The Voices of Men in Praise of Jane Austen
Messages on the
Bulletin Board - c. March 1, 2001
Dear Meister,
First of all I want to state how pleased I am to have found this site and I will continue to "check in" to see the latest postings from Male Voices---and may there be many more of them!
I thoroughly enjoy the postings on the movie versions of Austen's works---and concur with many of your opinions---so very much better expressed than I could have done. Particularly, I appreciated the examinations of the various Emma versions and Robert Z. Leonard's Pride & Prejudice.
I agree with you that in the latter Olivier made a caricature of Darcy rather than a skillful characterization. However, I have to say something in his defense in that I believe it only his lack of experience in film acting that caused him to err in his choices. He was always, first and foremost a stage actor and as such, subtlety and the excruciating sensitivity of the motion picture camera (especially in close up) was something in which he admitted to being a neophyte during his early attempts. This being said, I insist he was, in many respects, perfectly cast. His choices were bad, or rather, too broad and unsparing of the true Darcy, but in every other respect he should have made an ideal and unsurpassable interpreter of our Hero. His appearance of course, is exactly of the aristocratic and manly beauty which we are told first caught Elizabeth Bennet's eye before she became "prejudiced" against his manner. And who else could so very well portray a man of such pride and breeding? Gable is a sound alternative for the very qualities you mentioned---however he may not have been able to convey the intellectual superiority which is so broad a facet of Darcy's character and I maintain this Olivier could have captured. Being English and well at home portraying native heroes of all periods he had at hand all the vocabulary (literal and general) which no American actor possessed.
All of which is a tediously long way of saying that whenever I watch this version yes, I do see Olivier's faults but I also remark the moments he hits the right "note" ( for instance, during his quiet refusal to "explain" himself in regard to Wickham in defense against Elizabeth's accusation of unfairness) -----and manfully fits the shoes of Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy.
An interesting bit of trivia: Olivier was anxious to have his beloved Vivien Leigh play opposite him as "Lizzy" and it was only conflicting commitments (to film Waterloo Bridge) that prevented it. I thought Garson fine but not nearly of the caliber of Miss Leigh's level and I love to think what she might have brought to such a role.
Dear April,
Thank you, I am a bit opinionated and, of course, my reviews are highly subjective. This site works best when others either temper or replace my own postings. I hope you will contribute further here. Your remarks on Olivier and Darcy are intelligent, fair, and to the point. The idea of Leigh cast as Elizabeth Bennet is intriguing - I cannot imagine that Garson was any better than Ms. Leigh might have been - on the contrary, there is a bit of Scarlet in Miss Bennet.
Your posting begs an explanation from me, an attempt to justify my harsh treatment of Sir Larry. First of all let me say that the thing that might have hampered Olivier the most was that deplorable script that was based upon an even worse play (not on Jane Austen's novel directly.) Also, he could have been worse, he was far worse in Wuthering Heights. On the other hand, he did some films that I admire very much. Have you ever seen the series of Shakespeare films that he did in which all opening scenes were staged in a mockup of the Strand? Those were all well done and he was excellent; I especially remember his Hamlet, Richard III, and Henry V. Anything by Branagh pales alongside those efforts.
To me, Darcy seems the strong, silent type - a man of action. He doesn't stand around and do a lot of weeping and wailing with Elizabeth in the Inn at Lambton. He doesn't make a lot of speeches and promises, he goes to London and fixes the problem. That is why I thought that Gable might have been the better choice. Olivier's Darcy strikes me as noisy. Also, I love the English accents but most of the accents in the 1940 version were American, that film was made by an American company, and Gable's accent would have been more consistent with the rest of the cast.
Dear Meister,
I heartily welcome "opinionated" opinions! They are the only ones worth while! And you pointed out ably all the weaknesses of MGM's Pride and Prejudice. I would even add that the "noisiness" engendered by Sir Larry's performance was rampant throughout the whole production, and what can be more surprising? This was an American production (very American) and we are a noisy, romping race compared to the stately, reflective British. No doubt they were thinking up how many ways they could "liven up the old girl's story" in the MGM front office. (Now, had David O. Selznick had this one on his slate it might have turned out much better---he was expert at transferring, quite intact, beloved novels to the screen without offending their fans.)
