All Jane Austen, All the Time

So it seems...

To make the most of the Masterpiece's presentation of The Complete Jane Austen on PBS Sunday nights, I've been re-reading all of Jane Austen's novels and watching as many film adaptations as I can. I picked up Sense and Sensibility from the library and, I rented the DVD of the Jane Austen Book Club and watched it this weekend. So, it's not surprising that I have Jane Austin "on the brain". There are worse things to be stuck on I guess.

It was Grigg from the Jane Austen Book Club who said, "All Jane Austen All the Time." Last night we watched the final episode of Pride and Prejudice (1995) with the dreamy Colin Firth as Mr. Darcy.

One of the things that makes Pride and Prejudice such a classic work of literature is the sterling cast of supporting, perfectly pitched, comic characters. The genre of Pride and Prejudice is a comedy of manners and the manners of the minor characters are truly comical. One of the most unforgettable comic characters of all times is the smarmy Rev. Mr. Collins. Tonight as we sat down for our Sunday family fellowship time, Chuck threatened to read Fordyce’s sermons to us for an hour or two, for our moral edification. (See, even my macho husband is being sucked into the Austen frenzy.)

And who can forget the annoyingly loud and nervous Mrs. Bennet, along with her permanently bemused husband, Mr. Bennet. To my mind the most perfect Mr. Bennet is Donald Sutherland in PandP 2005, in fact the most perfectly cast and perfectly acted character in any of the Jane Austin adaptations I’ve seen is Sutherland’s Mr. Bennet.

Another supporting character is Lizzy’s pedantic sister Mary Bennet. Mary spends all her time with her nose in a book and thinks that books alone make her wise and someone worth listening to. In honor of the comic supporting cast of Pride and Prejudice here are some choice Mary Bennet quotes:

Mary had neither genius nor taste; and though vanity had given her application, it had given her likewise a pedantic air and conceited manner, which would have injured a higher degree of excellence than she had reached.

…she was eagerly succeeded at the instrument by her sister Mary, who having, in consequence of being the only plain one in the family, worked hard for knowledge and accomplishments, was always impatient for display.

“…What say you, Mary? for you are a young lady of deep reflection I know, and read great books, and make extracts."
Mary wished to say something very sensible, but knew not how.


They found Mary, as usual, deep in the study of thorough bass and human nature; and had some new extracts to admire, and some new observations of thread-bare morality to listen to.

And even Mary could assure her family that she had no disinclination for it.
"While I can have my mornings to myself," said she, "it is enough. -- I think it no sacrifice to join occasionally in evening engagements. Society has claims on us all; and I profess myself one of those who consider intervals of recreation and amusement as desirable for every body."

"Pride," observed Mary, who piqued herself upon the solidity of her reflections, "is a very common failing I believe. By all that I have ever read, I am convinced that it is very common indeed, that human nature is particularly prone to it, and that there are very few of us who do not cherish a feeling of self-complacency on the score of some quality or other, real or imaginary. Vanity and pride are different things, though the words are often used synonomously. A person may be proud without being vain. Pride relates more to our opinion of ourselves, vanity to what we would have others think of us."

"I admire the activity of your benevolence," observed Mary, "but every impulse of feeling should be guided by reason; and, in my opinion, exertion should always be in proportion to what is required."