The Telegraph lists the various film adaptations that Pride and Prejudice has inspired over the years. The article is terribly meta; for instance, we learn that in the 1967 version,

Ian Fleming’s niece Lucy, playing Lydia, wore the same costumes used in a 1936 stage production by her mother, Celia Johnson, who played Elizabeth.

*head spins* And wasn’t that the one in which Susannah Harker’s mother played Jane Bennet?

And let’s not forget that in the 1995 version:

The production also had a unique Austen connection - Anna Chancellor, who played Caroline Bingley, is a distant relative of the author.

More P&P meta: Barbara Leigh-Hunt is godmother to Judi Dench’s daughter. (Thanks to Alert Janeite Liz for pointing out the obvious. :))

The Guardian has an article about various venues dedicated to Jane Austen, such as Jane Austen’s House at Chawton and the Jane Austen Centre at Bath, and how they are hunkering down for a big post-P&P3 rush — though they all note that interest never really wanes completely!

The UK’s multi-million pound Austen industry is gearing itself up for a busy autumn. If the film takes off, some believe the next few months could be as hectic as the heady days that followed Colin Firth’s dripping Mr Darcy emerging from the lake in the 1995 television adaptation of Austen’s best known work. David Baldock, director of the Jane Austen Centre, said: “The interest in Austen and her work continues to grow and grow. There is always a worry it will become too commercial, but what is happening is positive. It is bringing new people to her work.”

We really liked this part:

Maggie Lane, honorary secretary of the UK’s Jane Austen Society, is not a fan of the film adaptations, but is not worried that the writer is becoming too commercial. “That side isn’t forced upon anyone. I think there is something in Jane Austen for everyone, and the more people that know about her the better.”

*applauds*

The Telegraph has a profile on Keira Knightley in which she talks about her lifelong passion for Pride and Prejudice.

Knightley first encountered the book on tape when she was seven years old. “I was - and still am - dyslexic, so I couldn’t read,” she says. “I always wanted to be an actress and had been asking for an agent ever since I was three years old. My mother said that if I came to her every day with a book in my hand and a smile on my face I would get an agent. I got around it with audio-books and became obsessed with Pride and Prejudice. I listened to the tape for years and years and when the BBC TV version came out [in 1995] I became even more obsessed. Finally, when I was about 14, I read the book for the first time.

“When you’re young you think you know everything and you have all the answers. Elizabeth Bennet is a character who is experiencing things for the first time and so she’s making mistakes all the time. She’s strong, intelligent and very witty, but she makes the most horrendous mistakes and sometimes you just want to shake her. The fact that she’s really annoying somehow makes her even more loveable.”

The article also notes that the Rosamund Pike will talk about her role as Jane Bennet in the Saturday Magazine. We’ll keep an eye out for it.