I’m sorry I didn’t write anything last week—I was preoccupied with planning content rather than producing it.
This week, I want to hear your thoughts about Jane Austen adaptations. Which ones do you love? Which ones do you hate? Which ones do you love to hate? Is your favorite a modern retelling or true to Austen’s pen? Is there a book you think never should have been written, a film never allowed to see the light of day?
Do you think there are too many Austen adaptations? Is, as Vulture critic Alison Willmore posits, Jane Austen only a “vibe” now?
I’m thinking about Austen adaptations now that I’ve watched Netflix’s Persuasion with Dakota Johnson twice—once before I re-read the novel, & once after. (There was more to like before my re-reading.) I haven’t seen the other Persuasion film adaptations yet, & while I’ve come to love the book in my 30s, I don’t feel as angry about the Netflix version as some Janeites. I understand what it’s trying to do: Capitalize on the success of Fleabag by having Anne Elliot express her interiority directly to the audience.
Unlike Austen’s novel, it fails to create that sense of intimacy we share with Anne. But, to me, the biggest problem with the adaptation is that it tries too hard to make Jane Austen “modern.” That’s why we get dialogue like
“Now we’re worse than exes. We’re friends.”
instead of Austen’s most eloquent
“They had no conversation together, no intercourse but what the commonest civility required. Once so much to each other! Now nothing! There had been a time…they would have found it most difficult to cease to speak to one another. With the exception, perhaps, of Admiral and Mrs. Croft…there could have been no two hearts so open, no tastes so similar, no feelings so in unison, no countenances so beloved. Now thew were as strangers; nay, worse than strangers, for they could never become acquainted. It was a perpetual estrangement” (Volume I, Ch. viii, pp. 59-60).
In a future post, I’ll explore the questions “Is Jane Austen modern?” & “Do we really need to modernize her?” The short answer is that we don’t need to modernize Austen or concern ourselves with how she’ll be perceived by a modern audience. When adapting her work, we need to look for the mirror Austen holds up to our modern lives & reflect on what she’s trying to show us. Amy Heckerling’s Clueless does this brilliantly, & I maintain that it’s still the greatest adaptation of Emma. A Beverly Hills high school perfectly mirrors the close-knit community of Highbury, where everyone knows there place & how to behave accordingly. It’s a system, & when Cher Horowitz tries to manipulate it to her will, it breaks. But, perhaps, a kinder & more open system—where people are free to choose who they associate with—takes its place?
Adapting Jane Austen is about finding the substance & shaping it in a new way. It’s not just a matter of “updating” dialogue. And there’s so much substance to work with, so I suppose we could do with a new P&P or Emma every 10 years. New versions that speak to a new moment, originating from an author whose work has something to say to every age that will ever be lived.
But we need adaptations with substance, not vibe. I write this fully aware that Modern Austen is a kind of Jane Austen adaptation, & not necessarily one with much substance. Who knows what Jane might think of my lifestyle newsletter & magazine (what I ultimately want this to become) inspired by her? I hope that I never impose modernity on Austen; my goal is to always find modernity in her work.
So tell me: What are your favorite Austen adaptations?
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Am I a Jane Austen adaptation?
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Hello Modern Heroines,
I’m sorry I didn’t write anything last week—I was preoccupied with planning content rather than producing it.
This week, I want to hear your thoughts about Jane Austen adaptations. Which ones do you love? Which ones do you hate? Which ones do you love to hate? Is your favorite a modern retelling or true to Austen’s pen? Is there a book you think never should have been written, a film never allowed to see the light of day?
Do you think there are too many Austen adaptations? Is, as Vulture critic Alison Willmore posits, Jane Austen only a “vibe” now?
I’m thinking about Austen adaptations now that I’ve watched Netflix’s Persuasion with Dakota Johnson twice—once before I re-read the novel, & once after. (There was more to like before my re-reading.) I haven’t seen the other Persuasion film adaptations yet, & while I’ve come to love the book in my 30s, I don’t feel as angry about the Netflix version as some Janeites. I understand what it’s trying to do: Capitalize on the success of Fleabag by having Anne Elliot express her interiority directly to the audience.
Unlike Austen’s novel, it fails to create that sense of intimacy we share with Anne. But, to me, the biggest problem with the adaptation is that it tries too hard to make Jane Austen “modern.” That’s why we get dialogue like
instead of Austen’s most eloquent
In a future post, I’ll explore the questions “Is Jane Austen modern?” & “Do we really need to modernize her?” The short answer is that we don’t need to modernize Austen or concern ourselves with how she’ll be perceived by a modern audience. When adapting her work, we need to look for the mirror Austen holds up to our modern lives & reflect on what she’s trying to show us. Amy Heckerling’s Clueless does this brilliantly, & I maintain that it’s still the greatest adaptation of Emma. A Beverly Hills high school perfectly mirrors the close-knit community of Highbury, where everyone knows there place & how to behave accordingly. It’s a system, & when Cher Horowitz tries to manipulate it to her will, it breaks. But, perhaps, a kinder & more open system—where people are free to choose who they associate with—takes its place?
Adapting Jane Austen is about finding the substance & shaping it in a new way. It’s not just a matter of “updating” dialogue. And there’s so much substance to work with, so I suppose we could do with a new P&P or Emma every 10 years. New versions that speak to a new moment, originating from an author whose work has something to say to every age that will ever be lived.
But we need adaptations with substance, not vibe. I write this fully aware that Modern Austen is a kind of Jane Austen adaptation, & not necessarily one with much substance. Who knows what Jane might think of my lifestyle newsletter & magazine (what I ultimately want this to become) inspired by her? I hope that I never impose modernity on Austen; my goal is to always find modernity in her work.
So tell me: What are your favorite Austen adaptations?
Drop some titles in the thread below.