On the rise

This week, British Janeites were treated to a new TV docudrama/literary-historical-biographical analysis/250th birthday tribute called Jane Austen: Rise of a Genius.

The title, with its middle-school-textbook grandiosity, seemed pretty hokey to me, until I discovered that the Austen special is the third installment in the BBC’s Rise of a Genius series, following Shakespeare in 2023 and Mozart in 2024. Then I was fine with it.

No, I take that back: Even after learning about the two earlier series, I still find the title hokey, and the YouTube preview, with its overwrought account of the shadowy seaside-suitor story—talking-head commentary intercut with costumed re-enactments of Jane’s Heartbreak At Losing The Love Of Her Life--is not encouraging.

But British critics gave the three-hour, three-part series good-to-stellar reviews for its mix of commentary, re-enactments, and clips from Austen screen adaptations, and in the run-up to Monday’s premiere, the BBC released excerpts from fifteen of the featured interviews, most of them with writers, actors, and scholars. Gems abound:

* University of Reading English professor Paddy Bullard: “Austen is the first novelist who belongs unmistakably to the epoch we live in today. She speaks to us almost like a contemporary.”

* Writer Bee Rowlatt: “I will forever be in love with the explosive scene where Lizzy Bennet stands up to the bullying Lady Catherine, insisting that ‘we are equal.’ It's so intense that I can't read it sitting down.”

* Novelist Kate Atkinson: “The happy ending is that you've been able to maintain your bravery, you have not tossed it away on a Mr. Elton or a Mr. Wickham. . . . You've understood all of those problems presented to you and you've overcome them, and therefore you deserve your happy ending. But your happy ending isn't really in marriage. It's in something more complex. It's in economic stability. It's in the happiness of the self. It's in the understanding of the self.”

So despite the red flags signifying Hokiness Ahead, I’m eager to watch! Where do I click?

Alas, it’s not clear that American Janeites will ever be able to see this thing. Currently, it’s available only on BBC’s iPlayer, whose website announces that it’s not viewable outside the UK. And my cursory search turned up no evidence that the earlier installments of Rise of a Genius (could we maybe call it ROAG?) have ever been available on this side of the ocean.

Perhaps this is my punishment for snarking at the title! Please, BBC: If I apologize and promise to behave myself, will you sell Jane Austen: Rise of a Genius (*snort*)  to BritBox?