Sunday, June 25, 2006

Why I Love Jane Austen

A drizzly, languorous Sunday here, with all the usual restful ritual of the day for me: church in the morning, shopping afterward at CVS for dry goods and Steve's C-Town for groceries, back to my apartment for lunch (blue cheese, crackers, and a green apple today), check e-mail, a little work, talk to Katy in the UK and Ted for our ongoing joint read of The Odyssey, run, shower, fix dinner, relax, talk to my family in Missouri, go to bed.

This is very solitary, you will note. It is not exciting. It is like two hundred other Sundays I've had in my nearly six years of New York life, and for most twentysomethings, it would be stolid beyond belief. But I love it and am happy in it; and as odd as this sounds, that is partly due to Jane Austen.

I first read Pride and Prejudice when I was thirteen years old, finishing the entire book from the First Proposal on in one breathless, besotted night. I loved Elizabeth, I loved Mr. Darcy, I loved "In vain I have struggled," I fangirled all over it. Two years later, the famed A&E/BBC production aired on TV, and I watched it in a state of mild disbelief: Was Mrs. Bennet really that awful? Did Mr. Collins actually say that in the novel? Surely Mr. Darcy didn't swim? I went back to the book and discovered what my romance-clouded reading had missed the first time through: Jane Austen was funny, often screamingly so, if you paid close enough attention to hear what she was saying. I reread the novel with new eyes, and the fact that I had missed such a major component of the book taught me to try to listen, really listen, to the books I was reading and the people around me.

This experience made me an editor, more or less, because editing is nothing but close attention to every word, every comma. And with further reading of Jane Austen's novels, I learned what I think of as the Zen of Jane Austen: Observe everything you can. If it is good, celebrate it; if it is funny, relish it; if it is wrong, condemn it; and if you can, record it, as clearly and accurately and intelligently as you know how, and it will speak for itself for ages to come. Austenblog quoted this passage from Emma in a recent post, and it made my jaw drop all over again with its brilliance:

Mrs. Elton, in all her apparatus of happiness, her large bonnet and her basket, was very ready to lead the way in gathering, accepting, or talking–strawberries, and only strawberries, could now be thought or spoken of.–”The best fruit in England–every body’s favourite–always wholesome.–These the finest beds and finest sorts.–Delightful to gather for one’s self–the only way of really enjoying them.–Morning decidedly the best time–never tired–every sort good–hautboy infinitely superior–no comparison–the others hardly eatable–hautboys very scarce–Chili preferred–white wood finest flavour of all–price of strawberries in London–abundance about Bristol–Maple Grove–cultivation–beds when to be renewed–gardeners thinking exactly different–no general rule–gardeners never to be put out of their way- delicious fruit–only too rich to be eaten much of–inferior to cherries–currants more refreshing–only objection to gathering strawberries the stooping–glaring sun–tired to death–could bear it no longer–must go and sit in the shade.”

In one paragraph, Jane Austen gives you an hour in Mrs. Elton's company, beginning with her "apparatus of happiness" (such a lovely phrase), her desire to lead the way, her perky never-tiredness, and her cheerleading for strawberries; then the ease with which she changes her favorite kind of strawberry, Maple Grove (her rich sister's estate, which she mentions at every opportunity), the gardeners not knowing as well as she does how to grow the fruit; and then her developing tiredness, which leads to trashing strawberries and her desire to sit down. All of Mrs. Elton is there in this paragraph, her small mind; her flexibility of principle in the face of circumstance or social advantage; her infinite undeserved sense of superiority; and most especially the fact that she doesn't listen to what she's saying, that she speaks without any real meaning to her words -- always the hallmark of villains and fools in Jane Austen. It's a little miracle of dialogue and characterization, and it advances the scene by moving us through an hour of the garden party!

So Jane Austen taught me first to notice these features in a text, then she taught me to appreciate them for their truth and the beauty in that truth. But the Zen of Jane Austen works outside literature as well. The taste of a sweet wine or sharp cheese; a friend's characteristic turn of phrase; the finery of a sparkling summer night: Appreciating these things begins with paying attention to them, being in them, almost, and outside yourself. And from appreciation grows love, and love, happiness -- a small kind, but an important one: the pleasure of having such wonderful things in your world.

