And, which Austen is your favourite and why?

Just read Persuasion for the first time, what a good book. Before I had only read P&P but liked Anne Eliot so much more.

Which Austen should I try next please (get very irritated with wet women in classics)?

Persuasion, then P&P. And in last place, Emma. Emma is so irritating, it really hindered my enjoyment of the book.

It's not the house (although Elizabeth does make a joke about that). The housekeeper makes Lizzy review her feelings about Darcy and see him as somebody who is kind to and worthy of the respect of his 'inferiors' - because the housekeeper has known him all his life and seen him in his natural habitat, her viewpoint resonates with Lizzy. Then she sees the love and gentleness with which he treats Georgiana and again that softens her view of him. She's seeing the 'real' Darcy in his own environment instead of the arrogant Mr Haughty he puts on in public (and is equally as due to shyness as it is to the natural arrogance of the aristocracy).

Sense and Sensibility does have the glorious Colonel dashing on his horse to bring Marianne's mother, though. Wish there was a gentleman who would ride ventre a terre for me when I was in peril.

I love Persuasion and indeed as the kids were out last night sat and watched the Ciaran Hinds DVD. love it

i dont think it is the house, but the housekeeper who really starts the revolution of understanding in elizabeth. and also seeing georgiana and her intense shyness, and seeing darcy be civil to the gardiners. a lot of evidence overthrowing previous understanding.

but in p&p fandom, i think the house is important in changing readers minds about darcy! girl meets house is a romance genre all its own. i als think that, in the ehle firth version there is a touch too much emphasis on her liking pemberler. could be i am oversensitive on it though since it is a frequent contention.

(And the Elliot father and sister are a hoot.)

Persuasion for me, too.

"All the privilege I claim for my own sex (it is not a very enviable one; you need not covet it), is that of loving longest, when existence or when hope is gone."

Really surprised and heartened to see Persuasion mentioned by so many here. I love it too. If we're talking adaptations I loved Ciaran Hinds as Wentworth a few years back.

I love P&P too but never quite got passed the idea that Lizzie only fell in love with Darcy when she saw his house - didn't a correspondent of JA point that out to her?

p&p because it is such a touchstone for many years. i find the relationship between lizzie and jane very moving and like to contemplate it. also i like to reflect on how darcy is this popular romantic hero and his personality is so the opposite of that ha! he may have a heart of gold but his curmudgeonliness makes him such a fun character. what a terrifying fil he would be.

i do agree on persuasion on all points. it is brilliant and fascinating. a struggle to flourish, it speaks to something very fundamental about life as it really is.

though what i really take from this topic is the yawning void in my rl of nobody to regularly talk austen with.

But that's because she's not young, isn't it?

By Austen standards I mean.

All the others are really young - late teens or very early twenties.

It's such a tragedy that she died so young, she would have written even more complex, interesting and sometimes sad characters.

Persuasion for me, too. Most likeable heroine - Anne's not silly (Catherine) or self-centred (Emma) or wilful (Lizzie) or wimpy (Fanny).

I have to say that the main way that I enjoy Austen adaptations is watching them with my Mum and pulling them apart

Mansfield Park, no question at all. I must have read it 100 times, & still love it. Hard to put my finger on why, but I think its because there are so many characters that ring true for me, and really none that are without any redeeming features (even Mrs Norris is clearly the way she is for good reason).

Joint 2nd has to be Sense & Sensibility & Pride & Prejudice, also like Persuasion but for some reason it doesn't quite tick the boxes for me in the same way.

Emma annoys me too much (Emma the character rather than the book as a whole, and Catherine from N. Abbey annoys me to the point that I find the book almost unreadable.

Sorry have just ruined Northanger Abbey for anyone who hasn't read it

Remus, I also love that Northanger Abbey and just adore JJ Feild as mr Tilney. Does anyone remember the 1980 s version with Peter Firth (aka Harry Pierce in Spooks) as Mr Tilney. Not that fanciable except at the end when he comes for Catherine on a horse... Sigh... I would say Northanger and Persuasion have the most romantic endings cos you don't see them coming.

I think it's easier to relate to Anne too in a way, because she's older. The story ages better than the others.

Persuasion.

I love P&P, but Persuasion is the work of someone who has lost that hope and optimism of youth and has had some real disappointment in their life - she was much older when she wrote it and Anne's wistfulness and yearning is heartbreaking.

There is so much in there that you can relate to her life - her mother's hypochondria and selfishness, when her own daughter was dying, she insisting on the sofa in the cottage, just like Mary and her imagined illnesses and lack of consideration for Anne. Anne's real talent for music, with literally no-one of any taste and discernment to realise how good she is - there's a suggestion that Jane felt that way since the death of her father, with regards to her writing. That resignation to having a life unfulfilled... so much there that's so sad and yet so subtly written that you don't really know why it's so sad...every time I read it, I notice something I didn't before.

Remus couldn't agree more about Billie Piper. Didn't think I'd be able to dislike Fanny Price anymore tbh then along comes Billy!

But I'm that you didn't like P&P!

I've said this before on MN and will doubtless say it again (and get moaned at by everybody again) but I do not like the BBC P&P at all. Tis pants.

Then again, the Billie Piper abomination (Billy Piper as Fanny Price ffs) makes the BBC thing look like a work of genius in comparison. And the ITV S&S was revolting too.

This is nice and this is great - the Harriet is lovely in it.

Jane!

But seriously, Pride and Prejudice wins it hands down for me. Every line is a classic.

Persuasion I think, closely followed by P&P. Not reread for a few years, maybe I should make use of the free kindle downloads!

Can't beat a bit of Darcy though! :)

And I also love the BBC dramatisation of it too