I have seen most of the Olivier Shakespearean films, a very long time ago. I must watch them again and have no doubt I will appreciate them better than I did as an adolescent. However, I have many times with pleasure, seen Orson Welles' Othello. Remarkable. The only American I can think of as being able to step into classic English roles with the ease and felicity of a native.
I look forward to future discussions on this site, which I am relieved to say
has mercifully less of the feminist "Bowderlism" characteristic of other
sites. To listen to their postings, it would seem Jane and all her
literary "daughters" were bursting to get to war with all the unsuspecting
gentlemen around them!
Cheers,
April
Dear April,
The screenwriters for that 1940 production were Aldus Huxley and Jane Murfin, and the film was based on a play by Helen Jerome. I don't know about Murfin, but the other two, at least, are English. (Here is a link to what my favorite Jane-Austen biographer, Elizabeth Jenkins, said about Jerome's play.)
Have you ever seen that excellent, Jennifer-Ehle version of Pride and Prejudice? What did you think?
I hold out better hopes for Americans' abilities to do Shakespeare. I admit that the fact is that the best Shakespearean actors do live and work in England. However, I believe they manage that inspite of a great handicap. Their great burden is their "public-school" accent (also known as "the Queen's English" or "BBC English".) That "public school" accent, that we Americans all admire, was invented only about 100 years ago in a premeditated and explicit way. In other words, Shakespeare never heard such a thing; in fact, Jane Austen never heard such a thing either (even though she was very close to two public-school nephews.) The problem is that the "public-school" accent is atonal while Shakespeare's west-country accent was heavily tonal. You don't have to take my word for this; try to obtain a copy of Robert MacNeil's miniseries, The Story of English, BBC, 1986. Shakespeare is covered in the third segment and there you will see English experts lamenting the BBC accent, and you will also hear the same passage in Shakespeare recited in the BBC accent and then repeated in a west-country tonality - the comparison is startling.
On the other hand, we have the recent American production of A Midsummer-Night's Dream in which most - not all - American actors did superbly.
Dear April,
I would like to add my "Welcome" to Ashton's. I enjoyed your thoughts on Olivier's P&P. He, as well as Gable, has always been a favorite of mine. As you and Ash said there were "problems" with Olivier's Darcy, but it is hard for me to see Gable as Darcy, mainly because I question his ability to do an English accent. I would have loved to see Vivian as Lizzie. I never really cared for Garson as Lizzie - just my personal taste. BTW I am as opinionated as the Meister. If I get a little blunt sometimes, don't mind me it only means that my Grandchildren are pulling on my skirt tails to hurry me up.
I won't comment on Shakespeare as yet because he and his works are on my "to do" list. However, your comments have given me some points to look for when I do, besides keeping the Meister on track. I did see most of the miniseries, The Story of English which was very enlightening.
April, we do seem to think alike, and I look forward to your postings,
too.
Linda
Dear Folks,
I enjoyed Albert Finney's romp in Tom Jones way back then - and we were both very young at the time! I didn't know or care who Henry Fielding was. (She said highly indignant.) However, times change and so have I - now I care.
You made your point. I did have one problem though; I had a question about the word you used to describe the real "Tom Jones" - Houyhnhnm. At first I thought you were pulling my leg or had made a typo. Surely such a word did not exist. Seriously, with trepidation mingled with apprehension, I stealthily approached my dictionary not believing for a minute that word was in there. When I found it (and its meaning) I had a good laugh at myself! Gulliver was not my cup of tea so it remains unread. After visiting this board the past year, I need to put a new dictionary on my wish list because mine is now worn out. You do stretch my mind.
I am now anxious to read Tom Jones, especially if it contains a "superlative love story" between two worthy characters! Wow!
