Mansfield Park Revisited (Everthing Austen Challenge 2)

Mansfield Park Revisited: A Jane Austen Entertainment by Joan Aiken.

This book was my second Everything Austen Challenge. Originally published in 1985 by Doubleday, this novel was republished last year by Sourcebooks Landmark. (Everyone's favorite JA sequel publishing house.) As a side note: Yes it's the Joan Aiken. Prolific writer, author of The Wolves of Willoughby Chase etc. for kids...And as another side note: I swear I have read another of Joan's Austen books as there are several. But I've gone through all of the titles and can't figure it out. The only thing that I can figure is that Sourcebooks has used the phrase "A Jane Austen Entertainment" as the title of another of their books because I know that was in the title of a book I read at some point....Hmmm.

Back to the book--Here's a quick description:
It's set where the original MP ends, Fanny's dear sister, Susan comes to take her place as Lady Bertram's new companion. Sir Tom dies in Antigua, Edmund and Fanny must go there to settle some business affairs as the new Sir Tom must stay to manage the estate etc. Who should appear just after Edmund and Fanny depart, but Mary Ormiston, nee Crawford, who is deathly ill and just wants to come to Mansfield to get some fresh country air and hopes to see her good friends. Add a meddling Mrs. Yates (Julia Bertram), the devilish Henry Crawford and the quaint parson and his sister who take Edmund and Fanny's places and there you have it.

Even with the best intentions this book should not have taken as long to read as it did. It's a mere 201 pages and I swear it took me two weeks to read. (While I just read one book this weekend.) That being said and admitted, I think it speaks volumes as to how entertaining this "entertainment" truly was. Sigh. Joan Aiken you are usually great. But I have to argue the value of entertainment here. There was no Fanny. And while you did justice to Susan's character and got Lady Bertram spot on, I was disappointed. Mary Crawford is dying some mysterious illness and she is all sweet and sugary.

(Insert screech of tires here.) What? Hold the phone, please. Now, I fully admit it's been awhile since I read MP, but sweet and sugary? Syrupy, maybe, but only to where it would suit her purpose. I just couldn't buy into the fact that Miss Crawford was so nice (and dare I say, genuine?) to Susan. In fact, they became fast friends. While the rest of the story was a bit entertaining (Julia trying to marry Tom off to her sister-in-law and ensuing fiascoes that arise etc.), this one character flaw made it so I was irked the whole reading. Every time she appeared on page, I felt a little twitch start up. It just did not work for me. I guess I need to reread MP and see if my interpretation of Mary Crawford is the same as it once was or if I'm completely off on this one.

I hate to say it, but 1 Bonnet out of 5: Listening to Mr. Collins read Fordyce's Sermons is better.

Excuse me, but is that a drapery you're wearing?

The other night I just couldn't take it anymore. We've been without a VCR player for quite a while and I wanted to watch the 1995 Persuasion which is, of course, on VHS. So, I went digging in the basement and dug out a VCR that had been hiding in a closet and hooked it up and set about to watching P whilst puttering about the living room.

I've seen it so many times. And know so many of the lines by heart. But I looked up at the right time this time. And maybe it's because we graduated from my college dorm room TV at 13 inches to a "big kid" flat screen TV (27 inches or something) that I noticed it.

Is Sir Walter Elliot wearing a drape or is it just me?
I had to do a little internet digging to find a picture of it, but here it is. Take a look, folks, and get back to me. I think he's part of the draperies. Only Sir Walter would try to show his finery by matching the drapes. Oh, Good Sir, weren't you supposed to retrench when you went to Bath? Personally, I blame Lady Dalrymple.

Harry Potter and Jane Austen? Yep.

Sigh. He's coming. Can you feel him? The Dark Lord ascends. Ok, well, not quite yet, but after seeing the Half-Blood prince last weekend, I feel a foreboding sense of darkness blanketing Harry and the gang.

All summer the one movie I wanted to see was HP & the Half-Blood Prince. It was the one outing I anxious looked forward to, especially because it came out in theatres on my birthday. But then there was an unexpected camping trip to the BWCA for my partner in crime and HP had to be postponed. I was ok with that as long as we got to go.

