“She is tolerable, but not handsome enough to tempt me”

The expression “She is tolerable, but not handsome enough to tempt me” links a line in Pride and Prejudice to Hardin’s recollection of how he once judged Tessa. As he reads her marked copy of the novel, its dismissive language turns into an ironic measure of the distance between his former attitude and his present regard for her.

Text and Context

The line appears in the familiar novel Hardin is reading, amid passages marked by Tessa. The fuller sentence continues, “and I am in no humor at present to give consequence to young ladies who are slighted by other men.” Its language treats a woman’s desirability as something to be assessed and granted consequence by a man, making the remark’s casual condescension part of its force.

Hardin’s Recollection

The wording brings Hardin back to his own earlier claim that Tessa was not his type. He now calls that judgment foolish, and counters it with the thought that she is everyone’s type, even if some people are too stupid to recognize it at first. The remembered phrase therefore exposes the gap between his former performance of indifference and the admiration he feels while turning the marked pages.

The Line as a Relationship Motif

The annotated novel gives Hardin a way to encounter lines that, as he reads them, relate to the two of them and to Tessa’s feelings for him. He treats her gift as the best he will ever receive, so the dismissive sentence becomes part of a larger exchange mediated by the book: Tessa’s markings make the text intimate, while Hardin’s response transforms an old insult into evidence of how profoundly his view has changed. Nearby, he recalls using another line, “You have bewitched me, body and soul,” when they first moved into the apartment. Tessa had laughed at his corny use of it and tossed a piece of broccoli at him, setting grand romantic language beside their teasing familiarity.