It is a truth universally acknowledged that few authors can resist the allure of Jane Austen’s deceptively simple plots. Many retellings of her books have emerged over the years, but (spoiler alert!) few of them come close to the wit, delectable turn of phrase, memorable characters and perceptiveness of the originals.
Austen only wrote six novels. I would have liked a dozen or two more, but instead have read and watched many of these retellings in the hope of finding one or two that are as clever as the originals.
Successful
Clueless
This clever 1995 film set in LA starred Alicia Silverstone as Cher, a self-absorbed, makeover-obsessed 16-year old who tries to set up Tai, a new student, with a relationship that she considers appropriate to her status. Sound familiar? Indeed, Emma. Mr. Knightley is replaced by Cher’s not-related-by-blood-stepbrother Josh — slightly discomfiting, but then so was the 17-year age difference between Emma and Mr Knightley. The film is full of wry, funny dialogue and doesn’t take itself too seriously, and is a sharp take on 1990s Southern California. Of course, the actors look too old for their supposed ages, but that’s the way of high school movies. It’s usually a problem dragging an Austen plot into modern times, but in this case it works because it’s set among wealthy L.A. high-schoolers who really are status-conscious, concerned about relationships but not jobs, and have lives circumscribed by their parents.
Longbourn, by Jo Baker. Much as I love Pride and Prejudice, I must admit that I was entirely focused on the events surrounding the Bennetts. Of course, there was a Downstairs to the Upstairs story; that is, a host of servants who enabled the seamless lives of the Bennetts and the Darcys and the Bingleys and allowed them to concentrate on their emotional and social concerns. Jo Baker’s Longbourn describes the events from the point of view of Sarah, a maid in the Bennett household, so it is more of a parallel story than a retelling. Remember when Elizabeth energetically walked across the fields and arrived in a muddy state at the Bingley household, to the supercilious horror of the Bingley sisters? Sarah was the one who had to clean her stained and battered dress afterwards. It made me think twice about the events in the original, without at all changing my affection for it.
Bridget Jones’ Diary, by Helen Fielding. Not a retelling exactly, but a funny modern take with lots of throwback references to Pride and Prejudice, and even a hero called Mark Darcy. The book and film, with its nods to the BBC Pride and Prejudice TV series including Colin Firth playing the same role, succeed because they pay homage to the original rather than attempting to skate on its plot. There is no family of unmarried sisters, Bridget has a job, and the cad happens to be her Lothario boss. Like the other successful novels, Bridget makes its own statements about society. (Unfortunately the author couldn’t stop here, and dragged out two unnecessary sequels.)
Sadly, Unsuccesful
Bride and Prejudice. This film by Gurinder Chadha featured the very lovely but stolid Aishwarya Rai as the Elizabeth equivalent, and showed her travelling happily in the back of a (pristine!) bullock cart in Punjab before she meets the eligible American Darcy. The film generally followed the plot, changing only the names, but throwing in a few Bollywood songs and dances. I suppose Chadha was trying to make the point that Austen’s pre-Victorian society was much the same as Punjabi society today, but even she seemed unconvinced: at various points there are some self-righteously modern statements about feminism, imperialism and colonialism that are plain ridiculous.
Eligible, by Curtis Sittenfeld. Emma, by Alexander McCall Smith. Sense and Sensibility, by Joanna Trollope. Northanger Abbey, by Val McDiarmid. The ‘Austen Project’ commissioned contemporary retellings by modern authors of all six of Austen’s novels. Eternally optimistic, I read three of these before giving up. Curtis Sittenfeld is an excellent writer and I had the most hope for her version of Pride and Prejudice, but was disappointed. The problem is that the society Austen wrote about was very specific and limited, especially for unmarried women. The events that occurred in her book don’t translate easily to modern times when women have education, careers, and options. Simply calling her Liz or converting Elizabeth Bennet’s letters into an email or SMS do not make the situations modern. In all these retellings, the characters often seem shoehorned into peculiar behaviour in order to follow Austen’s plots.
Death Comes to Pemberley, by P.D. James. I feel sad to say this about any novel by the brilliant P.D. James, but this is an awkward update on Elizabeth and Darcy squeezed into the format of a murder mystery. The mystery is quite well done, the writing is of course excellent, but the book would have been better without the Pemberley connection. The characters are familiar, but they lack the sparkle of Austen’s people. The TV series of this book was even worse: marriage to the grumpy Darcy and motherhood apparently destroyed all Elizabeth’s charm, wit and humour.
Unmarriageable, by Soniah Kamal. Pride and Prejudice in Pakistan? This novel follows the plot and characters precisely, to the extent of giving them Pakistani versions of their names. So we have the sisters Jenaba, Alysba, Marizba, Qittyara, and Lady Binat, Fahad “Bungles” Bingla and his friend Valentine Darsee, Sherry Looclus, and even a grating “Jorgeullah Wickaam”. I counted eight “It is a truth universally…” sentences and at least twenty mentions of Austen. (Yet somehow Alys, who teaches the book to her students in English class, never notices the startling parallels between the book and her own life, even to the names.). The twist is that Jena and Alys are 32 and 30, “over the hill” in the Pakistani marriage market, while Bingla and Darsee are younger than them, another unspoken taboo. The hypocrisies and double standards of Pakistani society are neatly underlined, but this retelling seemed forced and unconvincing. The best part is the epilogue which is Kamal’s own addition and is interestingly original.
This is only a small subset of the hundreds of other Austen-ish variations set in past and present times. I’ve heard that Pride and Prejudice and Zombies is pretty original and clever, but not being a zombie fan, I’ve skipped that one.
At least two more South Asian versions came out recently. Ayesha at Last, by Uzma Jalaluddin is set among Muslims in Toronto. Sonali Dev’s Pride, Prejudice, and Other Flavors plays around promisingly with the gender and privilege of the original story: Trisha Raje is a descendant of royalty and a famous neurosurgeon, who is attracted to DJ Caine, a mixed-race chef with poverty and racism in his past.
“One half of the world cannot understand the pleasures of the other“, said Austen’s Emma, and so it hardly needs to be said that this post is entirely subjective. But do tell me what you disagree with :-).
Recent Comments