Ah, and it was worth it. The expensive meal in downtown Mpls (to celebrate an anniversary, not to celebrate HP), then going to the local theatre all dolled up. Yep, it was all worth it. I'd read a review that called this HP movie "artsy" and I like that. It's been interesting watching the movies as they ebb and flow with the tides of directors & screenwriters coming and going. (1. Chris Columbus/Steve Kloves, 2. Chris Columbus/Steve Kloves, 3. Alfonso Cuarón/Steve Kloves, 4. Mike Newell/Steve Kloves, 5. David Yates/Michael Goldenberg & 6. Daivd Yates/Steve Kloves.) Each one has its own sense of something--be it awe, wonder, intrigue, foreboding and that works for me. They don't have to be just like the books, but I do think they do a good job on their own of telling the HP story.

A bits were added here and there (fire at The Burrow, the inferi scene), but all were done to tell part of the story that couldn't be fit into the final cut of the movie. (IE: The Burrow = muggle attacks throughout the book?) I loved the black inky smoke that arose from the pensieve and was also used for credits. Portraying the budding romances of H&G and R&H was done well. Sigh.

But friends, what has this to do with Dear Jane Austen? Oh, read on. There's always something.

I just happened to glance at the Sunday newspaper as the movie came out and what did they liken HP to? That's right folks--Pride and Prejudice. The article actually quoted John Granger, a Potter scholar. So I did some digging and found the actual artcle. "Harry Potter and the Ivory Tower: A Poster Scholar Puts J.K. Rowling's series on a shelf with Stoke, Chaucer, Austen and other Great Book Authors" can be found here.

Here's a small excerpt about its likeness to P&P:

Just as the key to Darcy and Elizabeth’s engagement in Pride and Prejudice was Darcy seeing past his pride and Elizabeth overcoming her prejudice, Harry’s victory over Lord Voldemort must come through love and after the revelation of an unexpected back to a revered or reviled front. Harry, like Darcy and Elizabeth, however, had to transcend his pride as a Gryffindor and free himself of his “old prejudice” against Slytherins.

Earlier in the article, Granger also discusses pride and I liked his thoughts. I'd never thought of this before. "Capital, capital," as Mr. Lucas would say.

We have, of course, the constant of “proper wizard pride” by which all nonmagical people, indeed, even magical brethren who are not “pure-blood” witches and wizards, are held in disdain. The Muggles we meet too hate the abnormality of the people living in Harry’s world. The poor, the clumsy, the awkward, the stupid, the ugly, and the unpopular at Hogwarts are also shown to have a hard time. Even the “nearly headless” ghost is a second-class citizen among the properly “headless” ghosts and prevented from participating in the annual Headless Hunt.

It is a fun article and worth a read for all Potter fans as well as Austen fans. :)

Where the Wild Things Are

I had to go to B&N to purchase some books for a baby shower gift yesterday and of course I came home with more than just gifts. It's just inevitable; a trip to B&N means buying books for someone in our family. (Me, the kiddo etc...) I had small small stack of board books, gifts and personal, and then I rounded a corner shelf in the children's section and there it was. A Maurice Sendak display. And I remembered...
We don't have a copy of Where the Wild Things Are just yet. And it is, well, Where the Wild Things Are. You know, Winner of the 1964 Caldecott Medal for "Most Distinguished Picture Book of the Year," and first published by HarperCollins in 1963...While I wasn't completely enamored with this book as a child (not sure we even owned a copy), I knew it and liked it. And we'd just been to the movies where we discovered that this beloved book is going to be a movie coming out in October. And so I came home with a hardcover edition. I just had to.

See the trailer here. (Youtube has the embedding turned off for this one and I don't have it in me to find it somewhere else.)

Really, though, what I'm excited about is that Maurice Sendak has given his blessing over this movie. And it's not a cartoon or a special effects filled action movie. It's live action, but simple from what the trailer and video below show. It just looks right.



Looks like we're going to need another babysitter...

A Memorial of Sorts

Saturday (July 18) marked the anniversary of Dear JA's death (in 1817). How fitting, then, that it also coincided with the family and I breaking out my birthday present--a Pride and Prejudice board game.

Each player is a couple (Darcy & Elizabeth, Bingley & Jane, Charlotte & Collins, and Lydia & Wickham) and one races around the board answering questions about the novel, visiting Longbourn, Meryton, Pemberley etc. and drawing Regency cards (think Chance in Monopoly--Go to Meryton to purchase lace for a new bonnet and while there collect the token if needed.) in order to collect tokens to fill your game card. Once all tokens are collected, the players race to the parish church to be the first couple there in order to win. It was a good time; I'm looking forward to playing it again, but this time as Lydia & Wickham and not Darcy & Elizabeth. HA!