After watching a few reviews, no one explained the story better than you. I just finished reading this book, and I had a few problems understanding how are they cloned and for what purpose. Thank you for explaining it very well!

It was a ghastly destruction of the beautiful supple book. The tension of the novel is destroyed. Persuasion is all about unexpressed longing. It should never have been made. I hate how they ruined a beautiful love story. Austen would roll over in her grave!

More pastiches and plot continuations are published for Jane Austen's novels and her world than for any other author except for Arthur Conan Doyle. There are at least 20 alternate endings for Pride and Predjudice on Amazon. And over a hundred total such homages for all of Austen's books. And a like number for Sherlock Holmes world. That tells me what people love most to read and think about.

you just do not understand what the literature of realism is. Back to school and don´t take our time

so you mean that seeing Black lady Russell and Asian Capt.Wentworth in Jane Austen´s book´s adaptation about regency era gentry and aristocracy in England - is nothing to talk about? So you mean that you do not know European histroey at all? Like, you have no idea? Or are you guys just afraid to even think the truth? Like you know, in 1984? (that was another book written about Britain, by the way)

Austen was incredibly popular among soldiers during WWI, which is a detail I find really heartwarming. Picturing men in the mud and trenches reading about Darcy or Emma or the Dashwoods is heartwarming. They were also recommended to soldiers who were suffering from shell shock because they were soothing. 2005 P&P introduced me to Austen as well. I think it's a beautiful adaptation but yes, the 1995 version is closer to the novel. But the 2005 version will always be close to my heart.

I had this on my Watch Later list and somehow I lost track of this. This was a really enjoyable video!! Thank you.

A comedy is a selected and skillfully-trimmed portion of the bigger whole we call reality, with the bad parts left out or suppressed. I'm guessing that because she (Jane) was the daughter of a clergyman she hoped (but did she believe??) that "all of this" (this mess of reality, with ALL lives ending in tragedy and death) will be straightened out, somehow, somewhere. Still, her observations about people and their behavior and motivation were firmly rooted in realism, not idealism. Your newfound wonder about this topic is hardly to be wondered at. My spouse was pretty much an atheist and a scientist until she gave birth; she is still a believer 34 years later.

From all the fools or weak sisters who are clergymen in her books, I always wondered whether JA's faith was of the shallow or casual kind. All those clergymen orbiting around the Big-House-park in MP were being supported more or less by West Indies slavery, and Jane had no problem pointing out hypocrisy. Thanks for sharing your sense of the other side of the coin.

Jane Austen was a realist in her style and methods of presenting her stories, but many of her novel's storylines (particularly in P&P and especially Persuasion) are romanticized to lesser or greater extent. Congratulations to your family on the advent of your daughter.

This year I read Hamerston Hall by Jane Eastbourne and enjoyed it. It fits in well with the Jane Austen July challenge !

Very interesting presentation! There's a quote, I believe it's Charlotte Bronte, where she expresses a strong aversion to the social world Austen writes about. Bronte sees it as confining, if not prison like. It shows the deep changes over a short period between Austen's world and Bronte's. Bronte's individualism very marked, compared to Austen's more organic social outlook.

I haven't heard of Hannah Moore, so I think that Jane Austen was playing the long game for sure!

Thanks for taking up the suggestion and doing this video! As bad as some of the adaptions have been, there has to be a medium that might turn a few to the works of Austen.

This short survey of Austen's reception brings up so much else. And you touched on such an important one -- moral and religious didacticism as an impediment to the integrity of an imaginative work. This recognition by Austen gives her work a resonance with both modernists and post modernists who have to take her seriously in our time. It's a mark of her genius. I came to Austen second year at university when I enrolled in a 19th c. English novel course, restricted to English majors. I wasn’t one, but somehow I wasn't bounced from the course. I had the benefit of a small class doing close readings of Austen, Eliot, C. Bronte, Dickens and Hardy. The professor wasn't too happy with a political science major befouling his group of English majors, serious about going on to graduate work in English. I made it through and gained a decent intro to Austen and the others. At the same time, concentrating in classical political philosophy, I studied under several profs who were acolytes of the acclaimed Leo Strauss at the University of Chicago. I came across some fascinating mentions of Jane Austen in the work of Strauss, such as - “we are in need of a second education in order to accustom our eyes to the noble reserve and the quiet grandeur of the classics,” Strauss notes that “those modern readers who are so fortunate as to have a natural preference for Jane Austen rather than for Dostoievski, in particular, have an easier access to (the classics & especially) Xenophon than others might have; to understand Xenophon, they have only to combine the love of philosophy with their natural preference.” I’ve been fascinated with Austen since then, with no abatement.

Cannot hear you.

Beatrice, I know this is a large question, but its something I've been thinking of for a while since I had a discussion a while back. Do you believe Austen is our greatest writer after Shakespeare? I do believe she is. The counterpoint put to me was Dickens. Someone else said Milton. But I think it is Austen, by a mile. Only Shakespeare is her senior from this island.

Thank you for the recommendations, Beatrice!

So many interesting selections here! 😊

I'm rewatching the 6 hour 1983 BBC production of Mansfield Park. It's thought there isn't a good adaption of MP, but I've watched this at least three times. I like it better and better each time. It has one great virtue - it's true to the book, there's no other agenda. On the nonfiction front, I'm re-reading Lionel Trilling's essays on Austen, and his reflections on her in Sincerity & Authenticity. I've also got hold of a Q.D. Leavis essay collection & Austen is well represented. Emma for a re-read. Edmund Burke's - On the Sublime and Beautiful. It's on the bookshelf, tried once, try again. Metropolitan, I like that one. A book about Austen's period....have to think about that.

