Americus Backers - Americus in Fiction

Americus in Fiction

In the opinion of expert students of the works of Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice showcases two brand new Americus Backers pianofortes - one purchased by Mr. Darcy for his sister and the other in the "fine modern house" of his aunt, Lady Catherine. Remember that we see Jane Austen’s work as historical fiction but she was writing about the height of modern fashion as she saw it. We are intended to envy and to admire her characters who were fashion leaders in the highest society whose new Palladian residences were commissioned with the sole purpose of impressing house guests, to which end they were filled with the very utmost in furnishings and fittings that London and the British Empire has to offer, including the novelty of a brand new class of musical instrument - the piano.

So a Backers piano is intended to imply the owner is at the cutting edge of fashion with the taste and disposable funds that make them the leaders and most enviable members of high society. (Remember that Austen is writing contemporarily with Backers. By the time she is published in the second decade of the 19th Century, piano design had moved on and the must-have instrument of the day would have been a piano by Thomas Broadwood, much like the one he supplied to Beethoven.)