Anybody else into Jane Austen?? I have a lot of trouble choosing faves, but I think Pride & Prejudice and Persuasion are it. I love how besides the obvious wit, romance, etc. that we find in the books today, Austen was making a statement to society of her time.

OK, I'll come out of the closet. I like Jane Austen too. Had to read Pride and Prejudice for GCSE English Lit, then made my mum by me Emma and Sense and Sensibility too. Enjoyed them all. Keep meaning to get the others but at the moment have to spend my cash on Set Texts for my degree.

I just went out and bought Pride and Predjudice, Emma, and Sense and sensibility...but I have not read any of them yet. I can't decide which one to read first lol any suggestions?

Pride and Prejudice is probably the easiest to tackle first (from my POV anyway). I found Sense and Sensibility a little harder to get into, although I enjoyed it when I did.

ok pride and Prejudice it is first... thank you

I've only read Emma and Pride and Prejudice. The first one I picked up was Emma, and that took me a while to get into, but towards the end, I started to really enjoy it more. Read Pride and Prejudice after I read Emma and absolutely loved it. The characters are witty and funny and the story just keep you reading. Definitly go with Pride and Prejudice first It's probably a better introduction into Austen's work.

Yeah, Emma is quite hard to get into, but it's good when you do get there.

how about the film adaptations? I have never in my life met anyone that didn't adore A&E's PAP. Colin Firth. do I really need to say more. Ang Lee's SAS was beautiful too. Mansfield Park and Persuasion were more low-profile...but no less enjoyable. I always felt like Emma w/ Gwyneth Paltrow was the most geared to pop culture. Anyone know if there's a movie of Northanger Abbey? I really liked that one.

I loved the Colin Firth and Jennifer Ehle version of P & P And Mansfield Park with Frances O'Connor was great. Kept rewatching it

I am a main supporter of Jane Austen, and I would have to say that my favourite work of literature by her would be Pride and Prejudice. It was the first novel I read of her work, and one of her best.

I have read other works of hers such as Emma, Sense and Sensibility, and Pursuasion.

I think her works said a lot about society and life at that time, and gives us a glimpse of something we were not around to experience. If she were around today, I would thank her for leaving such a present behind, for those after her time.

For anyone who has not read these stories and more, I would definately recomend them. I will now finish my continuous praises.

One last comment: I found that the film adaptation of Pride and Prejudice was one of the best adapations I have seen of a novel. Colin Firth and Jennifer Ele portray the characters flawlessly, and they are true to the plot of the story. I salute those who worked on that project.

I completely agree... I even find her work to be somewhat timeless. The basic themes are still applicable today.

My fave has got to bed Pride and Prejudice but I also loved Emma.

Also, I LOVE YOUR SIG!!! EEEE

Ohhhhh, I loved, loved, loved the P&P adaption. S&S was quite enjoyable too. I remember seeing Mansfield Park years ago, but I can't quite remember my impression of it.

But I don't know, I saw P&P first and it has a special place in my heart, so that has to be my favourite.

-sporritt

i have never read anything of jane austen's ever since i was in like grade four i would watch the tv special of pride and prejudice which is why i can't read that book(believe me i've tried) but the book is exactly like the tv special!!!! oh well it's really good but then i tried to read emma and couldn't get past three pages i would really like to read jane austen's books does emma get better??????????

Emma definitely gets better.. It's one of my favourites.

But, maybe it isn't that you don't like the story, it's that you don't like the style? If you don't enjoy reading Jane Austen (and I think it's an acquired taste), none of her books will ever get 'better'

thanks i'll keep that in mind however i'm wasn't exactly patient so i'll try again

HI!

I like JAne Austen too!!!

and my favourite is Pride and Prejudice...

My faves are P&P and Mansfield Park Emma is good too though

Hello!

Pride & Prejudice is the only book I've ever re-read immediately after finishing it the first time. I absolutely love that book! You know the part towards the end where Lizzy tells off Lady Catherine de Bourgh? -one of my all time favorite scenes; it's priceless!

Emma and Sense & Sensibility are also outstanding...

Confession: I got half way through Persuasion and never finished.... I had to return it to the library and never got around to it again. I'm a bit shamed about that.

The following is from an essay by Mark Haddon. The full essay is here: http://books.guardian.co.uk/departments/ch...1189538,00.html

In fact, the book most often in my mind was Pride and Prejudice.

Jane Austen was writing about boring people with desperately limited lives. We forget this because we've seen too many of her books on screen. All we can think of is country houses, heritage frocks and Colin Firth's chest in a wet shirt. But if Austen were alive today, she'd be writing about chartered accountants in Welwyn Garden City.

Her heroines were bound by iron rules about what they could do, where they could go and what they could say. Their futures depended on the single question of who they would marry. Was it going to be the baronet? Or were they going to fall for a cad in tight red trousers and be discarded in a boarding house in Bath?

Yet Jane Austen writes about these humdrum lives with such empathy that they seem endlessly fascinating. And her first act of empathy is to write about them in the kind of book these woman would themselves read - the romantic novel.

This was what I was trying to do in Curious Incident. To take a life that seemed horribly constrained, to write about it in the kind of book that the hero would read - a murder mystery - and hopefully show that if you viewed this life with sufficient imagination it would seem infinite.