Jane Austen is gracing the £10 in UK today – Mr. Darcy can just GTFO. BBC reports today that Austen will be replacing Charles Darwin and will be the exclusively accepted £10 by Spring 2018. Austen was born July 18, 1775 and it only took about 200 years for the UK to put her face on currency! Earlier this year, on the anniversary of her birth, it was announced she will adorn the newest £10 to huge support and excitement from various feminist/Austen-ist organizations.
Austen is considered a proto-feminist author, most famous for Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility. Her novels focus on the lives of women who are trying to marry, the newly married, and the unhappily married. She published her novels anonymously originally, but now her name is on the tongue of every high school English teacher every day.
The note looks fantastic, showcasing a famous sketch of Austen as well as the Queen Elizabeth, with golden foliage around the transparent window was designed to stop counterfeiting. The note was made with a polymer plastic, chosen for its durability and the difficulty to counterfeit compared to paper. More importantly the new note will have risen dots in the top corner to assist blind or sight-impaired spenders.
Elizabeth Fry, a prison reformist in England, is the face of the £5. The US has heard rumblings of a bill with a female leader on it, Harriet Tubman has been accepted as the obvious best choice – but no such currency exists yet, and no real plan has been set to create it. Hopefully the US, and every other country, will get the memo that female faced currency is feminist, cool and bound to happen. So if you’re in the UK, keep an eye out for these, and the next time you go to the corner store, you can spend an Austen on some great snacks and coconut water.
Photo 1 and 2 from Bank of England
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