BTW, as you mentioned, "I have often wondered how many of the millions of war deaths in the history of our planet are, in fact, the de facto suicides of thwarted lovers?" I did notice that is very similar to what Anna's lover (Vronsky) in Anna Karenina was saying at the end of the movie. Coincidence? Nah!
Your comment about the principle handed down by the court in 1954 was thought provoking. At the time, and given my Southern attitude, I didn't think too highly of it. Now, in retrospect and having made an attitude adjustment, I think you are quite right by ranking the principle that "separated groups can never be equal" with the Magna Carta and Declaration of Independence. That is awesome!
As for your pet peeve, I noticed years ago that revisionists were at work. About 20 years after graduating from High School and College (I was a history student), I started buying old history texts at used bookstores to find out what they had to say. Those older books were not the same as my textbooks. I knew something was amiss - I just didn't know what. My point being - that is the reason I want to read the books that our Dear Jane read - I want to get a "feel" for her times for myself and not depend on what some critic has more recently said.
Dear Linda,
Does Vronsky really say that?! I don't know why I am so shocked, I am always finding new ways that Tolstoy and I think alike. That's another story.
At present, I am composing my last Jane-Austen-influences posting. I realized that the two authors I didn't give much thought to were Defoe and Swift - By the bye, they didn't much care for one another - you know, like Fielding and Richardson. I always liked Swift's Houyhnhn (Houyhnhnices?), those horse-like creatures that were so elegant and graceful that after Guliver had lived with them a few years, he found human company unbearable.
Tom Jones is a great love story - one of the greatest. You - especially you - will love Sophia Western. In fact, about half way through, Fielding's narrator confesses that he has fallen head-over-heals, totally in love with her himself. That is played for laughs of course, but you will sense that there is a lot of truth in it as well. Tom is also a wonderful young man, but he will disappoint you at times as he did me (and the narrator), but when you begin to consider his situation and circumstances, you will forgive him. Then you will be able to fully appreciate his many random acts of kindness that make him worthy of Sophia. The passage describing the proposal is hilarious, but it is also quite affecting and even sexy - at least, it was for me.
By the way, I read The History of Tom Jones and The History of Sir Charles Grandison in the wrong order. Tom Jones should be read first so that you can have some perspective on Richardson's reply.
I love Fielding, I love his Tom Jones, but I would have pledged my fate and my faith to Sophia Western.
And now on another and an ugly matter. I just finished de Sade's Justine, or the Misfortunes of Virtue. He died two years before Jane Austen; so, I figured he was a contemporary and since the book - a novella really - was in the Library my wife assembled in college four decades ago, I decided to read it. I thought that it was probably about people who took pleasure in inflicting or receiving pain during sex or about really mean-spirited people. I figured, "how bad can it be? It can't be any worse than the movies that Hollywood makes for teen audiences these days." WRONG! - shee-eeze! It is a sequence of stories about serial killers who kidnap, torture and then murder young woman. The torture and murders are described in great detail as are the unapologetic philosophies of those men. In the end, all the criminals prosper and the virtuous are given terrible fates - the virtuous Justine is struck and killed by lightning. Apparently, de Sade spent a lot of time in jail - which makes a whole lot of sense to me - but, why were his books published? I have something I would like to question that Berkeley professor about who assigned that book to my wife's class.
Dear Ash,
Check out this post by Julie W on Thomas
Gisbourne (at RoP) for an astonishing influence. Julie also mentions Jane's
Letters which is something else I have to read. And, Anielka has a thread above
Julie's post about Boswell's Life of Johnson which is very interesting
also (something else I haven't read). Have you ran across any of this
yet?
Linda
Dear Linda,
Your friends at RoP may be on to this already, but you might check to see if they know about Henry Churchyard's exhaustive research on the literary allusions in Jane Austen's letters and novels. (He supplies the links!) He caught the allusion to Gisborne that you mention and added this sentence, "This is perhaps An Enquiry into the Duties of the Female Sex by Thomas Gisborne, 1797." I have nothing else to add.
I read Boswell's Life and learned to hate Boswell. I know Anielka and respect her judgment. If Anielka can be more sympathetic to Boswell, then she will be a better reporter than I.
