“Dumbed down” P&P
Another academic slams The Annotated Pride and Prejudice as “dumbed down.”
Ever since there’s been some thing called British Literature, “Pride and Prejudice” has been at the heart of it. There’s good reason for this. As far as an English professor is concerned, the novel is a kind of miracle: relatively short, eminently readable and nearly 200 years old.
The response of an undergraduate faced with the prospect of having to read it, of course, is to figure out some dodge — or at least a shortcut that will leave the impression that he or she has not only read it, but also understood it. Once upon a time there were CliffsNotes. More recent students go to Sparknotes.com.
Now, thanks to Anchor Books, we have something called “The Annotated Pride and Prejudice,” a cumbersome edition of the novel aimed at the uninitiated reader. Publicity material touts this edition as “like having an incredibly knowledgeable person reading over your shoulder and discussing the book with you.”
[. . .]
None of this fluff is all that objectionable, and is often quite fun. What is objectionable, though, is that Shapard presumes to take up the job of the reader, providing footnotes that interpret the novel - and sometimes with inferior results.
Yikes! We really haven’t heard anything good about this edition at all…Joan Ray posted some objections in comments, and an AustenBlog reader review indicated it’s mostly for very new readers. We’ve heard from other Janeites who were disappointed with the edition. If you want something pretty scholarly, the new Cambridge edition, though spendy, might be just what you’re looking for (and they have one for each of the novels! La!).
April 3rd, 2007 at 5:48 pm
Now I am craving those Cambridge editions, although I don’t believe I could ever afford them. And I realized that my very first P&P, was an annotated one in German. There I learned f.e. that the references to blue coats for Bingley and Wickham, if I remember rightly, indicated that said gentlemen were clothed to the newest fashion of the time. Very trendy those two.
April 10th, 2007 at 11:21 pm
I bought a copy of this and ended up giving it away. Some of the notations were dumb, and in many places it felt like the notes were written in simply to fill up that side of the spread—repetitions all over. Anyway, for the complete novice it might offer some insights, which was the reason why I gave it away. Hopefully it will add another convert to the ranks of the Janeites.
So I just ordered a couple of volumes of the Cambridge Editions from the Cambridge University Press. Ouch! My wallet is still stinging. But I hope to complete my set before the year is out, including the forthcoming Edition, Later Manuscripts.