Jane Austen Roundup

I have now read every Jane Austen novel and watched every Jane Austen screen adaptation I could find!

Here's a list of her books in order of my preference, and under each book, a list of all the screen adaptations I watched, in order of my preference. The links take you to my "reviews" - and I put that in quotes because I know I didn't actually review each movie/mini-series entirely on its own merits; how well it represented the book was a large factor in how much I liked it.

1. Pride and Prejudice ★★★★★
   
   1. 1995 BBC Mini-Series with Colin Firth ★★★★★
      
   2. 1980 BBC Mini-Series ★★★★½
      
   3. 1940 Film with Laurence Olivier ★★★★
      
   4. 2005 Film with Keira Knightley ★★★
      
   
   
2. Emma ★★★★★
   
   1. 1996 TV Movie with Kate Beckinsale ★★★★★
      
   2. 1996 Film with Gwenyth Paltrow ★★★★
      
   3. 2009 BBC Mini-Series ★★★½
      
   4. 1972 BBC Mini-Series ★★★½
      
   
   
3. Mansfield Park ★★★★½
   
   1. 1983 BBC Mini-Series ★★★★
      
   2. 2007 TV Movie ★★★
      
   3. 1999 Film ★★★
      
   
   
4. Sense & Sensibility ★★★★
   
   1. 1995 Film with Emma Thompson and Kate Winslet ★★★★★
      
   2. 1981 BBC Mini-Series ★★★★
      
   3. 2008 BBC Mini-Series ★★★
      
   4. 1971 BBC Mini-Series ★★★
      
   
   
5. Northanger Abbey ★★★★
   
   1. 2007 TV Movie ★★★★
      
   2. 1987 TV Movie ★★½
   
   
6. Persuasion ★★★★
   
   1. 1971 BBC Mini-Series ★★★★★
      
   2. 1995 TV Movie ★★★★
      
   3. 2007 TV Movie ★★★
      
   4. 2022 Netflix Movie with Dakota Johnson ★★★
      

The book Emma was a very close second behind Pride and Prejudice. I found Emma overall more entertaining, but Pride and Prejudice did have more wit, though less humor. And the fact that Emma was a bit of a snob - a charming and endearing snob, but a snob nonetheless - was a little off-putting sometimes.

I also really enjoyed Mansfield Park, and I don't know if it's really fair to dock it half a star just because it wasn't quite as entertaining. I thought its characters were the most complex of all Jane Austen novels.

And even though Persuasion is listed last, and given the place of "least favored Jane Austen novel", that's not to say that I didn't enjoy it. It is, after all, still rated four stars!

Persuasion (2022 Netflix Movie)

★★★

It's been a long time since I've read the book, so I can't remember many of the details anymore. I am pretty sure that scenes and dialogue were added to help move things along, which I know is not unreasonable, since condensing the book into one two-hour movie is a tall order.

The race-blind casting was fun and in line with modern race-conscious sensibilities. The Anne character broke the 4th wall to address the audience directly, a method of explaining things that I really didn't mind. But the dialogue itself being modernized felt weird, and the entire movie had a playful mood that did not match what I remember of the book, which I think of as having more gravitas (except, perhaps, for sister Mary's antics).

I think Dakota Johnson acted well, but she was too pretty to be the Anne of the book, who is supposed to be not very physically attractive. Also, I did not find Wentworth well-cast. Finally, the swoon-worthy love letter near the end is the highlight of this book for me, but the most meaningful lines were read aloud in Anne's voice, and I really wish they were read in Wentworth's.

This movie was entertaining, but mostly it made me want to re-read the book, so I can better judge its faithfulness to the original material.

Loveless by Alice Oseman

★★★★

A truly important - and funny! - book that goes a long way in normalizing the exploration and discussion of sexuality. There is plenty of drama to move the story along, but really the primary plot is Georgia coming to terms with being aromantic and asexual.

In the beginning, I was put off by how Georgia, an 18-year-old student starting university, centered sex and romance, believing that everybody is supposed to have a romantic partner. She saw herself as the weird one for not having kissed anyone yet, let alone not having had sex. But as it turned out, one of the key points of the book was Georgia realizing that there are no rules about how you "should" behave or what you "ought" to do when it comes to relationships. You do what feels right to you, as long as you're not hurting anyone. You do you. A very healthy, empowering message.

Perhaps this message was best summed up by Georgia's roommate, when she said to Georgia, "I think it's pretty amazing that you haven't felt peer-pressured into doing anything [sexually] by now. You haven't made yourself do anything you didn't want to do. You haven't kissed anyone just because you're scared of missing out. I think that's one of the most mature things I've ever heard, actually." (p. 118)

There's also a meaningful point about friendships, how they can be just as valuable as romances. I really enjoyed Georgia's friendships, both the comfort and familiarity she shared with her old friends and the exciting novelty of getting to know her new friends.

This book is very modern, with lots of teenage slang, including very casual use of the f-word. I even had to Google some of the lingo, e.g., apparently "AU" means "alternative universe" in fan fiction.

More notably, though, potential readers might appreciate a heads up in knowing that this book is very frank and open about sex, sexuality, masturbation, attraction, social norms, and identity. ("Hand jobs" and "getting fingered" are explicitly mentioned.) The book lays bare a few variations of difficult and awkward conversations, which is actually great, in a way, because if you have similar questions yourself, you can just read this book and spare yourself those conversations in real life!