Sense and Sensibility 2008 mini series is very good, beautifully photographed and the cottage is set in Cornwall instead of Surrey. Very atmospheric and worth watching. Lost in Austen is good too. Thank you Beatrice for your Austen Challenge and recommendations.

I love that you and your husband read aloud to each other! Byron as a vampire sounds right up my alley! I will have to check it out. Happy Jane Austen July. :)

I read Jane Austen and the Clergy last month and I enjoyed it. It answered a lot of questions I had about the clergy at the time.

Yes, a Mansfield Park lover! So happy that you’re back, Beatrice ❤

Thank you so much for your recommendations!! Glad you posted. Blessings!❤

Ideas re: Austen content for a future video-perhaps a survey of how Austen was perceived in different periods. I know she had admirers early on, but some just dismissed her as a chronicler of the gentry's romances. I know Sir Walter Scott was a great admirer. But many others in the 19th c. lost track of her. In the 20th c. she had a great revival, some placing her in company with Shakespeare. It would be interesting to trace the patterns of Austen appreciation in different eras.

I've not done the Austen challenge- I'd like to take a shot at it this year. In the nonfiction category, I'm currently reading something that might make the grade. I may be stretching it. It's a selection of essays of an American woman of the late 19th and first third of the 20th century. The book is American Austen: The Forgotten Writings of Agnes Repplier, edited by John Lukacs. Agnes Repplier was recognized as a premier American essayist in her time, but forgotten in ours. She was a devout Roman Catholic, a feminist and a very erudite and witty writer. John Lukacs was one of our finest historians, Hungarian born, he made his home in the Philadelphia area, and through interest in the social history of Philadelphia he discovered and championed Agnes Repplier. I'll take any opportunity to re-watch Metropolitan, I adore that film. And through your earlier mention I've watched and loved Austenland. I still haven't got a copy of the Collins' bio, but I've read hers on Austen and the clergy. The Norton Critical editions are a great entryway to authors, lots of gems, annotations and criticism. Persuasion is a good call, I haven't reread it in so long. Happy reading!!!

Volume too low Beatrice. Please please adjust it UP. I have to turn it to 11 and move up close. Everyone else on YT I can hear without cranking it up. Please!

Thank you for the review, very interesting! Just read the book, its very thought provoking.

Oh know u are beatrice portinari

Emma being bad with a single old woman makes me hate her.

What do you think about other translations of Dante's Divine Comedy like Hollander or Mandelbaum or Longfellow? I wonder about these 3 because they're all free online so it would be a good way to read Dante if we can't afford to buy it. Also my local library has Ciardi and a Penguin edition I think it's Kirkpatrick so I suppose these are two other options. Thanks in advance for any thoughts you might have! 😊

I think this is one of those insights that really helps me see Jane Austen in a clearer light, on a much deeper level than I had before. Thank you so much!!

You've convinced me! I didn't intend to read him, but now I'll give him a try.

Fantastic. Thank you for this video!!! My request is to make more videos on aesthetics! I'd like more of an introduction to Greek beauty before you dive more into Christian aesthetics. This has been a topic of interest to me as well. I never imagined that Christianity would present a different kind of beauty, though. This is a really interesting topic. I would like to add also that I've been thinking of beauty as the manifestation of Goodness. Therefore, if there is a new form of goodness, we would have new forms of beauty. I love your channel when you just share whatever you're thinking about, like this. You have a living mind! It's so refreshing! Thank you! Keep making videos about whatever you want!

I love your channel very much.

We did a play on this book when I was in 9th grade. One the most beautiful books ever written, to get life, love, and heaven you first need to go through hell.

Very interesting, thank you. I have the book 'Mere Christianity' looking forward to your next book choice.

You've inspired me to download the Companion to the Altar and bring it into my own devotional life. I'll miss Jane Austen content!! I love your channel.

You have no idea how grateful I am for your channel. The intro to this video is such a treat. The rest of the video was lovely. You're awesome. Also, behind you on top of the dresser, is that a Roman breviary with the red pagination?

I would love to hear more about your understanding of feminism, what it means exactly, how you understand it, whether you understand yourself as a feminist, different kinds of feminism, etc.

That’s quite a credo Beatrice!Well argued and explained! Good Easter book. Are you going to read Sayer’s religious play too? Looking forward to Brideshead! Happy Mothering!

Disappointed that I never received a notification from YT for this episode. Till We Have Faces is a splendid work. I wonder if you'd consider a Waugh video or series contrasting the early "satirical Waugh" vs. the later "Catholic Waugh". I think it's a false dichotomy, serving an agenda to promote a supposed, lost secular Waugh, but I'd love to learn your views. Along these lines, I wonder if you've ever seen the film adaption done of "A Handful of Dust" (1988). It was made by the same director as the excellent 80s ITV Brideshead adaption. The cast alone highly recommends it. It wasn't initially received as well as the BR adaption, but I think it's quite a good film and true to the novel. A Handful of Dust is considered his bleakest novel, but it's sometimes ridiculously thought of as nihilistic or despairing, when it's actually questioning and despairing about mankind setting up shop in a self directed world without God. A trip down the via negativa. Looking forward to your next upload.

Excellent. I've noticed how consistently Austen contrasts "accomplishment" in women with other "more substantial", virtuous qualities. I think this video is exceptional in putting into words something so consistently hinted at in Austen's novels, which I have, until now, seen but not been able to vocalize and describe. Thank you.

Congratulations on your baby!! I really appreciate your scripted essay-style videos on serious topics, I also think that this topic, since it is a review of something less serious, is fittingly unscripted and more spontaneous and I think it really fits well! You're doing great! Thank you for your videos!!

Beatrice, I was recently studying theology for a master's in Toronto. Are you still living there or are you back in England now? Are you familiar with the Oratory of St Philip Neri there in Toronto?