Austenmania
Last Sunday I spent a very pleasant hour reclining, listening to a fantastic BBC Radio 4 adaption of 'Pride and Prejudice'. Hats, and bonnets, off to all involved, including what I am sure is a quite marvellous cast, who, wonderful though they were, merely provided a soundtrack to mental images populated by the cast of the 1995 BBC adaption featuring Colin Firth's wet shirt in a BAFTA award winning role as best supporting garment (informally known as 'the golden girdle').
Just what will be required to ever remove that particular adaption from the nation's collective memory is uncertain, although any future adaptions would do well to feature 3D, or dinosaurs. Probably though, there's simply no chance of any subsequent version of the story unseating Andrew Davies's version as the definitive pride and prejudice. It's certainly better than even the one written by Jane Austen, what with hers not being on telly and everything but instead being a print version, and apparently not even available on Kindle, initially.
Maybe it just aired at the right time. Looking at it, the BBC obviously had access to sackful of loot, each episode obviously costing the sort of money it takes to run a Premiership football team for a week today.
It's easy to see how these adaptions might have an effect on impressionable young women. Chaps may choose to invest wisely in, say, collectible replicas such as sonic screwdrivers, or limited edition DVDs. Wise purchases to be sure, until you get a girlfriend and treasured possessions move from artfully lit shelves to boxes under the bed, on top of the cupboard or, in extreme circumstances, to being listed on eBay. This is a particularly crippling way to part with a purchase as it reveals that the limited edition replica you shelled out a fortune for, one of only 10,000, is practically worthless.
Girls, one imagines, can get 'bonnet-fever' and indeed programmes such as 'Lost in Austen' and films like 'Austenland' have identified this as enough of a trend to wring a series or a feature film out of.
What, as a concerned parent, should one do - if anything - if your daughter shows signs of excessive Austen-mania, such as sighing, wearing bonnets, attending church and sitting in the front room embroidering.
First and foremost, you should just be grateful she's not self harming or reading the ''Twilight' books. But if it all gets a bit too much, for instance her refusing to attend school as she is convinced that appearing too educated will put men off and prevent her from making a good marriage, then it's time to mount an intervention.
Do not be tempted to take the 'so you tried a cigarette, let's smoke the entire pack and see how you feel then' approach. Last Christmas I happened across the 1995 adaption being aired, all six episodes back to back, and that was the rest of the day taken care of, and it was fantastic. No, you need to, in a safe and unthreatening way, shock the hell out of her by showing what happens when people take these sorts of things to extremes.
Start with the blog of anyone who enjoys spending their weekends attending civil war reenactments. Then visit the blogs of their children, who will point out that while their mates were going to Disneyland and Centre Parcs, their own holidays from eight to eighteen years of age consisted of touring various battlefields, dressing up, and being skewered by a pike before learning that the actual battle took place in the next postcode but hey ho there's always next year. And lots of mud. Just google 'resentful teens' and set your filter for 'period costume' (not, as many think, hot water bottles strapped fore and aft and a sweatshirt with ice-cam down the front of it, but usually something with a hat featuring a plume).
Such examples can serve as timely warnings that it's great to be enthusiastic about your hobbies and history, but that if you are having a screaming argument with another adult about the correct pronunciation of 'epaulette' in relation to British army uniforms during the Peninsular war, it's time to either go for a beer, or complete that PhD.
Austen is seductive. Which is ironic, given how repressed everyone is. Who wouldn't want to inhabit a world where the men are handsome and wear very, very tight trousers and are rich, and wear tight trousers and everyone goes to balls, which you can see, because of, well, you know.
One can see how one would want to retreat from a complicated world into a selectively idealised past of balls and bonnets, but beware taking things too far. How far is too far? Easy - it's three bonnets. One for everyday, one for best, that's all the bonnets anyone ever needs. If you have three bonnets, seek help, or eBay, at once.
Just what will be required to ever remove that particular adaption from the nation's collective memory is uncertain, although any future adaptions would do well to feature 3D, or dinosaurs. Probably though, there's simply no chance of any subsequent version of the story unseating Andrew Davies's version as the definitive pride and prejudice. It's certainly better than even the one written by Jane Austen, what with hers not being on telly and everything but instead being a print version, and apparently not even available on Kindle, initially.
Maybe it just aired at the right time. Looking at it, the BBC obviously had access to sackful of loot, each episode obviously costing the sort of money it takes to run a Premiership football team for a week today.
It's easy to see how these adaptions might have an effect on impressionable young women. Chaps may choose to invest wisely in, say, collectible replicas such as sonic screwdrivers, or limited edition DVDs. Wise purchases to be sure, until you get a girlfriend and treasured possessions move from artfully lit shelves to boxes under the bed, on top of the cupboard or, in extreme circumstances, to being listed on eBay. This is a particularly crippling way to part with a purchase as it reveals that the limited edition replica you shelled out a fortune for, one of only 10,000, is practically worthless.
Girls, one imagines, can get 'bonnet-fever' and indeed programmes such as 'Lost in Austen' and films like 'Austenland' have identified this as enough of a trend to wring a series or a feature film out of.
What, as a concerned parent, should one do - if anything - if your daughter shows signs of excessive Austen-mania, such as sighing, wearing bonnets, attending church and sitting in the front room embroidering.
First and foremost, you should just be grateful she's not self harming or reading the ''Twilight' books. But if it all gets a bit too much, for instance her refusing to attend school as she is convinced that appearing too educated will put men off and prevent her from making a good marriage, then it's time to mount an intervention.
Do not be tempted to take the 'so you tried a cigarette, let's smoke the entire pack and see how you feel then' approach. Last Christmas I happened across the 1995 adaption being aired, all six episodes back to back, and that was the rest of the day taken care of, and it was fantastic. No, you need to, in a safe and unthreatening way, shock the hell out of her by showing what happens when people take these sorts of things to extremes.
Start with the blog of anyone who enjoys spending their weekends attending civil war reenactments. Then visit the blogs of their children, who will point out that while their mates were going to Disneyland and Centre Parcs, their own holidays from eight to eighteen years of age consisted of touring various battlefields, dressing up, and being skewered by a pike before learning that the actual battle took place in the next postcode but hey ho there's always next year. And lots of mud. Just google 'resentful teens' and set your filter for 'period costume' (not, as many think, hot water bottles strapped fore and aft and a sweatshirt with ice-cam down the front of it, but usually something with a hat featuring a plume).
Such examples can serve as timely warnings that it's great to be enthusiastic about your hobbies and history, but that if you are having a screaming argument with another adult about the correct pronunciation of 'epaulette' in relation to British army uniforms during the Peninsular war, it's time to either go for a beer, or complete that PhD.
Austen is seductive. Which is ironic, given how repressed everyone is. Who wouldn't want to inhabit a world where the men are handsome and wear very, very tight trousers and are rich, and wear tight trousers and everyone goes to balls, which you can see, because of, well, you know.
One can see how one would want to retreat from a complicated world into a selectively idealised past of balls and bonnets, but beware taking things too far. How far is too far? Easy - it's three bonnets. One for everyday, one for best, that's all the bonnets anyone ever needs. If you have three bonnets, seek help, or eBay, at once.
Labels: Andrew Davies, Austen, BBC, Drama, Jane Austen, Literature, Pride and Prejudice
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