No Sense and No Sensibility

Jane Austen is destroying my productivity. I mean, ruining it! The laundry is piled sky-high and the kids have eaten freezer-to-oven chicken strips twice this week. I barely made it to my volunteer job two days ago. I have thank you notes to write and even this year’s Christmas letter to start. I have bills to pay and an invoice to submit for remuneration. But oh no! I’m reading Jane Austen!

Last week, I re-read Pride and Prejudice for what was probably the 20th time. It is my favourite of the handful of timelessly witty classics produced by this brilliant novelist. In fact, it had been my first Austen, back in 1993, when I was living in Vancouver and happened into a bookstore on Broadway, near my apartment where dozens of paperback classics were stacked on a table at the front. I returned the next day to buy three more Jane Austen novels: Emma; Mansfield Park; Sense and Sensibility. Six months later, I grabbed Persuasion, another favourite, while waiting for a flight at an airport in northern Canada. Later, Northanger Abbey completed my paperback collection.

These books have come with me all over the world, for I know that a craving for Ms. Austen’s words will come over me at least once per year and I will be obliged to read every book again. I linger over the words and how beautifully they are put together. I laugh at the wit (“It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife.”) and her portrayals of the unending manoeuvring in society to preserve wealth, to obtain a position, to marry well, or to gain a livelihood – all keys to success in the day.

I never tire of the romances, for they nearly always turn out well, with a satisfying rich-boy-marries-poor-girl conclusion. I never tire of her characters; the way some are upheld for their virtue and steadfastness, while others are mocked for their vanity and pretentions! I never tire of Austen’s depictions of societies at Bath and London nor of her descriptions of the tiny hamlets and villages that still typify rural England.

Now, in addition to reading the novels, I have the luxury of watching the movies – those fabulously epic BBC versions of Austen’s best. Who could not be moved – weak at the knees actually – watching Colin Firth play Mr. Darcy with such intensity? Who would be immune to the attentions of such a handsome aristocrat? Who among us would not secretly wish such a man to be madly in love with us? I could watch that movie every day!

The problem is that once I started reading one Austen, I cannot get enough. I will re-read every novel I own, as well as a collection of fragmented and unpublished stories that I possess as well! Perhaps it is a blessing that the poor woman had only a handful of novels in print at the time of her passing at quite a young age; otherwise, I would never get anything accomplished at all! As it is, between the books and the movies, I can be out of commission for more than a week!

Even worse is my unexplained desire to adopt the dialogue of the books. Nowadays, when we see and hear so much rudeness, vulgarity and hate, I long for more civility in communication! It takes much longer for Jane Austen to express something, but that’s why it’s so pretty. Her characters rarely blurt out what’s on their mind; they’re more careful about the phrasing, but wouldn’t that kind of filter be welcome? Pity the friend who calls during an Austen week, as I’m likely to answer that I’m “honoured to have the privilege of dining with her in a fortnight” or that I am “indisposed at present” or that I am “vexed” by something that has happened.

Now, pray, madam, forgive me! If you’ll be so good as to excuse me, I must attend to my duties. (Ya, ya, I need to throw a load ‘o laundry in the machine and pick up the kids at school ... back to reality!)