Portland Center Stage Theater is presenting a stage version of PRIDE AND PREJUDICE through November 20. Tickets are available online.

If you’ve seen this production, send in your review!

ETA 10/31: A review from the Oregonian.

Times Newspapers of Auckland is offering free passes to P&P3–it requires e-mailing to answer to a very easy question by 5 p.m. on Monday. That’s soon for you guys, we think, so make haste!!!

…sort of! Raphael Kadushin writes about traveling through the beautiful Hampshire countryside, including Chawton, in the Minneapolis-St. Paul Star Tribune:

“And this is where she wrote,” the docent said.

“She” was Jane Austen, and what I was staring at was a tiny wooden table, its round top about the size of a Frisbee, tucked discreetly beside a window, looking like something praying not to be noticed.

The table was the kind you would serve cashews and olives on, though there might not be room for the cashews, and it was hard to picture Austen composing “Pride and Prejudice” on this undersized insult of a writing desk. Seeing it was like learning that Julia Child produced all those airy French soufflés in an Easy Bake oven, though Child didn’t have to worry about hiding her work every time someone entered the kitchen.

It is a rather tiny table, and pretty beat up, but we agree with all of the author’s comments about Hampshire–it is really beautiful country. It is easy to understand why Jane Austen so loved it.

Big bad hockey dude Brendan Shanahan of the Detroit Red Wings told the Detroit Free Press that he likes Jane Austen–at least, better than he likes Ernest Hemingway, which is something, one supposes.

“Jane Austen or Ernest Hemingway? Ah, will people think less of me if I say Jane Austen? I like “Sense and Sensibility.” . . . I guess I should say Hemingway. You know, I really kind of, I know it’s embarrassing, but I like her stuff better than his.”

Don’t be embarrassed, Brendan darling, we assure you that women are swooning everywhere. The boys will only tease you because they’re jealous.

The Editrix and Dorothy, incidentally, are very fond of watching a hockey game of an evening, so the enjoyment of hockey and Jane Austen are not necessarily mutually exclusive. (But we must add, Mr. Shanahan notwithstanding: Go Flyers!)

…and already plotting the How and When of our return to the scene of our public triumph, lovely Bath. We know Jane wasn’t fond of that city, but we liked it, especially out towards the first place that the Austens lived there, 4 Sydney Place.

A complete travelogue is forthcoming sometime this week–have some catching up to do first.

We really need to lead a round of applause for the other AustenBloggers (particularly Cub Reporter Tasha, who has done yeo(wo)man work and is being revived with a bracing pot of Dorothy’s Orange Pekoe) for handling things whilst we swanned round Old Blighty having fun. Or, in that Nelsonian spirit, perhaps three cheers:

Hip, hip, HUZZAH!

Hip, hip, HUZZAH!

Hip, hip, HUZZAH!

Incidentally, when we win the lottery, we plan to purchase 4 Sydney Place, kick out the current squatters who live there (hope they didn’t mind us taking photos of their house…but they really should close their curtains. Just saying) and turn it into the new and improved AustenBlog World Headquarters, with the comfortable chintz-upholstered chairs of the Jane Austen Memorial Library and Reading Room open to all Janeites! You just have to know the Password of the First Degree…Tilneys and trap-doors, of course.

It’s indescribable.

Here’s an accompaniment you might find diverting.

Thanks to Elaine for sending this in!

Thanks to our good friend Paul over at KeiraWeb, we now have a list of cities for the November 11th release of Pride and Prejudice:
(more…)

Friends, Readers, Janeites:

In all the fever and frenzy that has accompanied the release of P&P2005, we’d like to remind you that not only has Our Dear Jane written five other novels, as well as a plethora of short stories and letters, but other artists besides famous actors have taken note of them! Please take some time to check out the panel to the right of your screen and look at some other Austen-related books/events that are “On The Street” or “In the Works.”

