Jane Austen

[BeardofPants]

Oh, I finished it ages ago. I've since read Emma, and Persuasion is on my reading list shortly, once I finish Beowulf. (Maybe, it's a toss-up between P and Seven Pillars of Wisdom by TE Lawrence.)

[Elvellyn]

Can anyone tell me why, in P&P, it says --------shire all the time instead of giving a name?

[Mercutio]

I've borrowed this from a wonderful Austen site everyone must visit: www.pemberley.com

More or less, ;-) Written by Caroline in response to -------shire? by Diane Catherine

] I always assumed that it was because if she used a real place name, readers living there would say, "This author obviously knows nothing about this place. What a stupid book!" But I would like a more definitive answer if there is one. Thanks!

That's one reason why they did it. A development of this was that if they used real places, or real regiments, or what looked like real places and real regiments, then people could say "Well, the Colonel of that regiment wasn't callled xxxxxx, or the Colonel of that regiment didn't do that/wasn't the fool you make him out to be/couldn't possibly have given that order!" Authors would be opening themselves up to accusations of libel, if not stupidity.

It's also a fall-out from a literary convention of the time when many books and pamphlets were written criticising the government of the day, or important figures, by using false names. Defoes' Gullivers Travels is possibly the best known of the earlier ones. Since the reporting of Parliamentary discussions was banned until about 1808, it had to be reported in newspapers under false names (and Samuel Johnson first did it by reporting the activities of the people of Lilliput!). Some rather scurrilous stories were also printed which were thinly veiled parodies or criticisms of important figures.

So when Jane Austen wrote the _________shire regiment, or the Earl of _________, she was a)avoiding the pitfall of being accused of inaccuracy and b) avoiding the pitfall of being accused of criticism of some important political figures.

And just for the record, there realy was a militia regiment that went to Hertfordshire and then camped for the summer at Brighton. It was the Derbyshire Milita.........

Now the Bronte sisters followed in this tradition, although I really don't know if they were as worried about political consequences as JA was. Jane Eyre is fairly obviously set in Northern Yorkshire and Durham, (The reference to Gateshead, a real place gives it away.) But Lowood Schooll may wel be based on a real place, in which case Charlotte was playing safe by not giving any more deatil about its location than she absolutely needed to.

[sun-star]

I think there's also a (c), which is that P&P is fairly obviously set in a neighbourhood similar to Austen's own home, and even while her authorship was secret she wouldn't have wanted to be accused of depicting real people she knew who lived there. Imagine local gossip saying you were the original of Mrs Bennett! When her novels are set further afield in counties she had less connection with, she doesn't avoid naming them outright (P&P says Rosings is in Kent, Mansfield Park opens by saying that the house is in Northamptonshire and in Persuasion Kellynch Hall is said to be in Somerset). Cities or large towns are usually named directly e.g. London, Bath, Lyme Regis etc.

[Mercutio]

Yes. Austen's first few books published were written "By a Lady."

"Sense and Sensibility" was credited "From the author of Pride and Prejudice."...or vice versa (?). It was a little later when people really started guessing her authorship and her brother Henry started publicizing (readily admitting that his sister wrote such witty and popular novels).

^that kind of got off track

[sun-star]

I saw the new P&P film yesterday. I'll put my thoughts in spoilers because, even though I think we all know the plot some of you might not want the details spoiled.

