WELP, I can exclusively report that this is a whole bunch of nonsense. Jane Austen wrote 90% of an excellent book and then 10% absolute shenanigans. Fifteen years have passed since I first read Mansfield Park, and the update is that my opinion of it is unchanged. It rules! It’s great! The Crawfords are very fucking fun, and Henry Crawford’s heel turn feels completely frustrating and unearned, and the only shift in my opinion is that I feel even sorrier for Fanny than I remember feeling, and I hate Edmund even more than I remember hating Edmund. But let’s put…
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The time has come for absolutely everybody to badger Fanny. It like… feels pretty uncomfortable for poor little Fanny to be at the mercy of all her relatives (especially the men), and for every single one of those people to be like “I know you don’t love Henry Crawford or even feel sympathy for him or share any of his values but might you not marry him anyway?” She is but a poor relation doing her best! Why must she constantly justify her lack of romantic interest in Henry Crawford to others?? God damn! This whole section features a lot…
Leave a CommentWelp, the time has come. Henry Crawford has showed back up, and he is fucking around, and he is finding out. The time has come for Henry Crawford to be an all-the-way fuckboy, and if my memory is correct, he is going to then substantially reform because he legit falls for Fanny, and then Jane Austen’s going to be like “Henry Crawford seems nice AND fun? Can’t have that!” and narratively ruin him. But let’s see how matters unfold. Not to keep beating a dead horse, but Mansfield Book continues to rule. I am having the best time reading it,…
Leave a CommentRemember last week, when I dedicated several hours of my time to the important research question “Was Jane Austen making an anal sex joke?” That same energy has not carried forward into week two. I do not understand what’s so morally insupportable about putting on a little play with some neighborhood friends, even a slightly saucy play, and Fanny and Edmund are so annoying about it that I can’t be bothered researching it to find out. Fanny does not think the Bertrams and the Crawfords should put on a play; Edmund does not think the Bertrams and the Crawfords should…
1 CommentLook, I did not expect to kick off Mansfield in May by performing a full-scale investigation into whether Jane Austen was or wasn’t making an anal sex joke in Mansfield Park. I am as surprised as you by this turn of events. As with so many things in the last year and a half, I am but a leaf blown wildly about by the winds of chance and circumstance. Here I was, innocent as a lamb, reading Mansfield Park in the car, wondering only about the extent to which Mary Crawford was wronged, looking not for anal sex jokes but…
1 CommentI have been threatening it for years, and now I’m going to do it! Long, long ago, when I was a college whippersnapper, I read Mansfield Park for a class and thought it was REALLY QUITE GOOD. Then some time passed, and everyone talked shit about Mansfield Park because Fanny’s a pain and Edmund’s a drip, and my vague memories calcified into the following: Mansfield Park is unfairly maligned (by the world); and The Crawfords are unfairly maligned (by Jane Austen) Well, 2021 is the year we’re going to find out the truth! Is Fanny as much of a pain as…
Leave a CommentHappy Tuesday, friends! The Broke and the Bookish are, as ever, hosting a Top Ten Tuesday, and I love the question for this week: Ten Books I Feel Differently About After Time Has Passed (less love, more love, complicated feelings, indifference, thought it was great in a genre until you became more well read in that genre etc.) I couldn’t think of ten — my initial responses to most of the books I read continue to hold true on rereads — but here are six, anyway! 1. Emma, by Jane Austen – I think the problem here is that I…
64 CommentsHappy Wednesday! This week, we’re talking about adaptations of classic novels and reviewing Alexander McCall Smith’s updating of Jane Austen’s Emma. We’re also getting back to our roots with a polar explorer update! You can listen to the podcast in the embedded player below or download the file directly to take with you on the go. Episode 44 Books discussed in this podcast are listed, in order, below. If any book is an adaptation of another book, the source material is listed in parentheses. Wicked, Gregory Maguire (The Wizard of Oz, L. Frank Baum) Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister, Gregory…
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