Where Good Friends and Jane Meet

So we weren't at a bar . . . but we could have been!

Recently I went to a conversation between William “Bill” Deresiewicz, author of A Jane Austen Education: How Six Novels Taught me about Love, Friendship, and the Things that Really Matter, and Karen “Karen” Joy Fowler, author of Jane Austen Book Club. There were about 15 of us there at Books, Inc in Berkeley, and OK, it was almost a month ago (don’t you just love instant reporting on the Internet?), but it was really cool! It was like hanging out with all you dear readers, all of us gabbing about Austen, all of us being surprised at just how differently we see the books. One of those, you know, life metaphors.

Here’s a few of the things we talked about. And because I think of you all as my Jane Austen friends, I’d love to hear what you think about any of them.

• The way that the humor of the books is generally lacking in the movies, and if this could be remedied. I and a few others said, yes, it could, but those movies would not be the rather swooshy pink rom-coms lots of people want from their Austen films. (Talk about irony . . . .) How you would do this I’m not sure, being better at watching movies than making them. Any ideas out there?
• Secularism in Jane Austen—how church and religion are hardly ever mentioned in her books, yet she was the daughter of a clergyman, etc, etc. And how the clergymen run the gamut from Edmund Bertram and Edward Ferrars to Mr. Collins and back again. Now my own take is that church and the clergy were such a ubiquitous part of Austen’s life that she hardly ever thought to comment on them, and that she saw the clergy in particular as just a bunch of guys. What do you think?
• Bill said that widowhood and loss are a theme in Persuasion. I’m not so sure. He pointed out that most of the characters are widows or widowers, which is true. Anne’s loss of Captain Wentworth and other losses do play a role, but as Miss Ball argued, the recovery of love and happiness is crucial to the book (and is significantly lacking in widowhood). And the way Austen treats the widows and losers of Persuasion, other than Anne, is not really very sympathetic. Like the clergy, I would venture to say that they were just more common in an age of earlier deaths. But it is an interesting thought.
• So was Karen’s comment that Mrs. Smith is a rather sinister character—she doesn’t tell Anne how wicked Mr. Elliot is until after Anne declares she won’t marry him. This is a common problem in friendship, though, isn’t it? In my own circle I know of two instances of one person on the brink of a disastrous marriage and their friend deciding whether or not to say something. One friend did, the other didn’t (having already made her opinions known). It didn’t make a difference in either case, and both couples are now divorced. Aside from the fact that it had never occurred to me that Mrs. Smith was sinister, this discussion pointed out parallels in Austen’s books to my own life that I hadn’t even thought of!
• One person asked how reading Jane Austen has enlivened your life. Do you think and act differently because of her? Karen said she suffered fools better than she used to, enjoyed them even! And Bill said she’d made him able to admit the possibility of his being wrong. For myself, I think that I started reading Austen young enough (~13) that she helped shape my entire outlook on life, both my morals and my ever-present sense of irony. Though I also simply felt that I had found a friend.

What about you? How has reading Jane Austen enlivened your life? Has she changed you?

Photo credit: ©2000 by Sean Dreilinger. Used under Creative Commons licensing.

Quote Unquote: “Rather too light and bright…”

Jane, I should have trusted you. Yes, I am ashamed to admit it, I was duped by the Serious People into taking something you said at face value. Out of context even.

I’ve been reading William Deresiewicz‘s new book, A Jane Austen Education, which is better than the Huffington Post feature makes it sound. (Geez, I wish I could say that about my book . . .) But we can talk about that later. The point is, all my academic life, people have told me that you repented writing Pride and Prejudice, and justified themselves by this quote:

The work is rather too light & bright & sparkling . . .

This is how they explain Mansfield Park, you see. However, Mr. Deresiewicz continues the quote:

—it wants to be stretched out here and there with a long Chapter—of sense if it could be had, if not of solemn specious nonsense—about something unconnected with the story; an Essay on writing, a critique on Walter Scott, or the history of Buonaparte.

Or, to sum it up in modern terms, Jane is saying, “I’m too sexy for Moby Dick.” (Oh dear . . . you all remember that song, right? . . . and anyway she is.)

Is this generally known by those that didn’t study math in college? Is it just me who’s been underestimating Miss Austen all these years? Learning the truth here is such a relief—Jane didn’t really hate P&P after all—but is also a little disturbing when you think about it. A friend once said that I was ironic at least 70% of the time, and Mr. Fitzpatrick thought he’d underestimated it. 😉 How many of my off-the-cuff remarks have been wildly misunderstood? How many of yours? If we’re still read in 200 years (ah, if only!), will the Serious People have their way with us? It makes me kind of sad to think so.

Ah well, who cares, I say! We’re too sexy for them! Repeat after me:

Jane’s too sexy for your paper, too sexy for your theory, so sexy . . .

As a final thought, I leave you with this quote from a Guardian sports article: “this Mr D’Arcy is some way removed from Jane Austen’s bodice-ripping fop.” Bodice-ripping fop. Just let that sink in. And then go hit someone with your copy of Pride and Prejudice. Repeatedly.