Listen up, Part II

Jane Austen’s influence on Bridgerton is old news. If the whole feisty-Regency-heroines-in-marriage-plots thing didn’t give it away, there’s the testimony of Julia Quinn, the author of the romance novels on which Netflix’ hit series is based: “Like most authors writing in my time period, I worship at the altar of Jane Austen,” Quinn wrote in 2008.*

Bridgerton’s influence on Jane Austen, however, is a newer phenomenon—or so it might appear from the announcement that British national treasure Julie Andrews (that’s Dame Julie Andrews to you, thanks very much) has made an audio version of Pride and Prejudice, the first episodes of which were released a couple of weeks ago to celebrate two birthdays: Austen’s 250^th and Andrews’ 90^th.

Andrews never appears on screen during Bridgerton, but she voices the role of Lady Whistledown, the pseudonymous author of a scandal sheet that plays an important role in the show’s many plotlines. With her icy affect, waspish observations, and diamond-sharp enunciation, Lady Whistledown is a version of Austen’s narrative voice, and although Andrews lives in our collective hearts as the embodiment of maternal-substitute love scored to show tunes, she plays this intimidating creature with relish.

Presumably she’ll be channeling some version of that persona as she reads P&P in its entirety across twenty-five episodes running perhaps thirty-five minutes each, to be released twice a week from now until Christmas. Noiser, the UK company producing Andrews’ work, insists on calling the program a “podcast,” though it sounds an awful lot like an audiobook to me. (Either way, it’s apparently “immersive.” But of course it is.)

Do we really need yet another Pride and Prejudice read-aloud, even when the reader is as accomplished as Andrews? Initial reviews of her work were mixed (see here and here), and I won’t be rushing to tune in. But if you can’t stomach the “revolution” promised by the latest audio adaptation of the novel, perhaps you’ll prefer Lady Whistledown’s version.

* Her adoration apparently hasn’t waned in the intervening years: Quinn is among the contributors to Encounters with Jane Austen: Celebrating 250 Years, a forthcoming anthology of adulation.