Pravda and Prejudice: Vladimir Putin compared to Jane Austen’s beloved Mr. Darcy
Barnini Chakraborty
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Russian President Vladimir Putin has been called many things: a vengeful villain, a ruthless dictator, and a war criminal.
But to former Austrian Foreign Minister Karin Kneissl, the Russian strongman, who is alleged to have cheated on his wife with a rhythmic gymnast, is giving off some serious 19th-century leading man vibes. Specifically, the beloved Mr. Darcy, the romantic hero in Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice.
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Kneissl told the BBC in an interview published Thursday that the former KGB agent accused of orchestrating heinous crimes against his countrymen was nothing short of dashing.
“He is the most intelligent gentleman, with the focus on gentleman — and I’ve met a few,” she said as her dog, a boxer named Winston Churchill, snored loudly next to her. “In the sense of what Jane Austen wrote in Pride & Prejudice about the accomplished gentleman, he amounts to this standard.”
The Kremlin leader showed up to Kneissl’s 2018 wedding with a bouquet, a kiss, and gifts, including a pair of earrings, a painting, and a samovar, a Russian urn used to prepare tea. The two shared a waltz, and at the end, Kneissl gave Putin, who has a penchant for riding shirtless on horses, a deep curtsy.
Her dance with Putin came just months after Russia was accused of poisoning former spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter with nerve agent Novichok in the United Kingdom.
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When pressed that Putin’s invasion of Ukraine and allegations of domestic atrocities were not likely on the list of gentlemanly qualities, Kneissl, a controversial figure in her own right, deflected.
“Well, [former British Prime Ministers] Tony Blair, David Cameron … they were all involved with their governments in military action,” she said.
When questioned again, she claimed the topic bored her and her dog.
“The whole thing happened nearly six years ago,” she said, sitting in front of a framed picture of her, Putin, and Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. “At the time, I was foreign minister, and I danced with President Putin. But I have done other things in my life before and after. Honestly, it’s so boring. It’s very boring.”
“To talk about the wedding?” the reporter said.
“Yes,” she replied. “There are much more interesting topics we can discuss.”
Asked if she had any regrets about the dance, she once again said she considered the subject monotonous.
“And the dog just fell asleep and was snoring because he knows the topic,” she added.
Kneissl served as Austria’s foreign minister from 2017 to 2019 after being nominated as a nonparty member by the right-wing Freedom Party. She drew criticism for her close ties to Putin, which she has regularly brushed off, along with allegations of being a Russian spy.
In September, she announced that she, her cats, and her ponies, which had been boarded in Syria, were moving to Russia.
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In St. Petersburg, she has set up a think tank she named GORKI, or the Geo-Political Observatory for Russia’s Key Issues, which searches for “solutions to the challenges of global development and the tasks of Russian policy.”
Calls to the Jane Austen Society of North America for comment were not returned.