Valentine Musings: Is Jane Austen a saint, or an author of woe?

Another Valentine's Day alone. No matter how reconciled you become to being single, this day is always a trial. The rest of the world seems to be attached, and most of the women you pass are carrying armloads of red roses and knowing smiles of anticipation. The planet is gorging on an amorous feast, and all you can do is stand at the door looking in and acknowledging your gnawing hunger.

And so home to this night's regular ritual: A snuggle on the couch with the dog and a film of one of Jane Austen's novels.

I am certainly not alone in taking refuge in the alluring tales spun by the patron saint of single women. Nobody in history has captured female fantasies quite like Jane. I do sometimes wonder, however, how much damage those stories have actually wreaked as they shaped impressionable young minds. Miss Austen may very well have launched a demonic evil, setting expectations over two centuries of womanhood that mankind will almost never be able to meet.

Austen's heroes could only have been created by a single woman. They're too perfect; the embodiment of fantasies and desires rather than experience or reality. And yet, she managed to capture ... or perhaps to create ... all the classic, and generally mythological, archetypes of the perfect man.

There's the poster child for fidelity, the long-suffering Colonel Brandon. Alone for 20 years as he remained true to his first love, finally awakened to a new life by the right woman. Looking for the father figure and mentor turned lover? Bring on Mr. Knightley. The best friend who matures into your soul mate? Meet Edmund Bertram. And then there's the most dangerous of them all: Fitzwilliam Darcy.

The Darcy myth is writ deep on the female soul. This is the one that has you believe a man's red flags and serious character flaws are actually just surface affectation. The devotion of the right woman will blast all those issues away, transforming him into the Prince Charming within. It certainly worked for Elizabeth Bennett. Leaving us all to believe, deep down, that inside every man there's a noble, generous, intelligent soul whose happiness will only be complete when he's guided to his true self by the steadfast love of a perky, intelligent woman.

You try hard not to believe it. You tell yourself that love doesn't magically transform people, and that men are what you see. Don't expect change. And yet the tendrils of hope planted in your pre-pubescent brain ... lying somewhere near the concepts of happily ever after, looks don't matter, and you achieve anything you want if you work hard enough ... still wrap around your heart. Yes, Darcy is a myth. But he, like his Austen fellows, is a beguiling and life affirming myth. Those heroes send a message of eternal optimism to the heart. It's unlikely, but men with the potential to love like this could be possible, couldn't they?

So thanks, Saint Jane, for providing the antidote to a miserable day. Hope springs eternal, with a little help from you, a stack of DVDs and a loving dog. Who is, of course, named Mr. Darcy.