For example:
The Cambridge University Press has a fab new site listing all their publications by and about Austen.
The latest Jane Austen Mystery will most certainly be a good and intriguing read!
If reading isn’t your thing, you can always go for the BBC Austen collection, now out on DVD.

There’s so much out there, both in your local library/movie rental store, and on the internet. Amuse yourself with the exploits of Emma Woodhouse rather than Keira Knightley, and remind yourselves again why Henry Tilney will be a more lively clergyman than Edmund Bertram. We’re not asking you to forget about the new film, only to remember that there was more to Austen than “truths universally acknowledged” and “dearest, loveliest Elizabeths.”

Thank you all again for all the support and feedback you give. It’s so much fun working here, and hearing from all of you makes it even better!

Andrea Jaeger of the Dayton, Ohio JASNA Chapter wrote to tell us of a Jane Austen birthday celebration in her neck of the woods, for those of you who can’t make the NoCal event! (Don’t worry, East Coasters, we’ll try and find something for you, too!

On December 18th, the Dayton JASNA will be holding a potluck tea in honor of our beloved Jane, complete with white soup à la Netherfield Ball!

For all you Lydia Bennets out there who simply long for a ball, the Dayton chapter aims to please with the “Springtime at Pemberley” Assembly Ball to take place on May 6, 2006. Activities for the day-long event include lectures, luncheon, period card games, a dance workshop, and the ball in the evening.

For more information on these events, or general inquiries for the Dayton JASNA chapter, please contact Andrea at regencydancingqueen AT yahoo.com (like always, replace the “AT” with “@”!)

Alert Janeite Julie F. wrote to tell us about Oxford University Press’ sale for the Oxford Illustrated Jane Austen, which includes her six major novels as well as her Juvenilia. The set also boasts 19th century illustrations (EDIT: not the C.E. Brock ones, see comments).

Julie F. also called our attention to the fact that this is a site-wide sale; we found some pretty good bargains while poking around - we suggest that our readers do the same!

Virginia Solomon of the Northern California branch of JASNA wrote to tell us about their “Jane Austen’s Birthday” meeting on December 3rd. (Yes, a fortnight early, but I doubt Jane will mind too much!)

The meeting theme is “Persuasion, Pride and Passion in Jane Austen’s Novels” Keynote Address: “You Pierce My Soul”. (Professor Kay Young, English Dept., UCSB) Commenting on the mind/body disconnect that Elizabeth Bennet displays in Pride and Prejudice, this presentation compares her reaction to those of Anne and Wentworth in Persuasion.

For more information, you can also visit their website or shoot an email to RC AT jasnanorcal.org (yes, that is an email address; we’re simply trying to prevent harvesting by those nasty spambots).

As always, we love getting information about JA-related events you’ve attended/planning/heard of in your area.

Last summer, Jennifer Ehle agreed to answer questions put to her by bloggers and fans alike. DaddyPundit at Blogcritics published some excerpts. The whole interview is available here, at the Jennifer Ehle Fan Blog.

My favorite bit?

Of the following men from Pride and Prejudice - Mr. Darcy, Mr. Bingley or Mr. Bennet - which would you want your son to grow up to be like and why?

~ These are the options?! It’s amazing the species continues.

Ouch! Now that you put it like that Jennifer, I guess you have a point.

Update: Thanks so much to Tina from the Jennifer Ehle Fan Blog for notifying us about the Ehle interview. I spent a little more time with the interview, and found this lovely bit as well:

“The relationship between Mr. Bennet and Lizzie was always my favorite part of the book. It was, for me growing up, the love story in the book; and I would weep whenever I reread it and would get to the bit where Lizzie tells Mr. Bennet that Darcy is the best man she has ever known. It is such an important part of the whole female fantasy of the story — the favorite daughter who idolizes her father above all men and then, when he fails to protect Lydia from herself, is exposed as a mere human being. Then, and only then, is the young woman free to find her own mate and open her heart to him.

