married, Sir Percival discovered that his wife had sent someone to the guillotine. Trusting in his undying devotion, Lady Blakley proudly refused him an explanation. Out of pride, Sir Percival hid all his affection from her, unwilling for the world to see his love for the heartless women he then believed his wife to be. Out of pride, Lady Blakely refused to tell him how unwitting her betrayal had been. For a year, they hadn't shown each other the mutual affection they smolders beneath the surface of their cold relationship or to tell each other the truths the long to reveal.

The rest of the novel chronicles Lady Blakely's gradual realization who her husband is and the terrible betrayal she has made out of ignorance. To save him, she tracks him to Dover and then across the channel to France. In an inversion of the story of Erec and Enide, she slowly realises that her doddering fool is the bravest and most competent man in Europe. She regrets that she has been so blinded by pride that she could not detect his identity sooner and spare the betrayal. When they are safe, Sir Percival in turn laments the pain and suffering his proud reticence caused his wife.

The filmed versions of The Scarlet Pimpernel make into an adventure story what is actually a beautiful love story. The novel's brilliance lies in Lady Blakely's slow discovery how strong and masculine her husband is. It lies in Sir Percival's hard-won realization how important honesty is in a relationship. And it lies in the couple's final understanding that pride has no place in a happy, open marriage.