I did some counting at Churchyard's site and found that Richardson and Shakespeare received the largest numbers of Jane-Austen allusions. But (sniff) Fielding received only the two that I have already pointed to at this site (sob!) Phooie! Oh, and your Mrs. Radcliffe received a high number as well.
Dear Voices,
I was struck by a side-comment made by Linda in her posting of 2/28/01. In the course of her discussion, our friend made an off-handed reference to the date "1954." Now, if you are not of our generation, you may not know the significance of "1954". In fact, that "1954" date will - I predict - come to be remembered as one of the most important years in the history of human progress. You see, 1954 was the date of the Supreme Court decision, Brown vs. Board of Education. With this decision, the court enunciated a principle that may rank with anything introduced in the Magna Carta or summarized in the Declaration of Independence. It was the principle, that separated groups can never be equal; in other words, true democracy can never be achieved in a segregated society. So simple - so true - and yet, so hard to swallow (ask the Serbs, Israelis, and Palestinians - ask anyone in Ireland.) Americans didn't just enunciate the principle, they then began the long, pain-filled process to eliminate segregation in our society. The process continues; much remains to be done; but, much has already been accomplished.
All that brought to mind one of my pet peeves; the young people of today have been led to believe that the '50s were the edge of the dark ages and the '60s were the leading edge of an enlightenment. The truth is that the earlier period is represented by Brown vs. Board of Education, the launching of Dr. King's movement, and by the efforts of those great heroes of human progress - the freedom riders and black-voter registrars. The anthems then were "integration now" and "we shall overcome." On the other hand, the late '60s and the '70s are characterized by the mantras "drugs make us peaceful and creative", "off the pigs!", and "men are pigs."
We now know that the popular leaders of the '70s and late '60s have failed at most efforts, but they have accomplished some things; for example, it is their characterization of the '50s that endures. I suggest you try to discover the real background and values of a typical parent of the fifties. Now, I graduated high school in 1955 and my father was born in 1910; so, go back and discover what the life of a person born in 1910 was like. Open up a history book and learn about their life experiences and the dramatic social conditions of economic depression, class conflict, and world warfare that such a person would have experienced while growing up. Then compare that to what you have been lead to believe about that generation.
More to the point, the generations of the late '60s and '70s have influenced misinterpretations of our cultural heritage. In recent years, we have seen their revisionist enthusiasm in filmed versions of Sense and Sensibility and Mansfield Park. But, the perversion I wish to discuss today is the '70s' version of Fielding's Tom Jones. I am making reference to a filmed version starring a very young Albert Finney.
The celluloid Tom Jones is a counter-culture, anti-hero. That is the way that our American generation of the '70s like to think of themselves. Fielding's Tom Jones is quite something else. The real Tom Jones is a natural Houyhnhnm, he is physically beautiful and naturally graceful and rational - well, except that Tom is also passionate.
Tom has two things going against him. The first is his birth - he is a foundling and, therefore, the neighborhood "bastard". On the other hand, before his mother abandoned him, she managed to deposit the new-born in the bed of Squire Allworthy, the most excellent kind of country gentleman. That excellent Squire loves Tom like the son he never had, and fully recognizes in him all the considerable ability, virtue, athleticism, and intelligence that are there. Tom Jones is raised with the education, manners, and gallantry of the best of men. Tom could never be the Squire's heir; that is to be the right of the Squire's nephew (and one of the novel's villains.) However, Tom is provided for rather handsomely in Allworthy's will.
Alongside Tom, Fielding raises up the neighbor gentlewoman, Sophia Western. If a male reader has not lost his heart to Elizabeth Bennet, then Sophia is sure to capture it - albeit, for different reasons. (It has been said that Sophia is modeled after Fielding's wife - I hope so, Fielding deserved to be happy.) The two knew and loved each other from childhood, but Tom's birth and fortune made it impossible for him to imagine a match with Sophia - the elders often reminded him of that fact - but, Sophia found it impossible to imagine anything else.