I suppose I will expose myself as a shallow thinker when I admit to never having considered that particular aspect before, that Elizabeth loved Darcy only after her father’s great failing occurred.

Of course that’s one reason I love Jane so much; no matter how many times you read her you always can find something new.

I will own to be a bit scandalized by this most shocking admission by Ehle:

I have always loved Austen — Pride and Prejudice and Persuasion are my favorites.

Still have not read Mansfield Park or Northanger Abbey.

Not read Northanger Abbey? Somewhere Mags is reading that and weeping.

Our good friend Paul over at KeiraWeb wrote to tell us about the beginning of the P&P promotions in the US. Miss Knightley will be appearing on Conan O’Brien on November 11th. The interview will also appear on CNBC Europe on November 16th.

Jane Austen Sequels wrote to tell us about their latest publication, entitled Miss DeBourgh’s Adventure, by Joan Ellen Delman.

Their website offers this description:

Description: Lady Catherine de Bourgh had always intended a marriage between her daughter Anne and her nephew Mr Darcy. But when Mr Darcy has the temerity to thwart her plans by marrying Miss Elizabeth Bennet instead, Lady Catherine resolves on bringing Anne to Bath to seek a husband. Shortly after their arrival, her ladyship is run down by a reckless coachman, and Mr and Mrs Collins hasten to Bath to be of service. As Lady Catherine recuperates from her injuries, Anne is befriended by the beautiful Louisa Wynnewood, and courted by Miss Wynnewood’s oh-so-charming and irresistibly handsome brother. But can the Wynnewoods be trusted - or are they only after Anne’s fortune?

The site also has purchasing information for this book as well as Miss Delman’s Emma sequel and some other fun tidbits.

Fellow Janeites, it’s happened.

The reviews are being reviewed: Alert Janeite Kirsty sent in this post by a blogger who has had enough.

As deeply fond as I am of Jane Austen’s novels, and of Pride and Prejudice in particular, I don’t pretend that they’re without their flaws. Austen’s romances are cerebral and mostly passionless, and her characters’ world is no wider than her own limited, proscribed existence. The wonder of Austen’s fiction is the fact that she took these coldly moral tales, combined them with her warm wit and keen powers of observation, and came up with a miniature of humanity in all its glory and silliness. Some things, some aspects of human existence, are missing, but in much the same way that we don’t turn to Tolkien for complicated and flawed characters, and we don’t read George Eliot when we’re after a barrel of laughs, it’s wrong to try and impose those aspects on our reading of Austen. For better and worse (but mostly for better), she is what she is–one of the finest authors in the English language, and well worth a first, second, and third look.

Now this is the type of Gritty Realism we AustenBloggers like to see!

Down in New Zealand, English professor Joanne Wilkes waxes poetic on the enduring appeal of Witty Jane.

Alert Janeite Claire sent in this snarking article from the New York Times, in which an inanimate object’s love for Keira Knightley is declared:

In “Pride and Prejudice,” the latest movie version of the Jane Austen classic, out next month, the camera follows her around like a besotted puppy. It flings itself out of windows and over furniture and through walls just to be close to her. When she’s not there, it frantically rushes around whimpering, sliding off the rest of the cast in anticipation, and when it finally gets her on the sofa or backs her into a corner, it just licks her all over, in an ecstasy of devotion.

Sorry Mr. Camera, I think Miss Knightley (as well as most other people of the feminine persuasion) prefers significant others with a noticeable heartbeat.

The Pace Press, however, is not so easily infatuated as Mr. Camera:

I’d love any excuse to encourage the public to see and become familiar with a Jane Austen tale, particularly one that is so revered, I’d have to tell everyone; instead of wasting your $10 to see this drained and cheap Hollywood imitation, go rent the ‘95 BBC mini-series. You can’t go wrong there. Can you truly tell me that you want to go see a movie where the tag line is, “Sometimes the last person on earth you want to be with is the one person you can’t be without”?

Um . . . no comment.