The first thing to say is, I think the experience of watching this film is completely changed by whether you've seen the BBC adaptation or not. I've seen it more times than I can count, I can quote lots of it by heart, and I don't really think it can be improved in essentials. For me it is the definitive version. So in watching this film I couldn't help comparing the two at almost every moment, which meant I didn't approach it in a wholly unbiased state of mind - it had a lot to prove to me so as not to seem like an attempt to cash in on a popular book by hiring some cute young movie stars. That's certainly not what this is - but neither is it really Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. Unlike the BBC version, which IIRC was six hours long, this film only has two hours to get through the whole plot. They fit the important things in well - mostly sacrificing minor characters (Sir William Lucas, Mrs Phillips, the Hursts etc.) and reducing Darcy's letter of backstory to a few sentences. Not much is wanting in plot terms. But in character, a lot of depth seemed lost to me, especially in the development of Darcy and Elizabeth's feelings towards each other - especially her transition from amused dislike, to hatred, to respect and then love. The real problem was Keira Knightley - she just can't carry off Lizzy's intelligence and wit, or convincingly suggest the growth she experiences when she learns her prejudices can be wrong. P&P is not just a light romantic comedy, as some people claim - it also concerns questions of self-deception and a firm core of moral judgement (I recommend C.S. Lewis' essay on the subject). This film lacks all of that and doesn't convey why something like Lydia's elopement is morally shameful as well as socially embarassing. Darcy's decency to his tenants isn't mentioned, so his essential goodness (such an important thing for Lizzy to discover at Pemberly!) just isn't there. I really can't decide about Matthew Macfadyen as Darcy. I like him as an actor, and he's good-looking enough if that's what matters, but it's difficult to judge someone's awkwardness in playing a character who is meant to be awkward all the time I think he was good. But I don't know. The film certainly looks nice. It's Romantic (with a capital R) - lots of pouring rain, full moons, dramatic piano music, and a proposal scene which would be more suited to Wuthering Heights. The actors playing Jane, Charlotte Lucas, Mrs Bennet and Mr Collins, and Judi Dench as Lady Catherine, were all sufficiently different enough to the other adaptation to be interesting. Unfortunately, Bingley is portrayed as rather an idiot, a kind of Hooray Henry, and Miss Bingley isn't very haughty. Mr Bennet isn't the clever, cynical man of the books (and seemed to me to be struggling with his accent). Georgiana Darcy isn't shy at all, and Wickham is an Orlando Bloom looklike (seriously!), weak rather than deceitful. I liked the ending - no sickly double wedding, it just finishes with Mr Bennet giving his consent. As I said, the second proposal scene seems to have come in from a different film, and I don't like Heathcliff!Darcy striding across the meadows, but the first proposal isn't too bad. The meeting at Pemberly is much better than the BBC's wet shirt take on it, with a nice scene between Darcy and Georgiana while Lizzy is spying on them. So, in conclusion, very enjoyable, with Keira Knightley the worst thing about it. She seemed to be doing a Jennifer Ehle impression some of the time, but that wasn't enough to save her acting

[hectorberlioz]

Originally Posted by Mercutio

Yes. Austen's first few books published were written "By a Lady."

"Sense and Sensibility" was credited "From the author of Pride and Prejudice."...or vice versa (?). It was a little later when people really started guessing her authorship and her brother Henry started publicizing (readily admitting that his sister wrote such witty and popular novels).

^that kind of got off track

Sir Walter Scott's "Waverly" novels are actually not about Waverly, which was his first. The reason some of his books are "Waverly" novels is because his name wasn't published with that first book, and they put "By the author of Waverly" on each of his subsequent novels.

I won't say anything about the new P&P except this: Keira Knightly isn't fit to play an Austenian heroine. She doesn't belong in that type of movie, she just doesn't look the part.
And has anyone heard that Anne Hathaway is going to playJane Austen in a bio pic? Anne Hathaway is skeeny. Jane is healthily plump (in the portrait I saw).

[BeardofPants]

I recently read the Jane Austen Book Club by Karen Joy Fowler - has anyone else read it? It was nice - made me want to re-read Austen again.

[Curufin]

Lucky you!!!! Someday I'd like to do a literary tour of England. You know, Austen, Tolkien, Lewis, Sayers, Herriot.....

Ah yes, and I forgot to mention I visited Tolkien's grave while I was in Oxford... Very touching.

[cee2lee2]

Originally Posted by BeardofPants

I recently read the Jane Austen Book Club by Karen Joy Fowler - has anyone else read it? It was nice - made me want to re-read Austen again.

I've seen a review but haven't read it. Since it made you want to read the originals again, it sounds worth reading.

[BeardofPants]

It was very engaging.

