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Your favourite Austen?

96 replies

ThursdayLast · 01/06/2015 21:43

By dreadful coincidence I've finished my library book and audio book on the same day Shock

I'm visiting the library tomorrow, so to tide me over I'll probably pick out an ancient old Austen but I can't face the decision!

Which is your favourite?

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DramaAlpaca · 01/06/2015 21:43

Persuasion Smile

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TheCraicDealer · 01/06/2015 21:45

Persuasion. Hands down, every time

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meandjulio · 01/06/2015 21:47

Mansfield Park for being deep in the story; Northanger Abbey for laughs.

It used to be Persuasion but I need a few years off the snobbery.

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MrsHenryCrawford · 01/06/2015 21:49

Mansfield park, decent length that you can really get your teeth into

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UptoapointLordCopper · 01/06/2015 21:54

Persuasion, for its criticism of respectable society.

Pride and Prejudice, for the sparkle of Elizabeth.

Northanger Abbey - funny.

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ThursdayLast · 01/06/2015 22:00

Well Mrs you do surprise me Grin

I read Val Macdurmuid (shit, I have no idea how to spell that) updated version of Northanger Abbey recently which was quite fun, but only if you sort of ignored the annoying fake yoof-speak and the million references to Twitter.

I think my favourite is Persuasion too. I feel like I relate to Anne Elliot the most out of the heroines. Although perhaps I flatter myself!

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Ladyleia · 01/06/2015 22:04

Persuasion for me too....think it's the sense of regret and getting the chance to correct the past.

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Lambbone · 01/06/2015 22:15

Mansfield Park

Really mature, interesting, substantial work.

And you get to see some really worldly people who are developed in depth (unlike Miss Bingley and Mrs Hurst for example)

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Whiteshirt · 01/06/2015 22:20

Mansfield Park (despite dreary Edmund and Fanny) and Persuasion, too, closely followed by Emma. Northanger Abbey is by far my least favourite.

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JasperDamerel · 01/06/2015 22:23

Persuasion for reading for fun (and crying over) and Mansfield Park for thinking about and studying a bit.

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ThursdayLast · 01/06/2015 22:24

So no P&P or S&S fans?

Overdone?

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Cooroo · 01/06/2015 22:26

Emma. For the humour, and the terrible agony she goes through after Box Hill.

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PartyFops · 01/06/2015 22:27

My favourite Austen? My DH! some days GrinGrin

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Hassled · 01/06/2015 22:27

I want to say Persuasion but I think for the comic horrors it has to be P&P.

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ThursdayLast · 01/06/2015 22:29

Mr Elton is an excellent comic horror.

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magimedi · 01/06/2015 22:30

I am about to be 60 & still have to read an Austen.........

She's on my list...........

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Cooroo · 01/06/2015 22:31

Mrs Elton too. Especially on the Prunella Scales audio book.

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FriendlyLadybird · 01/06/2015 22:33

Persuasion, Mansfield Park, and Emma. Persuasion is so romantic; Mansfield Park is interesting, serious, profound; Emma I just love.

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VashtaNerada · 01/06/2015 22:34

Persuasion has always felt a bit more 'grown-up' to me (in a good way!) but Northanger Abbey is both completely silly and utterly hilarious. Depends what mood you're in.

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AnyRailway · 01/06/2015 22:41

Wow, I was coming on here to say Persuasion, and everybody else has said it too.

It really is the best of them, I think. Anne Eliot is such a lovely herione, and deserves every happiness she gets. Persuasion accepts that people are fallible, and gives the chance of some redemption.

I love Mansfield Park now, but hated it when I was a teenager, and thought Pride and Prejudice was much better. Mansfield Park offers the opportunity of redemption, but the two most vital and attractive characters refuse to take it, because they have already become too corrupted by wordly values.

When young. I thought Bingley (in Sense and Sensibility) was touchingly lovely when he quoted Shakespeare, despite how pathetically weak he turned out to be. I thought the situation between him and Marianne was sentimentally tragic, instead of being a depressingly inevitable consequence of his utter crappiness and her tragic inability to see reality with any clarity. Brandon is obviously a great catch in wordly terms, but as a man he is just a consolation prize for her own weakness. And Elinor doesn't do much better, with a bloke who was foolish enough tro be taken in by Lucy.

Now I am older...

I wish Jane Austen had lived a whole lot longer to write more books.

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AnyRailway · 01/06/2015 22:47

(the typos and incoherence are due to half a bottle of wine Blush

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VashtaNerada · 02/06/2015 06:09

Grin Yes, I did wonder when Bingley did a cameo in S&S! It's Willoughby isn't it?

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BertrandRussell · 02/06/2015 06:20

My dd says Northanger Abbey is the best account of teenage friendships she's ever read. She was having the usual teen hassles when she read it, and it just put everything into perspective for her!

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AnyRailway · 02/06/2015 06:32

Yep, Willoughby is who I meant. I should have stayed of the wine, that post made no sense...

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ThursdayLast · 02/06/2015 06:57

I think I'm going to have to give Mansfield Park the next shot. You are all convincing me to love it Smile

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