Alert Janeite Cinthia wrote to us about the Spectator’s opinion on the film, which finds a comfortable balance between obsessive admiration and downright snark:

Overall, fans of the book and mini-series should be generally pleased with the film. It was a good adaptation of the classic novel and will help any Austen fan get past their prejudice and be filled with pride.

And that, dear readers, is diplomacy in action.

This is seriously cool. Alert Janeite Lorraine wrote to tell us about a new computer font based on Jane Austen’s handwriting. There’s also a complex analysis of Jane Austen’s handwriting from a technical point of view–the creator of the font seems dismissive of placing psychological traits on it. So even if you’re not interested in the font, we recommend checking out the link.

Oh, the fun we will have with this.

Download the font at Ms. Frauss’ site or here.

(The inspiration for today’s title will soon become clear. Bear with us.)

Alert Janeite AmandaJ wrote to tell us about a review of P&P3 from the Australian ABC network; the film opens there next week.

DAVID STRATTON: I think it’s a fine adaptation. Brenda Blethyn is not my favorite actress, but she’s really good in this. I think on just about every level it succeeds really well. I’m giving it four and a half.

MARGARET POMERANZ: Oh, I feel a bit mean only giving it four.

AmandaJ tells us, “These two are very respected reviewers here - and can be hard markers. So this is a fine score!” She had a chance to see the film at a preview and enjoyed it very much.

The Christian Science Monitor chooses the film as one of its “Picks” - five things they think “you’ll really like,” though we think it the sort of compliment that must disarm reproof:

Prejudiced (and proud of it)

Seinfeld may disdain puffy shirts, but even he would have to concede that they look rather fetching on Colin Firth in his career-defining role as Darcy in the 1995 BBC/A&E adaptation of Jane Austen’s Pride & Prejudice. Word is that next month’s film version, ghost-written in part by Emma Thompson and starring Keira Knightley, is very good, but we doubt it will improve upon the mini-series, now available on DVD.

Gee, don’t get carried away with your enthusiasm there.

And it appears that Keira Knightley’s portrayal of Domino Harvey has become a gay icon. While we found this news as amusing as Miss Knightley herself seemed to, our No Six Degrees of Separation Rule normally would preclude reporting it on the weblog, except for this tidbit:

Knightley herself says she would duck the historians who’d come in to give lectures and etiquette lessons on the Austen set to perfect Harvey’s kickboxing routine with a trainer.

No. Comment. Not sayin’ nothing. Nope, nuh-uh. Mouth resolutely shut, keyboard under control.

Darcy’s Diary by Amanda Grange (which the Editrix recently reviewed) is available for preorder from barnesandnoble.com. The authoress tells us that it should be available from Amazon.com soon as well.

Alert Janeites Kirsty and Maureen wrote to tell us about Scotsman.com’s report that Mr. Darcy has topped a poll of readers’ favorite literary hero, beating out Harry Potter.

Fitzwilliam Darcy made his entrance in Jane Austen’s romantic novel Pride and Prejudice, which was published in 1813 and has remained a favourite for almost two hundred years.

The story sees the wealthy, upper-class Mr Darcy overcome his inflated personal pride to marry the spirited Lizzie Bennett, who comes from a far less privileged family.

An article in the Guardian about a literary festival in Wells poses a question that many Janeites have had:

Over lunch the present warden, Geoffrey Crossick, an urban historian by trade, described giving a talk to a school in Essex about the story of towns and cities. At the end, he asked for questions, and a young girl asked, apropos nothing, “What did they wipe their bums with?”

Geoff didn’t know the answer then, and still doesn’t. As my brother pointed out, Jane Austen is silent on the subject. It is hard to imagine Elizabeth Bennet going to the privy with a handful of wet moss, but that may be what happened. Perhaps readers could help?

We think you have your pick of two answers: the first being rational and Janeish, the second for history wonks.

1. Fictional characters don’t pee.

2. Most likely, yes.