[Valandil]

I just finished Persuasion. For me, it was number 6, so I've now read all the Jane Austen novels! I read most of it today.

[cee2lee2]

Originally Posted by Valandil

I just finished Persuasion. For me, it was number 6, so I've now read all the Jane Austen novels! I read most of it today.

Congratulations on finishing all of the novels.

What did you think of Persuasion? It's my second favorite after Pride and Prejudice.

[BeardofPants]

RE: going to town, it's still used in NZ to refer to big cities like Auckland (city NOT region). My mother used to say it all the time - "we're going to town today".

[GrayMouser]

Just been going through the "Cambridge Companion to Jane Austen".

The two most interesting chapters, natch, are "Class" and "Money".

They explain a lot of the social framework behind the stories, like exactly what kind of life you could live on various incomes: how many servants, if you could afford a carriage. A house in "town", in addition to your country residence, would take at least 4,000 a year. Also, when a woman is mentioned as getting a lump-sum inheritance, everybody at the time would automatically calculate it as an annual income at 5%, invested in gov't bonds.

Respectable occupations a younger son could go into, and still maintain status as a gentleman- clergy(C of E, of course), law, Army, Navy, and maybe medicine, though that was still a little dicey. The Navy was better to Jane, not only because her brother was in it, but also because the Army actually cost money, while in the Navy you could make money from captured prizes.

Interesting stuff

[Valandil]

That's interesting GM. I may have to pick up that Companion Book myself. I am somewhat familiar with British Navy of that time from other readings - mostly Horatio Hornblower series by CS Forester. He gives a lot of information (along the way) about the kinds of ships, sailing, navy life, advancement and prize money. So that helped me connect with those kinds of things in Persuasion and Mansfield Park.

ceelee - I'm not sure where I would rank Persuasion. I loved P&P when I first read it, then read it again. I read Emma next, and debated with myself whether it was even better. Then, reading all the others in succession, it's just really hard to rate them against one another. I've enjoyed them all. There were some differences that stand out to me in Persuasion though:

* I think there's less dialog and a lot more narration.
* The characters are more isolated. Anne is very much alone. And we don't REALLY get inside Captain Wentworth's head until the very end of the book. Otherwise, we only have Anne's analysis of what's going on. In many ways, that's very realistic as we move toward a relationship ourselves though.
* There were a few places where things were a little unclear, some sentences I wasn't quite sure of, some spellings I wasn't sure of (unless they've changed... possible). I wonder if some of these things (and maybe even the preference for narration over dialog) were due to Jane's illness.
* At a couple points, I started to wonder if there were somewhat subtle sexuality aspects - and I wonder if they're in some of her other books and I've missed them. I also wonder if the nickname for 'Richard' was already used in slang reference to the male anatomy 200 years ago, and if that's what she was getting at in one point.

Just some musings...

Rian - are you sure about the 'up' for London? I've never noticed that anywhere before. Jerusalem of course, both because it was The Holy City, and because it was physically on high ground, but I hadn't heard that about London.

[Rían]

I'd heard that about London, but never about Jerusalem! But that makes sense about Jerusalem.

[Rían]

Yes, it looks like it's up to London ...

http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=236330

and from another place at that site:
"It's an old-fashioned usage. In old railway timetables "up trains" always meant towards London, "down trains" away from London, regardless of geographic direction. And students at Oxford (or Cambridge?) would talk about being "up" when they were at college, "down" when they weren't. And being "sent down" was a very very bad situation to be in...have to explain that one to Pater, and he'd be in a frightful wax..."

[Count Comfect]

Rian is correct - especially regarding Oxbridge, where referring to a London train as "up" might be a capital offense! There is no up uppier than Oxford...or Cambridge, if you went to that benighted institution.

[Coffeehouse]

Jane Austen.. never-ending English classes.. *shivers*

We read Pride and Prejudice in class and then we watched that BBC series that lasted for ages with Mr. Darcy and the up-to-no-good Wickham.

I can't say I liked the books, all those names confused me. Was a bit better with the seriess, but that's only because those British accents sounded so hilarious and that crazy mother always had some emotional breakdown