Left in the Lurch

The jilted bride - what a poignant idea that is! Filled with hope and joy for months, then having every expectation crushed at the last moment. No wonder we sympathise with the crazed Miss Havisham.

 Here's Cate Simmons' beautifully eerie take on Miss Havisham*

The writer Ronald Frame was so intrigued by Charles Dickens' jilted bride he wrote an entire backstory for her from the details in Great Expectations.

She may have been based on a real person: Eliza Emily Donnithorne (1826–1886) of Australia. Here's her grave:

Another famous literary disappointed bride is Jane Eyre. Mr Rochester is denounced as a bigamist at the altar. Still married to his mad wife Bertha, he cannot wed the distraught Jane.

In real life, the pain of such a loss can lead to suicide attempts.

Miss Li seen seven storeys up c/o NBC news 

Fortunately Miss Li was saved by Guo Zhongfan, a local community officer. She tried to kill herself after her fiancé had left her and married another woman just days before their wedding.

Taking quite a different approach was Angela Burrow, previously a Major in the Queen Alexandra’s Royal Army Nursing Corps. She went ahead with the reception on New Year's Day at Tylney Hall, staging it as a 'new beginnings party', after her fiancé of three and half years told her by text it was off.

Some might want revenge. Quentin Tarantino's The Bride in Kill Bill, for example, or this ghostly creation by Giulia:

How would you feel?

*For more delicate artwork, see  Cate Simmons Steering for North