Adaptations 8/25

The Line of Thought

. . . to dream over books and loiter at street corners and let the line of thought dip deep into the stream.

--Virginia Woolf, A Room of One’s Own

A surfeit of sequels

Jane Austen never wrote a sequel. Among her many excellent qualities was a sure sense of when to leave well enough alone. Alas, too many...

Deborah Yaffe

Aug 4, 2022

Something to talk about

Google the Omniscient doesn’t seem to know if it was Henry Ford, P.T. Barnum, or somebody else entirely who first declared, “I don’t care...

Deborah Yaffe

Jul 21, 2022

In praise of repression

Early on in Netflix’s polarizing new adaptation of Persuasion, Anne Elliot leafs through a scrapbook in which she has preserved accounts...

Deborah Yaffe

Jul 18, 2022

Damage control

You’re a couple of weeks away from premiering your new movie. Your core audience has been vacuuming up every scrap of news about the...

Deborah Yaffe

Jul 7, 2022

Feeding the beast

The appetite for Jane Austen-adjacent content never seems to flag, at least in the Anglophiliac precincts of PBS. If you ate up Season...

Deborah Yaffe

Jun 30, 2022

That trailer

During an overseas visit earlier this month, I was too swamped with family business to follow the news with my usual attention. This...

Deborah Yaffe

Jun 27, 2022

Bonnetfest closeup

If you’re a Janeite who can’t make it to Cincinnati’s Taft Museum of Art this summer – and will therefore miss your chance for an...

Deborah Yaffe

Jun 9, 2022

In the air

The zeitgeist is a peculiar thing. For decades – centuries, even – almost nobody makes a Pride and Prejudice update centered on same-sex...

Deborah Yaffe

Jun 2, 2022

High stakes, low stakes

In Jane Austen’s novels, the stakes of the courtship game could hardly be higher: Her heroines face irrevocable decisions that will...

Deborah Yaffe

May 30, 2022

Back to the beach

May already! Practically swimsuit season – and thus a perfect time to check out the latest news about the two beachiest Jane Austen...

Deborah Yaffe

May 9, 2022

Killing Mr. Darcy

You’ve heard it before: Modern men can’t measure up to Jane Austen’s heroes. Straight, female Janeites are hooked on impossible...

Deborah Yaffe

May 2, 2022

Adding to the list

Since March 1, we’ve swooned (tastefully) over Sanditon, chuckled at (or ignored) The Courtship, held our breath for Bridgerton’s ve-e-ry...

Deborah Yaffe

Apr 25, 2022