On a lighter note, it was fun reading a book that was set in the UK. Georgia didn't go to college, she went to "uni", which apparently is usually a 3-year endeavor, not 4 like in the U.S, and typically does not require sharing your dorm room with a roommate. Georgia and her friends drank a lot, but since the drinking age is 18 in the UK, presumably it was all legal. At times it felt like Georgia's uni experience revolved a bit too much around drinking culture, but I admit it was realistic, so it's probably a good thing for teenage readers to be exposed to that kind of party lifestyle safely in a book, giving them a chance to think about how they might handle certain situations.

The only other thing I wanted to mention is that I found the part about Georgia explaining aro-ace identity to her cousin a bit convenient plot-wise, like, just as soon as Georgia figured it out herself, she's in a position to support someone else in the exact same struggle? But I admit it was a useful scene because it showed how older people, who didn't grow up with the open-mindedness and terminology of today, might be moving through life, doing the best they can, without having the wherewithal to fully understand their own identity. 

Overall, a good read for mature teenagers - and their parents! - to better understand the range of sexual identities out there. It also provides a lot of good modeling on how to talk about such matters.

Rise: A Pop History of Asian America from the Nineties to Now by Jeff Yang, Phil Yu, and Philip Wang

★★★★★

As fun as it is informative!

This book is about the rise of Asian America, a self-defined community (separate from the idea of "Asians in America") that broke through stereotypes and bamboo ceilings. The growth of Asian America's visibility was spurred by the coming of age of kids born to a wave of Asian immigrants who first arrived in the U.S. when exclusionary immigration laws were lifted in the late 1960s. 

I am one of those kids! This book, more than any other, resonated with me in an unprecedented way. It absolutely made me feel seen. Everything, literally everything, down to the list of songs in "Original Synth: The Anthems of Young Asian America" (p. 26-27) rang true for me. In "Finding Our Religion" (p. 279), I actually burst out laughing at #27: "People singing hymns in an Asian language and English at the same time, creating cacophony" (p. 281) - a hilarious truth I witnessed in my youth and had totally forgotten.

Rise is a collection of essays, illustrations, graphic novel content, photos, timelines, lists, infographics, quotes, commentary - all of it raising up Asian American people, culture, accomplishments, and issues. The three authors - whose work I've followed online for years! - wrote most of the content, but plenty of other prominent Asian Americans have bylines or were interviewed. (If you aren't familiar with a particular contributor, there's a handy list with biographical blurbs at the back of the book.) It's very much a coffee table book - printed on heavy,  photo quality paper with content organized in colorful, eye-catching, easy-to-digest chunks - but I read it from start to finish, cover-to-cover, every word, every caption. I just could not get enough of it.

The vast majority of the book upliftingly covers "the good", e.g., Asian American representation in entertainment, sports, arts, politics, etc. Sufficient space is also given to "the bad", e.g., yellowface and cultural appropriation, and "the ugly", e.g., controversial topics like tiger parenting.

Though the book's subtitle focuses attention on the 1990s and later, there's actually a very enlightening "Before" section that presents a brief but thorough overview of Asian American history through the 1980s. I was in high school and college during the 1990s, so that section felt personally nostalgic for me. And with much of the 2010s still fresh in my mind, I really enjoyed getting a behind-the-scenes look at Fresh Off the Boat, Crazy Rich Asians, Linsanity, and #StarringJohnCho.

Portrait of a Thief by Grace D. Li

★★★★

In a somewhat improbable premise, five college-aged Chinese Americans agree to commit a series of art heists.

For about the first third of the book, it felt like the heist was contrived to simply be the means by which these characters would come together. The pacing was slow and deliberate, each character engaging in much introspection and self-analysis as they looked to justify their decision to join the crew. As children of immigrants, each with their own unique experiences, they examined their familial relationships and self-identities, tried to understand their place in the Chinese diaspora and make sense of their uncertain futures. The weight of immigrant dreams and unresolved sense of self hung over almost every conversation, action, and interaction.

When the first heist finally started to come together, a healthy dose of suspended disbelief was necessary. Here we had a young adult crew, all somewhere on the stereotypical Asian child-of-immigrants predetermined path to success (e.g., elite school, pre-med or engineering, etc.), with little to no relevant criminal experience (except what one happened to conveniently pick up as the son of the FBI expert on Chinese art theft), planning a heist in 4 weeks while also holding down their full-time studies or job. The main characters being on the precipice of change positioned them well for so much self-reflection, but maybe the story would have been a little more believable if they were all just a bit older.

Still, seeing the first heist come together was a satisfying development. The pace picked up, though the book never quite became a page-turner for me. About halfway through, an unexpected twist finally hooked me and got me wondering how things would end.

I found it difficult to become fully immersed in the book because I was constantly distracted by the author's writing style. The prose leaned into the art theme, was excessively descriptive and poetic with careful attention being paid to the way light or darkness fell into a room, or on someone's face, or over a city, with colors of gold and red or gray. The author relied heavily on this: a set-up employing the word "this", followed by a colon, followed by some kind of revelatory statement.

Yet, I gave this book 4 stars. It resonated with me in a very personal way that does not often happen. I enjoyed the main characters and their changing relationships; each of them felt like someone I could have known in college, and in them I recognized pieces of myself and my Chinese American community growing up. And it wasn't just the complicated identity stuff that I found relatable, but also the casual references to boba and dumplings. Also, Chinese characters were dropped in-line with English text, not just the pinyin romanization but actual Chinese characters! The representation just felt amazing.