Jane Austen Revisited
With Bellevere House coming up for sale next week, I thought I’d post a bit about Jane Austen. When I was growing up, JA saturated my house because of my mother. Some of my earliest creative efforts involved making little picture books of Pride and Prejudice, although I haven’t been interested in the story since. She really was just wallpaper and I didn’t think she was interesting. She was just there.
After working on the JA project, I began to rethink this author and her fans. My mother was not typical. Her view was old-fashioned even when she was young (the 1960s) and one of the few other fan-type commentaries she enjoyed was a book written in the 1940s. The 1940s. So I wasn’t prepared for the 21st century fans, or even late 20th century fans. The cult. The explosion. The Jane Austen girls. I didn’t know who these people were and I didn’t overly care. But I did gradually notice their movies and fanfiction had a tone I didn’t expect. Some of the movies were dark, sleazy, or bizarre; others droning, angsty, or a bit odd when portraying characters. (Such as Harriet.)
I hadn’t thought of working with any of the novels in an in-depth way and I lumped them all together as DeBooksByJehnAusten. (Sounds like a name for a fan website, doesn’t it?) Once I did, I noticed surprising things, and when I watched the movies closely, instead of casually, I saw more. And then I was reminded of that old 1940s book. The authors of that book had rated the novels from best to worst and I’d wondered why they put P&P so near the bottom and Emma so near the top. True, I didn’t care about P&P—but didn’t everyone love it? And EMMA? Boring, BORING Emma at the top??
I came to feel that was entirely true. Their list was pretty much accurate. Even then, they were seeing something I wasn’t in these books. And after I overheard someone talking about the parents in JA, as a way to rate the books, I saw they also all agreed. So here, partly based on them, partly on personal experience, is my official Jane Austen list.
Emma ~ a bit boring and something about it feels old and overdone. (Somehow.) But it’s harmless and cute. Much more interest in Frank Churchill than you’d think.Persuasion ~ slow and truly for a niche audience. But not as bad as you’d think, even if characters like the Elliots seem stuck-up and remote.Mansfield Park ~ deeply frustrating. After working with it, I concur. There’s so much that’s good, but something about the audience’s view (and the characters themselves) is unlikable and vague.Northanger Abbey ~ I want to like it. I really do. It used to be my favorite and underlying it’s still harmless. But the view of so many characters now makes them out to be bad people.Pride and Prejudice ~ shady, shady. True, many just think they’d like to be witty, clever Lizzie in a fancy dress. But there’s a dedicated audience that needs explaining. And why does it convert so well to having the characters as little kids? I'm not the only one to do this. That’s weird.Sense and Sensibility ~ There’s not much to say at this point. It’s . . . become more dark than it used to be. It’s hard to speak well of any of the men and even Mrs. Dashwood seems questionable.
And there will be more updates.
After working on the JA project, I began to rethink this author and her fans. My mother was not typical. Her view was old-fashioned even when she was young (the 1960s) and one of the few other fan-type commentaries she enjoyed was a book written in the 1940s. The 1940s. So I wasn’t prepared for the 21st century fans, or even late 20th century fans. The cult. The explosion. The Jane Austen girls. I didn’t know who these people were and I didn’t overly care. But I did gradually notice their movies and fanfiction had a tone I didn’t expect. Some of the movies were dark, sleazy, or bizarre; others droning, angsty, or a bit odd when portraying characters. (Such as Harriet.)
I hadn’t thought of working with any of the novels in an in-depth way and I lumped them all together as DeBooksByJehnAusten. (Sounds like a name for a fan website, doesn’t it?) Once I did, I noticed surprising things, and when I watched the movies closely, instead of casually, I saw more. And then I was reminded of that old 1940s book. The authors of that book had rated the novels from best to worst and I’d wondered why they put P&P so near the bottom and Emma so near the top. True, I didn’t care about P&P—but didn’t everyone love it? And EMMA? Boring, BORING Emma at the top??
I came to feel that was entirely true. Their list was pretty much accurate. Even then, they were seeing something I wasn’t in these books. And after I overheard someone talking about the parents in JA, as a way to rate the books, I saw they also all agreed. So here, partly based on them, partly on personal experience, is my official Jane Austen list.
Emma ~ a bit boring and something about it feels old and overdone. (Somehow.) But it’s harmless and cute. Much more interest in Frank Churchill than you’d think.Persuasion ~ slow and truly for a niche audience. But not as bad as you’d think, even if characters like the Elliots seem stuck-up and remote.Mansfield Park ~ deeply frustrating. After working with it, I concur. There’s so much that’s good, but something about the audience’s view (and the characters themselves) is unlikable and vague.Northanger Abbey ~ I want to like it. I really do. It used to be my favorite and underlying it’s still harmless. But the view of so many characters now makes them out to be bad people.Pride and Prejudice ~ shady, shady. True, many just think they’d like to be witty, clever Lizzie in a fancy dress. But there’s a dedicated audience that needs explaining. And why does it convert so well to having the characters as little kids? I'm not the only one to do this. That’s weird.Sense and Sensibility ~ There’s not much to say at this point. It’s . . . become more dark than it used to be. It’s hard to speak well of any of the men and even Mrs. Dashwood seems questionable.
And there will be more updates.
No comments have been added yet.