Tom's other defect is his passionate nature; he can be irascible and, too often, he thinks with his - umm - heart. Men are like that. Incidentally, Fielding makes it quite clear that had a match with Sophia seemed at all possible, Tom Jones would have been a perfectly faithful lover. Also, Tom Jones is not a seducer; he is merely a beautiful and well-mannered young man and it is the women who come after him. Well, Tom's enemies make the most of his defects and exaggerate and misrepresent where they don't invent. After a long, relentless effort, they poison Allworthy's opinion and Tom is disowned and turned out of the home. The novel is set in 1745, the year of a great insurrection in England and Scotland. Tom decides to join the loyalist forces in order to die in the war. (I have often wondered how many of the millions of war deaths in the history of our planet are, in fact, the de facto suicides of thwarted lovers? - men think with their ... hearts!) So, he starts out as a Don Quixote, but circumstances are such that he ends up a Candide and a Gulliver. Fielding does something interesting - he also turns Sophia out on the road to escape a wedding arranged and insisted upon by her father. So, there are two pilgrims to this story.
I won't tell you any more - I won't spoil things for you. There is a lot of comedy and a lot of sadness and a superlative love story between two worthy characters. I will conclude by mentioning a scene that greatly affected me - I don't know why - it seems so wonderful for some reason I can't explain. The beautiful refugee, Sophia, is traveling with a maid servant and a youthful male guide. They are on horseback, of course, when they encounter a grouping composed in exactly the same manner - a run-away wife (she turns out to be not what she seems), a maid, and a guide. There is this beautiful passage when the two parties are riding along in the moonlight when, almost without thinking about it, they coalesce. The two gentlewomen end up side by side as do the maids, and the two young men ride one in the front of the party and the other in the rear. That segregation is kind of sad, but the conversations are wonderful and the image Fielding created in my mind is beautiful. I especially like the way the two guides intuitively form an advance and a rear guard. I don't know - maybe you have to be there.
Dear Voices,
This month's surprise link is fascinating, and, I must admit, a bit surprising as well. Like many readers, I would have expected Mr. Collins to speak more. I was also a little surprised that Elizabeth Bennet was hardly mentioned. In any case, this was an excellent link. Thanks Ashton (and Jonesy)!
Dear Ashton et. al.,
Who is this Eric Johnson, and why does he think that his silly (although fun) analysis of words is of any value, other than as a mild entertainment? If someone had analyzed Austen's novels as Johnson does, and posted the results on Male Voices; I would applaud. But Johnson doesn't see his efforts as mere trivial, obsessive pursuits. On the contrary, he says:
"This article has just touched the surface of the kind of study of the novels of Jane Austen that can be done with the texts in electronic form with the dialogue of each speaker identified with SGML tags. Not only is more sophisticated analysis of her novels possible with editions in which characters' speech can be isolated, compared, and contrasted, the editions stimulate it. Similar electronic versions of the novels of other writers would be truly helpful for literary scholars."
This blather is troublesome. Why do we need electronic, textual analysis to discover that Anne is selfless, and that Frank Churchill talks about himself? Are we so lacking in confidence about our ability to read a novel that we must confirm our opinions with pseudo-scientific mumbo jumbo?
The ascendancy of the "sciences" and the fall of the "humanities" is mirrored in this silly approach to literary criticism. Can we make the analysis of novels a "science"? Should we even try to?
Don't get me wrong. I have nothing against Johnson's article, other than his call for action that I quoted above. If somebody wants to analyze word use with computers - fine. Let us not confuse such statistical, pseudo-scientific play with literary criticism, though. The critic is an artist. When he attempts to become a scientist he does not elevate himself - he debases himself.
Dear Folks,
Judith Terry (University of Victoria, British Columbia) wrote the introduction to my copy of Persuasion. This is taken from her "Select Bibliography".
"For those specifically interested in Jane Austen's language, Norman Page's The Language of Jane Austen, Basil Blackwell, Oxford, 1972, is enlightening. J.F. Burrows' Computation into Criticism, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1987, is a mind bender, only for the numerate: it is a unique and compelling analysis of the most common words in Austen."
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