Thus I love Austen for the romance, humor, wisdom, the snapshot of a world seemingly more beautiful and orderly than ours; I love her for the endless pleasure of her texts -- the perfect plots, gloriously balanced sentences, truthful characters, the fact I always find something new. But most especially I love her because she taught me to observe and appreciate the little things, beginning with one paragraph in one marvelous book, and expanding out into kind people, funny menus, great music -- and quiet Sundays.

11 comments:

  1. What a lovely, lovely post.

    I had to reply because I happen to be lunching on iced white tea, cheese, (Emmenthaler, not blue,) crackers, and green olives (not an apple, but does start with a vowel.) And, this very morning, I ordered a copy of ENTHUSIASM. And, And I have a Lyle CD right here, on my desk, although I'm listening to the BROKEBACK MT soundtrack,

    I'm in the CK zone --or a few degrees away from it, at least.

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  2. That's a great CD, as is Joshua Judges Ruth and everything else in his catalog, but The Road to Ensenada may be the single most perfect audio recording ever made...

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  3. That was beautiful...and as I also love Jane Austen and Granny Smith apples (won't eat any other kind, in fact), I also had to comment. I met you in October, at the RMSCBWI conference, and I should have known right then you were an Austen fan -- powers of quiet observation, and the confidence to speak of peripheral matters that affect the topic at hand. It was a lovely lunch that Saturday, and I'll always remember it as my first conference, my first 'day out' as a writer.

    On a similar track, my first love in Jane Austen was PERSUASION...still my favorite, as well.

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  4. I first read PRIDE & PREJUDICE at twelve. For years Mr. Darcy was my ultimate man. (Perhaps this contributed to my not dating in high school.) But i didn't notice how funny the book was until my third time through at 17. Maybe the younger mind isn't equipped for that type of humor?

    Thanks for the good post/thoughts.

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  5. If ever I'm in the mood for a good read, I know I can pick up a Jane Austen novel. Though I've read them over and over, I enjoy them every time . . . the mark of a great novel!

    My sophmore (high school) English teacher indroduced me to Jane Austen (as well as many of the other classics including Thomas Hardy's works), and I've loved "classic" literature ever since.

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  6. I have to tell you;

    I have recently discovered your blog, and I learn so much from you. When you use a word that I am not familiar with, I go to www.dictionary.com and my vocabulary is expanded. Your life in New York sounds VERY EXCITING, to me. As I sit here by the lake in Maine, and hear the loons cry out my window calling to one another at the front of the house, and as the crickets and frogs harmonize near the back of the house, I live with my own little symphony! With an occassional wild rabbit or turkey who sit in the audience out the side door... Yes New York must be exciting indeed!

    Granny Smith apples, I am fimiliar with, but MacCoun's are my particular favorite. And when I make my weekly visit to our local library, I will check out Pride and Prejudice because I think that perhaps I have missed out on something great while focusing on the music that the creatures create here on Silver Lake, and immersed in "The Lost Boy, and "A Man Named Dave."

    Thank you for your wonderful post, it was a lovely read on my 44th birthday!

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  7. That's prezactly what Sundays are for.

    Robin Prehin, if only you took one nibble of a crisp, multi-hued gala, I suspect you might recant.

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  8. She's like wiggling your weary feet in a pail of warm water at the end of that long, hard day, like slipping on that comfortable, old, raggedy, flannel nightie you can't release, like walking in that pair of old, just-right-fitting jeans you'll never never be able to buy again...except she's so much easier to access in different situations.

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  9. Hey Brenda --

    No! Maine is the place to be! Not to mention that E.B. White used to live there. *sigh*

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  10. One of my favorite P&P moments is the conversation between Darcy's aunt and Lizzie. The way Austen has Lizzie maneuver through that mine field is genius.

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  11. One of the sweetest pleasures: to pass on a love of Jane Austen to my daughter, who read Emma this year and portrayed the heroine (in a middle-school report) wearing a dance gown and a ball and chain. The commentary on female destiny was her own.

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