Ode to Austen

 

There is no doubt in my mind that Jane Austen would be thrilled with some of the movies that have been made from her novels. I have turned to Austen’s novels much like I’ve read that British soldiers did during World War I, in the trenches and as therapy to re-establish a sense of “order” to a world seemingly gone askew (Rudyard Kipling’s short story “The Janeites” delves into Austen as wartime consolation). So she’s an old favorite, as are the movies her work has inspired. Some of these movies have not only captured the spirit and content of Jane’s novels, but are time machines into the period in which she lived.

Joe Wright’s Pride and Prejudice, Ang Lee’s Sense and Sensibility and Adrian Shergold’s Persuasion stand out the most in this respect, although most movies and television series based on the novels have taken great pains to be true to the time period. There are scenes in these movies that are veritable tableaus of life in Austen’s time. The breakfast scenes in the Bennet family’s dining room, with these dogs that walk through the house, breeds that one would think only existed in Austen’s time; the first dance, in the village, where the Bennet girls are introduced to Mr. Darcy and Mr. Bingley, where the space and lighting are not only true to the time period, but also most decidedly romantic. The story telling is very modern, so the pace is quicker than the novels, but they do justice to the stories.

Above all, these movies, in particular the ones mentioned above, build upon the different relationships present in the Austen novels. While it is true that the romantic relationships are at the heart of the stories, the heroine in Jane’s works has other just as important relationships that are thankfully captured as primary in the movies, and great female actors have been brought in to develop them. The magnificent Emma Thompson and Kate Winslet have the best scenes in Lee’s Sense & Sensibility including the heartbreaking one where Marianne lies dying and Elinor pleads ”do not leave me alone!” The great Toni Collette working alongside Gwyneth Paltrow on the exasperating relationship between Harriet and Emma in Douglas McGrath’s Emma, or the brilliant Sally Hawkins as Anne Elliot in Shergold’s Persuasion being ensnared by Alice Krieg’s Lady Russell. They are a delight to women, since we know that our female relationships are this strong and decisive in our lives.

Austen’s writing is so durable that even male film directors can channel the fortitude of the female characters in Jane’s novels in the romantic relationships they establish with the always moral and faithful male characters she develops. These are, ultimately, a romantic’s view of love. They are full of the hope of the endurance of love, made beautifully manifest in Captain Wentworth’s love of Anne, or Mr. Bennet’s response to his wife when she reproaches him for not having compassion for her nerves: “You mistake me, my dear. I have the highest respect for them. They’ve been my constant companions these twenty years”, never said better than by Donald Sutherland playing Mr. Bennet to Brenda Blethyn’s  wonderful portrayal of Mrs. Bennet.

Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice was published 200 years ago this year. It is a testimony to this wonderful writer and her female characters that the women in the films based on her movies today are still so fabulous and certainly constitute an ideal to women today. They are intelligent, resilient, moral, caring women with a drive and love of life and its challenges, never deterred and never corrupted. When Elinor asks her sister if she is comparing her conduct to that of  Willoughby, Marianne responds much like this Austen admirer would do today: “No. I compare it with what ought to have been. I compare it with yours”.